{"id":1310,"date":"2008-07-20T17:14:01","date_gmt":"2008-07-20T17:14:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=1310"},"modified":"2008-07-20T17:14:01","modified_gmt":"2008-07-20T17:14:01","slug":"review-drop-anchor-by-ben-barton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/review-drop-anchor-by-ben-barton\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Drop, Anchor – by Ben Barton"},"content":{"rendered":"



drop, anchor<\/span> is the new chapbook collection by Ben Barton. Although the author is described as 'a queer poet from Folkestone' this is not a collection of gay poetry. True, there are some that deal with aspects homosexual relationships but essentially this is a highly accessible \u2013 and readable \u2013 collection of 21 shortish (in some cases very short \u2013 there's even a haiku in there) poems about love and life. And lovers and family. And even encounters in supermarkets. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. <\/span>

Although I suspect one of the key poems for Barton is <\/span>The Re-Birth Remembered<\/span> \u2013 about his still-born twin brother, which manages to be tear-inducingly sad without resorting to the usual cliches, the piece I found the most moving was <\/span>Commandment No.5<\/span>. This deals with the equally painful \u2013 but far more prevalent yet never seriously addressed \u2013 issue of the strained relationships that appear between fathers and sons as both grow older. Here's the opening stanza<\/span>

My father is a stranger to me.<\/span>
He never turns-up uninvited.<\/span>
Sitting cautiously on the sofa<\/span>
Genteel<\/span>
He waits \u2013 never asks,<\/span>
for a mug of tea.

<\/span>
\u2022 drop, anchor<\/span> by Ben Barton is published by Erbacce Press (ISBN 978-1-906588-18-2). The price is \u00a33.99 and you can order it direct from Ben Barton or, via PayPal, from Erbacce.<\/span>
www.erbacce-press.com<\/a>
www.benbarton.co.uk<\/a>
<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

drop, anchor is the new chapbook collection by Ben Barton. Although the author is described as 'a queer poet from Folkestone' this is not a collection of gay poetry. True, there are some that deal with aspects homosexual relationships but essentially this is a highly accessible \u2013 and readable \u2013 collection of 21 shortish (in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1310","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1310"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1310\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}