Look, Clare! Look! is the story of a year. When Clare Pollard set off on a six-month world trip, she wanted to write a long poem which engaged with what she saw and felt during her travels. On her return, she discovered that her father was seriously ill, and his funeral was held on New Year's Eve. Clare Pollard's third collection is a book about journeys and home. She looks closely at both global issues and the blossom in her yard. Beginning as a meditation on western guilt against the backdrop of SARS and the Iraq War, it ends by looking at our closest relationships, in poems that deal with a pregnancy scare and her engagement, as well as illness and loss.
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Dumplings were sold on every cluttered corner -their dour, pinched faces sweating in bamboo stacks -that cost 10Y or so, nothing to us.The Journey, China
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(@BloodaxeBooks, 1 January 2005, paperback, 110 pages, bought from Borders Music and Video, now closed)
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I bought Look, Clare, Look not long after I discovered Pollard's work. It's one of my favourite's from her collections because it's so raw and personal. I feel like Pollard has peeled off her skin and let me see deep into her heart. I mean that as a complement. I enjoyed every poem in this collection. The first two sections explore Pollard's world trip, the sights and sounds she experience. These poems are vibrant, raw and visceral. The third section deals with her father's illness and death and some of these are hard to read. This is a dazzling collection. My favourite poems are Bangkok, Cambodia, To a Bonobo, To Absinthe, The Beginning of the End and My Father and the Snow. I'd recommend this.
