In 2024 politics has been inescapable for many poets, a retreat from the world impossible, particularly from the Israel-Gaza war. This has been especially true for the Palestinian-American poet Fady Joudah, whose [...] (Out-Spoken) suggests the impossibility of fully articulating the effect of the pain and destruction, but also a yawning absence now and in the future: “From time to time, language dies. / It is dying now. / Who is alive to speak it?” Meanwhile, in Bluff (Chatto & Windus) Danez Smith delivers an “anti poetica”, grounded in the protests after the murder of George Floyd, exploring the limits of poetry to effect real change.
Rachael Allen’s second collection, God Complex (Faber), uses the twin poles of a relationship breakdown and environmental collapse to paint a picture of a crumbling Britain, where “sense slides into oblivion”. Joe Hill Makes His Way Into the Castle by Katy Evans-Bush (CB Editions) is focused in its anger. She refashions the words of American countercultural poet Kenneth Patchen, an inspiration of the Beats, into blasts against the depredations austerity has caused, while also finding redemption amid the chaos.
