The Field in Winter

By David Clarke

The Field in Winter, the third collection of poetry by David Clarke, winner of the Michael Marks Award, elegantly reflects on memory, time, and the very particular landscape of loss, in a calendar of poems, a 'charm of words' that track and loop through seasons of nature and living.
The relationship between the environment, the human body and the self takes centre stage here in poetry that is concerned with being in the world - senses alive to the detail of things, the trunk of a linden tree , the shock of cold water, the frenzy of bees and blossom. But these remarkable poems also write towards the intangible in the late summer's dusk – an empty cage, a bird flown; history's slow grind and echo. Clarke's elegies reach out to touch what passes us fleetingly in a moment of time – 'before the tongue can catch them' – held for that second, precious, in his poised and finely weighted poetry.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Nine Arches Press
• Release date: Sep 7, 2023
• ISBN: 9781913437770

David Clarke

David Clarke’s first pamphlet, Gaud, won the Michael Marks award in 2013. His first collection, Arc, was published by Nine Arches Press in 2015 and was longlisted for the Polari Prize. Another pamphlet, Scare Stories, was published by V Press in 2017 and was named a Poetry School ‘Book the Year.’ His second collection, The Europeans, was published by Nine Arches in 2019. His poems have appeared in publications including Magma, Poetry Wales and The Guardian.

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