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

I can imagine that Gerald Locklin’s approach to writing poetry is not likely to find favour with certain English critics, especially the kind who complain about what they refer to as “chopped-up prose”. Locklin’s poems, loosely constructed around the rhythms of the spoken word, use everyday language to put across their sometimes seemingly-casual messages:

I have obtained from my dog’s vet
a prescription for tranquillisers
which I only use, judiciously,
when thunderstorms or holiday fireworks
threaten to drive the poor thing
right through the plate-glass doors
that separate her ample yard
from our cat-crowded living room.

The same approach is used to deal with intellectual or social or personal themes and it gets across the idea that Locklin has an individual poetic voice that is ready to take on all sorts of subject-matter and sees no reason to refine it to do so. Looking at paintings, thinking about his marriage, walking the streets of Paris, telling the reader that he has a son who is a fireman, considering a philosophical proposition; they’re all a part of his life and, like the dog’s problem, are dealt with in a direct way that sounds like a man confiding in a friend. As I said, it’s not a way of writing poetry that will appeal to those who think that it ought to be difficult and tightly-structured. The near-throwaway style of Locklin’s work will probably anger them and, to be fair, like a man talking, not all of what he says is of great interest. Some of the poems are slight enough to be instantly forgotten and others take time to reach conclusions that are less than satisfying.

     But the point about poetry like this is that it needs to be taken in large doses if you want to taste its true flavour. It’s the personality of the poet that counts and as it establishes itself in the reader’s mind the writing reflects the man. I found myself warming to someone who so obviously loves jazz and art, who isn’t afraid to challenge politically correct assumptions (he has a strong poem about feminist claims that the wives of artists like Jackson Pollock were equally talented but somehow never got the opportunity to show it) and who can acknowledge his own failings and be open and humorous about them. And who can write a short poem like this:

why do you think they want
their kids to have kids?

do you think they really want
retirement jobs
as babysitters?