NEW HOPE INTERNATIONAL REVIEW

An independent small press poetry review

NHI independent review
TWO STATES
A Second Poetry Collection Inspired By War And Terrorism Atlantean Publishing
38 Pierrot Steps
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This page last updated: 10th December 2007. 		TWO STATES

TWO STATES is a second poetry collection inspired by war and terrorism. That's what it says on the tin. Poets were quick off the mark against the attack on Iraq back in 2003 and ever since, for each journalist's column or TV news programme, poets have been constructing ant-war poems, commenting poems, howls-of-pain poems linking with the latest atrocity. Each is feeding off the other. Outrage has to be kept alive; that is what this publication — and, sadly, many others — has as its duty. Each poem approaches, like a box of pins, from yet another angle.

There's concern for the fighters and the fought — THE BALLAD of READING NEWS, Steve Walker, a wonderfully measured piece, with echoes of you-know-who


	And each one kills for hate or love
	By each let this be heard
		They do it for a worthy cause
		Or some religious word
		And those they kill are just like them
		Which makes it all absurd.
And, in TRAVELLING NORTH, Margaret Boles, gives a civilian's reflection on the bizarre situation:
	How once we accepted
	The soldiers were part
	Of the life on that part
	Of our island, making
	Things more secure.
Then, there's concern for the injured — D.S. Davidson's SAME HIGHWAY
	A splash of gore marks the way
	Back against the raghead
	Stumbling to disaster, half-dead
And, for those who started it off, BURNING BUSH by D.J.Weston has the compressed, playground-suitable
	Silly ass,
	Grinning liar—
	Pouring gas*
	On the fire.

		(* That's petrol  to us!)
Another pointing the finger, from D.J.Tyrer in TWO STATES, subverting that famous Kitchener poster
 
	All they want is a war
	All they need is an enemy
	And that enemy is you.
We had to wait for the now-famous First World War poets to stagger back (Siegfried Sasson) or die (Wilfred Owen, Isaac Rosenburg); the Second World War had Henry Reed, Keith Douglas. Those in this collection have taken it upon themselves to comment, protest, whatever, as civilians. Worry when they stop. They can come up with very little that is new, the skill is in saying No in as many ways as possible. Unusual viewpoints, some impressive lines, this is a valuable cross-genre of journalism and poetry.
"All a poet can do today is warn. That is why the true poets must be truthful."
Yes, Wilfred Owen himself, joining in.

reviewer: Pat Jourdan.