Midwinter at Walden Pond

An ice-bound New England pond - utterly still though racked with sub-glacial groans - serves as an image of a mind overwhelmed one moment by troubling memories the next by the peace that passes all understanding. In his new collection Michael Jackson explores the impact on a poet's consciousness of past and present events - both personal and historical - and the possibility of transcendence in love and creative work. Without ever submitting to bland fashion or to clique Michael Jackson for almost fifty years has written poetry which is that of a man confronting 'the things happening' of his time poems probing at that recurrent query where does one take one's place in 'the terrible parades of history'. There is no final reply. But by love by compassion by constant attention to what is said and how it is written the questioning itself with luck sustains. What one hears in his readings is the modest confident international voice that drives his poems the conversing of a man who as ever is on one road to find another. - Vincent O'Sullivan.