Poetry Magazines - The best collection of poetry magazines online - Simon Armitage

Wide Skies, Salt and Best Bitter by Peter Phillips.
Hearing Eye, Box 1, 99 Torriano Avenue, London NW5 2RX , £6.95.


Peter Phillips in Wide Skies, Salt and Best Bitter sometimes winds up a poem too neatly so that it closes off the possibilities. Dog Talk for instance has good images and movement: 'Sky wrapped round / the beach, a rain-wall falling / from clouds large as parks.   Last night I lay in the sky's lap, looked into darkness' later: '...Far off I heard the boats unload. / The air was tangy with fish...'  For me the ending didn't do the poem justice. He reflected on Victoria Park in London, concluding '...It's strange, / I miss the noise.'  The opening poems relate to landscapes in Norfolk, such as April on Holkham Beach, 'A flare of primroses, / pale light moving out / over sand dunes to the sea', and Coastal Light, where he says '...I walk under clouds / of thin milk, look out over mud // and slosh of marshes...'.

   Probably the best poems in this collection are in the group Five Foxes.  The images are allowed to work on their own and segue beautifully into thoughts about the scene as in the excellent verse in Fox Trap: '...He felt his bones lose grip, / flicker of breath. / Then he opened his eyes, / saw the white gauze air change / to a different shade of white.' Fox in the Garden is beautifully constructed and contains the splendidly contrasting images: '...I want to let him in, / hold a chunk of world / in my arms, feel his heart / against my chest.// He pants from a night raid, / drags the scrag of a blackbird, / shakes its head / till feathers scatter.'