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The Feather List Extracts by Charles Johnson
five seasons press, 41 Green Street, Hereford HR1 2QH www.fiveseasonspress.com ISBN 0947960376 128pp £7.50

A book lover's book this. Although usually when one begins a review by saying that this is a beautifully produced book it's as a precursor to saying that the contents are appalling. And I wrote that before reading even one word of print, confident — solely from his record as the publisher / editor of Flarestack chapbooks and of his magazine Obsessed With Pipework — that Charles Johnson would let little but quality work find its way to print. I wasn't wrong. Ideas wrapped in imagery, my kind of poetry this. To call the outcome of Charles Johnson's labours free verse, however, would be to misapply 'free'. This is language made to work — for our enjoyment — to satisfy both the aural and visual demands he requires of it; and yet all reads as if casual, throwaway conversation. Oh, he's good is Charles, every poem but a door ajar, leaving us wanting more. Every poem properly reliant on collaboration between writer and reader, having us each provide our own scenario, and proceed to speculations born of our own experience, and so make each poem our own. Some even are poems one has thought to write oneself, recognises here their successful realisation. Take this, dipped-in-chosen-for-its-length.

     At Walcot

     Hands folded together
     I'm not even bothering to look up to where
     I know the tree hardly moves
     outside the closed window.

     Logs settle. I wait
     for nothing to happen.
     Just the turquoise wall
     and the cherry red settee.


And each time, trying to save time, that I skip and dip in I find myself reading on, turning a page... And the title poem? The feather list is just that. Marvellous. Compelling poetry this.