This new collection from Emma Purshouse marks something of a departure from her previous work. It is partly inspired by the American poet William Matthews and, in particular, his poem ‘Morningside Heights’, as revealed in poems such as ‘Black Country Doldrums, July 2021’ and the lengthy poem sequence ‘Trade and Commerce – hourly intervals of a midsummer market day’ and its counterpart ‘Trade and Commerce – on a midwinter market day’. Unsung adopts a darker, less humorous tone than we have usually come to expect from this poet. These comments aside, the collection still sparkles with inventiveness and wit.

Part of that inventiveness is seen in the way the collection has been structured into three distinct sections with headings that have more than a hint of Shakespeare in them.  The Shakespeare theme includes a crown of sonnets placed strategically at the centre of the collection and a poem about Anne Hathaway confronting her husband over his suspected inconstancy.

The titles and formats of some of the other poems in the book are also inventive. Two such examples are ‘Counting the Stops on the 529’ with all the next stops named and announced in italics at appropriate intervals throughout the poem and ‘Nets at Number 58’ where snowflake patterns on net curtains perforate the text.

Poems vary in length according to subject matter. Of the shorter ones, this two-line one caught my attention:

 

     She presses her nose to the shop window and looks

     There’s nothing in there for you, darlin’; it’s only books.

                                       (‘Overheard Outside The Works’)

 

Another example of inventiveness is to be found in ‘What I the Cockatoo in Dudley Zoo Can and Cannot Do’ which is written in the voice of a cockatoo pictured in Percy Shakespeare’s painting Bird House. In another animal poem, ‘We imagine ourselves as monkeys in a Victorian taxidermy diorama’, Purshouse writes a response to a piece of taxidermy on display in Haden Hill House, Cradley Heath. ‘A lion speaks to the press’ is an ekphrastic response to the Biblical scene Daniel in the Lion’s Den by Rubens. The opening lines show how Purshouse has given this a contemporary twist:

 

     I don’t know what had gone on

     some argument or other, a grassing up

     none of my business, boring people stuff.

     Any road up, they shoves this bloke in with me.

     Daniel? Yeah …. might have been. Anyway

     praying all night he was. Pray, pray, pray.

     No, not prey. Pray. As in prayer.

 

History is rewritten as narrative in modern parlance in ‘Matchgirls at Whitsun, 1888’ which is based on the matchgirls’ strike in east London in the autumn of 1888 credited in part for leading to the formation and growth of the labour movement and ultimately the Labour Party. Another poem, ‘Victoria Returns to Public Engagements  - Wolverhampton, November 30th 1866’ makes use of actual diary entries penned by Queen Victoria for the day in question.

In the two lengthy market sequences, Purshouse displays her usual talent for sharp-eyed observation which rises above that of mere reportage. The random nature of these pieces is a reflection of what we see as complete strangers that holds our attention for maybe less than a minute during the course of a working day. In these sequences, a somewhat bleak picture is painted of life among the market stalls and their surrounding shops during a time of austerity and hardship.

In ‘View from the beer garden – day time’ something of the sadness that pervades this collection is summed up in its six spare lines:

 

     A rude dog barks over traffic and trains.

    A swastika is burnt into the grass

    on the scrubland beyond the low fence.

 

     An old man white-haired, red-shirted

     walks bow-legged to a younger man’s car.

     With a bleep he opens the driver’s side door.

 

Purshouse has a real gift for portraying the towns of the Black Country as they are now. She does not shy from showing us the raw side of life with all its impoverishment. She speaks up for the unlovely and the unsung and finds poetic expression in the harshest of post-industrial landscapes and takes comfort in the fortitude of the human spirit.

The title of the cover painting, set in Wolverhampton’s Queen Square, is Street Poet, subtitled ‘Emma Purshouse, Wolverhampton’s first Poet Laureate’, by Midlands-based artist Keith Turley. His work is in public and private collections and can be viewed on Instagram with the name keithturleyart.

 

Emma Purshouse, Unsung, Offa’s Press, £9.95