Lockdown Latitudes

Steven Waling writes overlooked life into vibrant presence. Embedded in England's North-West, the pandemic enters these poems to be observed precisely and compassionately, but does not overwhelm the bedrock integrity with which he inhabits his poetic landscape. This new collection exhibits Waling's signature collage breaks and cuts which animate and surprise whilst also trying on more reflective and narrative modes. This is a book capable of registering the embodied privations of quotidian life before, during and after Covid 19, whilst also imagining Jesus searching for coffee in downtown Manchester, or reviving ten Lancashire words ideal to map 'lockdown' culture. Waling implores us to 'fully engage in the dance' whilst hallucinating 'ghosts of famine choirs on street corners', delivering on his promise: 'I will blow / life in these questions that refuse / to be answered.'



Scott Thurston