Wing

Description

Matthew Francis's latest collection celebrates the richness of nature and of our responses to it. The pleasures of summer are emblazoned in the colourful wings and evocative names of butterflies, while a nocturnal encounter with an earwig becomes a joyous incantation to the 'witchy-beetle, forkin-robin' of dialect. His love of history, embodied in his acclaimed Mandeville and The Mabinogi, gives rise to a sequence based on Robert Hooke's microscopic observations. There are tributes to the poets Basho, Dafydd ap Gwilym and W. S. Graham, to fireworks, apple varieties, and hot toddies. And, in a moving elegy for a friend killed in a parachute accident, Francis shows us a vertiginous vision of a world where even the dead 'sleep on the wing'.

Matthew Francis is the author of five Faber collections, most recently The Mabinogi (2017). He has twice been shortlisted for the Forward Prize, and in 2004 was chosen as one of the Next Generation poets. He lives in West Wales and is Professor in Creative Writing at Aberystwyth University.

This shimmering collection dissects the natural world with a wondering, meticulous eye, by a gentle and quiet poet who occasionally recalls Dylan Thomas. -- Guardian Best Books of 2020 Linguistic precision sustains [Francis's] new collection . . . The sense of discovery and delight is palpable. -- Standpoint Outstanding. Poignant, sensitive, intricate, witty, it captures both panorama and microcosm. -- Tablet