Thaw

When a thunderstorms dark reverberations glimmer in the night-sky of the head or when apricots generate an edible appreciation of soft time we discover Charles Bennets lyrical and powerful poems revealing the impact of nature in memorable unexpected and sometimes unusual ways.This fascinating collection concerns itself with forms of melting: fluid interfaces between natural and human environments. Beginning and ending in gardens it explores aspects of experience informed and affected by close observation. Time and again whether in the form of a blackbirds tuneful message a seashells glossy interior or the smell of fresh rain our relationship with ecology is reinvigorated. Delighted rapturous and occasionally disturbing this is a collection enthralled by the sensual delights of the natural world and its creatures. should we / have been listening more / and listening harder? Charles Bennett wonders in Planting Apricots. But its difficult to imagine poems that listen more closely than these to the green music of the natural world. At play is a sensibility which - alert to happenstance and to the lives of plants and creatures - willingly finds a common ground that furnishes moments of quiet transcendence. The vivid precision of the image-making attests to the thoughtful rigour of this poets attention. A sow was never before like a lake of treacle but will always be so now. Katharine Towers