He is, I think, at his best when he writes of the people he loves, and for White, that sometimes includes what many would see as an unlikely cast list of acquaintances, as well as the virtually nameless passersby whose lives, often radically more circumscribed than his own, move him. He writes tenderly of his wife:
Full moon, guard her as she flies:/ the air hungers/ at such height:/
And he writes sympathetically about the lost, disenfranchised or dissident people he has met around the edges of the worlds where he has worked, from Africa to England. Through it all he says,
I trusted on such evidence speech,/ sure as whatever guides the swallow/ or propels salmon to their home reach,/
to keep us human, re-inventing/ the aboriginal word made flesh/ (with reference to our necessary closure).
The result of this faithful re-figuring of his experiences is a work of rare beauty and power. WHERE THE ANGOLANS ARE PLAYING FOOTBALL is a dynamic, provocative and altogether compelling read, and it deserves to be widely known as an example of how the investment of conviction and a humanist outlook can make contemporary poetry both eloquent and important.
WHERE THE ANGOLANS ARE PLAYING FOOTBALL can be purchased from either www.parthianbooks.co.uk or www.amazon.co.uk for £7.99.
Next month I'll be looking at more of the freshest work by new and familiar faces at Ragged Raven and Katabasis.
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