These poems are, like all good poems, not easy to read. They are full of pain, grief and menace. They are angry; but also they are tender. There is a cast of tramps, drunks and outcasts; but there are also children, beautifully etched, given to us in all their terror and innocence. A prevailing question seems to be, ‘Can men cry?’ There is no simple answer; but certainly the little scenes, the half-glimpsed lives, the sad stories presented here should encourage or allow tears, and it is to the immense credit of the poet that, while never becoming sentimental or maudlin, he brings the reader to the very brink of a vast sorrow that we all need to acknowledge, in ourselves and in the fabric of the world and lives around us.

David Punter, poet, Professor of English University of Bristol

​​

​