Plays & Poetry

From treasures in museums to paintings in galleries and churches, from first impressions of the unfamiliar to fresh takes on the well-known and -loved, the triggers behind the poems in Pat Boran’s seventh collection in the main depart from the poet’s trademark starting point of autobiography.

From treasures in museums to paintings in galleries and churches, from first impressions of the unfamiliar to fresh takes on the well-known and -loved, the triggers behind the poems in Pat Boran’s seventh collection in the main depart from the poet’s trademark starting point of autobiography. Instead in Then Again his focus is very much outwards, with the poems comprising a mini Odyssey that takes in parts of Ireland, Paris, Sicily, Cyprus and elsewhere, finding along the way the echoes of earlier discoveries and deeper concerns. The book’s title acknowledges both the unexpected returns and the subsequent re-evaluations that memory occasions as it makes new connections between present and past, between our personal journeys and our shared fate.

Louis Bourne is a poet and Professor Emeritus of Spanish; Georgia College & State University. He will publish the first translation of Robert Bly’s poetry in Spanish in Madrid in spring 2019. "In this overdue, welcome first collection of poems in English by Louis Bourne, who has given so much time and talent to translating other poets’ work, the reader enters the end of the poet’s university days as he takes up a language teacher’s life only to find the stuff of memorable poetry, a mature voice dealing with people and places in Spain where the poet still lives a third of each year. Poems on the natural world, social history, love loss and loss of loved one lead to universal themes, the full circle of several lives. This collection can boast many poems of such a standard they will be durable as the landscapes he explores." John Liddy, Irish poet based in Madrid, co-founding editor with Jim Burke of the long-running journal The Stony Thursday Book

Here are the stories of boys, mere children, waiting in the square to be hired by a rich farmer who comes and squeezes young muscles before making his choice. Here is talk of hard borders and heartache; the harsh life of the mill workers; the dark secrets of the river; a journey with the poet's father on the last train to Sion Mills.

This collection radiates beauty, honesty, and an authentic poetic voice that seems to overturn everything ugly in human experience. Tender portraits of family roots accompany a kaleidoscopic Strabane and touch on the anxiety of growing up in fraught political times.

Boyle's luminous poems are intimate portraits of confined and unsung lives, furnished with a sensuous exactness. Hermione, mourning her lost children, is cheered by the "blushing crimson tips" appearing in her winter garden. Birds are significant reminders of life, colour, and wry defiance in these self-assured poems of hard-won sustenance.

Boyle's luminous poems are intimate portraits of confined and unsung lives, furnished with a sensuous exactness. Hermione, mourning her lost children, is cheered by the "blushing crimson tips" appearing in her winter garden. Birds are significant reminders of life, colour, and wry defiance in these self-assured poems of hard-won sustenance.

Dublin poet.