Fast

‘You were sleeping when they found you, curled in a ditch, long summer grasses bending down to brush your senseless face.’ These poems of loss, sacrifice, love and renewal look at the strangeness of the world with a wide-eyed wonder. Using startlingly muscular, taught and vivid language, “Fast” cuts through the sentimental media-babble of today and offers instead a disturbingly clear, yet ultimately compassionate gaze. Whether tackling child murder, a biblical resurrection, a visit to a supermarket or the transit of Venus, Dunkerley re-makes the world so that his readers can see it anew.

Praise for Fast:

“What I admire about Hugh Dunkerley’s poetry is the spareness and clarity of his language: his ability to tackle the extremities of experience – death, sex, loss, the ruthlessness of nature – with a vision which is unsentimental and yet profoundly moving.”—Vicki Feaver

“Closely-observed imagery which displays a deftness and delicacy. This is a very strong, compelling collection.”—Brendan Cleary