‘Soar, surprise and delight’
Local author Michael Durack’s new poetry collection, published by Revival Press, will be launched during Limerick’s April is Poetry Month at the People’s Museum, 2 Pery Square, Limerick on Friday, April 17 at 7.30pm.
The launch will be performed by distinguished Limerick poet, Edward O’Dwyer. The collection is divided into four sections with the first, Poets Are Busy, focusing on the craft of poetry and including poems written in a variety of forms such as the villanelle, pantoum, rondeau and triolet. The second section, On the Border, is a miscellany set in places ranging from Aintree to the French Auvergne, from Carrick-on-Suir to the US-Mexican border, from Cape Canaveral to the Northumbrian coast. It includes a sequence on a range of sporting events as well as a meditation on the art of goalkeeping and tributes to some of the poet’s favourite songwriters - Paul Simon, Gordon Lightfoot and Jimmy Webb.
The shorter third section, Tales of Endurance, comprises a ten-poem sequence inspired by the epic Earnest Shackleton-led expedition to Antarctica between 1914 and 1916. Finally, The Full Irish examines Ireland past and present with poems devoted to the Shannon Scheme, the Leaving Cert, the sports grounds of Thomond Park and Páirc Uí Chaoimh, Kildare’s K Club, Dublin’s Ha’penny Bridge, the seaside resorts of Kilkee and Salthill, and the poet’s home patch of Birdhill in the parish of Newport. According to American poet, Anne Harding Woodworth: “Michael Durack’s astute mind, his keen observations and fondness for detail will make you laugh, will leave you choked up, will remind you of something familiar.” Limerick poet, Edward O’Dwyer writes that “the poems manage to always soar, surprise and delight, owing to the unimpeachable wit, playfulness and (the poet’s) capacity to view his subjects slantways.”
Michael Durack’s poems have appeared in publications such as The Blue Nib, The Cafe Review, Skylight 47, The Honest Ulsterman and Poetry Ireland Review. He is the author of a memoir in prose and poems, Saved to Memory: Lost to View, and three previous poetry collections, Where it Began, Flip Sides and This Deluge of Words, all published by Revival Press.
Look In! can be ordered online from limerickwriterscentre.com and will be on sale in The Nenagh Bookshop, at O’Mahony’s and Quay Books, Limerick, and in the Ballina-Killaloe area at TJ’s, The Forge and Larkin’s Gala store.