This second edition of our popular mini-anthology calls at every stop on love’s roller-coaster journey – from the first dizzy declarations of passion, to the clear-eyed devotion of a couple in old age. In one of the most celebrated of modern love poems, we sense the boundless optimism of love at full tilt: “…you are whatever a moon has always meant and whatever a sun will always sing is you” from ‘i carry your heart with me’ by ee cummings. Along the way there’s also humour and warmth in the form of a battered straw hat that has come to symbolise what it means to be together for the long haul. These are poems that capture all the light and shade of love; poems to make you think and feel. The selection is edited and introduced by Lorraine Mariner, a poet and librarian who works at the National Poetry Library in London. Poems by Fleur Adcock, John Ashbery, ee cummings, Tishani Doshi, Lorraine Mariner, Alice Moore Dunbar-Nelson, Sinéad Morrissey, Peter Sansom, Alfred Lord Tennyson and RS Thomas.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 20

Dimensions: 137 x 210 mm

Publication Date: 01-05-2008

We’ve had so many requests for a pamphlet about friends and friendship, and finally it’s here! This insightful selection of ten funny, poignant and refreshingly honest poems deals with the reality of friendship in all its forms. From childhood alliances at school through the angst of teenage years into companionship and the redemption of old age, Lorraine Mariner shows that friendship poems come in as many different shapes and sizes as our friends themselves. “Half my friends are dead. I will make you new ones, said earth. No, give them back, as they were, instead, with faults and all, I cried.” from ‘Sea Canes’ by Derek Walcott. Poems by Edwin Brock, Polly Clark, Elizabeth Jennings, Jackie Kay, Lorraine Mariner, Alden Nowlan, May Sarton, Stevie Smith, Derek Walcott and Emily Wills.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 20

Dimensions: 137 x 210 mm

Publication Date: 01-10-2016