I reviewed this collection for The High Window. This is an abridged version of the review.
Dining with the Dead is a substantial collection of ninety-six pages. The poems are thronged with people, some of them dead, or likely to be, others very much alive, but often confronting or considering death in some way. One of the few exceptions to this appears to be the woman of the first poem, ‘Devil Dress’. Slipping on a: ‘black jersey dress’, ‘an augmented Eve skin,’ she seems full of life as: ‘she sets off into the night / with an apple in her hand...’ but she may, of course, be a memory, as dead as the: ‘strictly soap and water woman’ whose funeral is the subject of the next poem.
What links the variety of characters and situations in these poems is Sinclair’s matter of fact tones, plain conversational style, attention to observed detail and wry sense of humour.
Another link running through the collection is the arrangement of the poems themselves. There is a juxtaposition of images and ideas. So, at the opening of the book we start with a women bursting with life and allure, slipping on a dress: ‘winking with the promise of what lies beneath’, followed directly by the dead teacher in ‘Stella’ of whom the poet says: ‘I thought her a nun in all but habit’. Then there is a poem about the speaker’s love of books, beginning with her childhood and school days:
And as my convent school prepared to mothball, I would slip into the library with my school bag, stuff with Dickens, Bronte, Hardy swag, that still wink at me from my shelves when I scan for a book.
Later, the dainty Victorian antique walnut writing box described in the poem ‘Writing Slope’ gives way to an unrelated poem about the speaker’s health, apparently improved: ‘with changing fortunes since you came along.’ The next poem, ‘Best present ever’, describes the efforts, apparently of the person who came along in the previous poem, to source and restore the best present of the title:
... this walnut writing slope, daintily designed for the dimensions of a Victorian lady, the belonging I would save if the house went up.
Then the following poem, ‘Mental Hack’, returns to a parental legacy of poor health, accompanied by likely premature death, and the improvement of the speaker’s mental outlook as, presumably the one who previously came along: ‘handbrake / turn(s) my life and, giddy with fun, / I take my eye off the future’. By the very next poem, the speaker is undertaking a: ‘personal TT”, and: ‘doing a ton’ along the M2 with the performer of the hand brake turn of the previous poem.
The links between poems create a conversational flow that augments the conversational style of the poems . It feels like a very relaxed, dinner-table conversation with the poet and the dead (and not quite so dead) of the title. Moreover, for poems that take death as key theme, the poems in this collection are bursting with life and energy.
If you wish to read the unabridged review in The High Window here is the link. You will need to scroll down to find the review. https://thehighwindowpress.com/catego...
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Dining with the Dead is a substantial collection of ninety-six pages. The poems are thronged with people, some of them dead, or likely to be, others very much alive, but often confronting or considering death in some way. One of the few exceptions to this appears to be the woman of the first poem, ‘Devil Dress’. Slipping on a: ‘black jersey dress’, ‘an augmented Eve skin,’ she seems full of life as: ‘she sets off into the night / with an apple in her hand...’ but she may, of course, be a memory, as dead as the: ‘strictly soap and water woman’ whose funeral is the subject of the next poem.
What links the variety of characters and situations in these poems is Sinclair’s matter of fact tones, plain conversational style, attention to observed detail and wry sense of humour.
Another link running through the collection is the arrangement of the poems themselves. There is a juxtaposition of images and ideas. So, at the opening of the book we start with a women bursting with life and allure, slipping on a dress: ‘winking with the promise of what lies beneath’, followed directly by the dead teacher in ‘Stella’ of whom the poet says: ‘I thought her a nun in all but habit’. Then there is a poem about the speaker’s love of books, beginning with her childhood and school days:
And as my convent school prepared to mothball,
I would slip into the library with my school bag,
stuff with Dickens, Bronte, Hardy swag, that still
wink at me from my shelves when I scan for a book.
Later, the dainty Victorian antique walnut writing box described in the poem ‘Writing Slope’ gives way to an unrelated poem about the speaker’s health, apparently improved: ‘with changing fortunes since you came along.’ The next poem, ‘Best present ever’, describes the efforts, apparently of the person who came along in the previous poem, to source and restore the best present of the title:
... this walnut writing slope,
daintily designed for the dimensions of a Victorian lady,
the belonging I would save if the house went up.
Then the following poem, ‘Mental Hack’, returns to a parental legacy of poor health, accompanied by likely premature death, and the improvement of the speaker’s mental outlook as, presumably the one who previously came along: ‘handbrake / turn(s) my life and, giddy with fun, / I take my eye off the future’. By the very next poem, the speaker is undertaking a: ‘personal TT”, and: ‘doing a ton’ along the M2 with the performer of the hand brake turn of the previous poem.
The links between poems create a conversational flow that augments the conversational style of the poems . It feels like a very relaxed, dinner-table conversation with the poet and the dead (and not quite so dead) of the title. Moreover, for poems that take death as key theme, the poems in this collection are bursting with life and energy.
If you wish to read the unabridged review in The High Window here is the link. You will need to scroll down to find the review. https://thehighwindowpress.com/catego...