NEW HOPE INTERNATIONAL REVIEW

An independent small press poetry review

NHI independent review
THE REVIEW OF CONTEMPORARY POETRY
edited of Gary Bills
Bluechrome Publishing
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Portishead
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BS20 7ZJ
UK
ISBN 1 904781 69 1
£9.99
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This page last updated: 10th December 2007. 		THE REVIEW OF CONTEMPORARY POETRY

The editor, Gary Bills, informs us that this anthology has been compiled to raise funds for The Stroke Association. Many well-known, established poets, including Andrew Motion, have contributed to this selection, which comprises nearly 100 poems, within which are included the three winning poems (by Peter Bond, Beryl Fenton and Bruce Adkins) from the Stroke Association Poet of the Year competition, chosen by Andrew Motion. As a preface to the poems, Alan Brownjohn, in a prose piece, DISLOCATED SUMMER, describes quite rivetingly the onset of a rare neurological disorder, third nerve palsy, and his slow, slow rehabilitation. Brian Patten, in FEELING A BIT HUNGRY, THE POET DECIDES TO WRITE A POEM, celebrates the endless resources open to discovery within the creative process:

	And even when I think I've emptied all my pockets
	When I close my eyes I can imagine
	A multitude of dishes, and taste
	The warm taste of peppers and hear
	The jungly sound of parrots.
THE ELEPHANTS OF ATLANTIS by Pauline Stainer is a beautiful, melodic and wistful piece:
	If only I could free
	Merlin from his reliquary
	of rippleglass,
	and open the eyes of the dead
	when their hair is braided.

	If only I could catch up
	with the rainbow
	and those seven herons
	dividing the rushes
	to the west of nowhere.
JACKSON POLLOCK SPEECH, by Beryl Fenton, unlike most of the poems which are a mish-mash of themes and styles, is actually about someone who had suffered a stroke, and is particularly incisive and effective in its language and tight imagery:
	For years she yearned to be understood —
	goo on — goo on — she'd urge us to pursue
	our guessing of her jumbled words.

	In her bedroom, still as in a tableau,
	the holland blinds half drawn,
	she finally managed, smiling,
	an unmistakable goodbye.
Amidst, as one would expect from such anthologies, the general competence of the work proffered, gems are rarer to come by; here is LOSS, something hauntingly different by Jacob Polley:
	my little sister,
	arriving quietly with your empty hands,
	I'm afraid of you because you know me well.

	Your eyes are like mine.
	If I throw you out, I'll be a witch
	in my dark house, with my dry heart,
	turning every honest mirror to the wall.

	So I must have you close by as I eat
	and sing, your black hair flowing
	from your head through my house and away.
In TRYING TO MAKE IT TO CREWE Rupert M Loydell, in his sober yet incisive way humbly, plainly and evocatively describes his train journey:
	Cathedrals and churches are exclamation marks
	up on the hills, new lambs the dots upon my eyes.
In NORTH COUNTRY John Burnside wistfully recalls his youthful past and its feeling of timeless emptiness:
	Saturday afternoon
	like a halted bell

	and that feeling we had
	that nothing would ever happen,

	waiting for hours at a time
	in the hush of ourselves
There are other excellent pieces by, amongst others, Nicoletta A Paulakida, Al Alvarez, Dee Rimbaud, Maurice Riordan, Les Merton, Ronnie Goodyer, Bruce Adkins, Deborah Tyler-Bennett, Joan Sheridan Smith, Patrick B Osada, Valerie McKinley and Linda Benninghoff. A cause worth supporting, and a selection worth perusing.

reviewer: Alan Hardy.