"The landscape is not a backdrop but a linguistic event: a drop swells on the lip of a leaf and falls / like a word being said."
"Overshadowed by an unnamed illness, the poems bear wounds but don't broadcast suffering; this restraint fosters minute attention to pilgrim gnats attending the water."
"Unlike many nature poems that overanimate or sentimentalise, the book is alive to the limits of human agency: it knows language itself is prone to collapse."
"The unwavering sonnet form represents an act of courage, a disciplined response to illness and dissolution, creating order where language threatens to collapse."
Sprackland's sixth collection consists of 45 unrhymed sonnets that intertwine three sequences set in the Blackdown Hills. The poems examine the relationship between art and articulation, as well as habitat and inhabitation. The landscape serves as a linguistic event, with intimate encounters devoid of a first-person speaker. The poems reflect on illness without overt suffering, focusing on minute details of nature. The unwavering sonnet form symbolizes a disciplined response to challenges, creating order amidst the potential collapse of language. Moore's collection addresses intergenerational trauma and motherhood through a confessional lens.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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