Maybe I should just stop reading ‘modern’ poetry. Or should I say, “poetry”. Because I’m afraid most of Ahren Warner’s book simply doesn’t at all fit with what I’d consider to be poetry. Some of it does – but a big chunk doesn’t. The good / clever / stunning images that are present just get lost in all the verbal chaos.
And I’m probably being completely thick, but I’ve no idea what the photographs that were ‘made’ has to do with anything.
‘The schema is pitch-perfect’; ‘the “poet’s poet” of his generation’. Really?! So says the praise on the back cover. Yes, it may well be very original, but I’d argue srtongly that isn’t by itself a sufficient qualification to make it good poetry…
We need another word for books like this; poetry it ain’t.
I couldn’t finish the book, though I really tried.
Honest.
Ian Gouge - Writer 