No, this is the poetry of the working class pub, the back alley, and rock and roll. No flowery metaphors or delicate imagery. McCabes’s language isn’t what anyone would call poetic by any stretch – or at least in the traditional sense. So you’ve probably gathered this isn’t your typical piece of epic poetry. Sure it’s a rollicking story, and it careens around like a run away roller coaster on occasion, but the images and impressions created by the stream of verse leave more of a mark on readers’ thoughts than any prose could hope. Although he tells their story from his perspective, he paints her life, and his, in as much detail, and with as much accuracy, as possible. Her brother, who narrates the tale, is her voice and her memories. The present being a nursing home where Una lives out her days in a haze of Alzheimer’s and bursts of outrage at slights that may or may not have happened during the day, isn’t what anybody would call pleasant. Winding and looping through the past and present of a brother and sister, the poem travels at full speed taking us on a mad and lyrical journey. What you might not have been expecting was an epic free verse poem. So you know when you crack the covers of this one you’ll be in for quite the ride. After all this is the guy who wrote Breakfast on Pluto and The Butcher’s Boy. Then again McCabe has never been your average writer. Poguemahone by Patrick McCabe, published by Biblioasis Books, isn’t your average book.
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