Every Shadow Has a Shadow

Richard Price has been described as “a poet who moves comfortably between the lyrical and the avant-garde,” and you can see that trait at its best in his latest collection, Moon for Sale (Carcanet, £9.99). While his subjects are mainstream – tattoos, Brexit, romantic comedies – his treatment of them is inventive. Born in 1966, he grew up in Renfrewshire and began writing poetry aged 14. Price was a key mover in Informationist poetry, alongside Robert Crawford and WN Herbert, with Price naming the movement. His poem ‘Every Shadow Has a Shadow’ wears its themes of sorrow and anxiety lightly.

Every shadow has a shadow. In the dapple a dark speckle, the meadow’s thirst.

Every sorrow has a sorrow, a lessening lesson, a congealing ghost.

Density of loss: a ‘once was’ (once was: brute finesse).

Grief, not grudge. Extinction’s edge. Last on the late last list.

There is a pang the weight of the sun’s fist. There is a pang the weight of the sun’s fist.