RESULTS

At the heart of Maurice Riordan's third collection is a sequence of 18 dramatic idylls set in rural Cork in the 1950s, in which the subdued microcosm of farm and smallholding - of boundary, townland and parish - is defined through the individual voices of the poet's father and assorted friends, farmhands and neighbours. The settings of these loosely contiguous fragments almost casually define a historical community, ranging around farm and fields, through furze and ragwort, headland and plantation, haggard and Bog - tracing the immemorial scenes of traditional farming life.

Inspired by the 40th anniversary of Rachel Carson's controversial and prophetic book Silent Spring, which warned against the indiscriminate use of pesticides and its consequences for the environment, this title showcases old and new poems that express a concern for the fragility of living things.