Book Details
- Paperback
- 64 pages
- ISBN 978-1-905082-43-8
Publisher Hearing Eye
Details
Witness Statement chronicles incidents or phases in the lives of the speakers whose testimonies it presents: domestic workers; refugees; foreign students; housekeepers; booksellers; deckchair attendants; counsellors; the bereaved, and mythical or legendary figures. It investigates issues such as immigration, the energy crisis, GM food, obesity, mobile phones and procedures for dying – time, manner, and place. The premise is that witnesses must be allowed to speak without interference from their interrogators, and always in their own voices.
From How Are The Mighty:
I carry my brushes to the throne room,
kneel on the dais, pick up the thousandth pair:
Ball Shoes, lined with white satin,
gold filigrane trimming, Louis XV heel –
the shoes she wore at her crowning,
‘Miss Manila 1954.’ As I rub on polish,
stir gold paste, I glance at the window:
the pink concrete palace steams in mist.
Autumn. By spring I’ll be through,
then it’s back to Pair One.
“…I wish I could write like Nick Blair: furiously funny, tender and sad.” — Hylda Sims, poet and organiser of Fourth Friday
“His poems express sympathy for the exile or outsider.’” — Martin Bates, Poetry as a Foreign Language, White Adder Press
From How Are The Mighty:
I carry my brushes to the throne room,
kneel on the dais, pick up the thousandth pair:
Ball Shoes, lined with white satin,
gold filigrane trimming, Louis XV heel –
the shoes she wore at her crowning,
‘Miss Manila 1954.’ As I rub on polish,
stir gold paste, I glance at the window:
the pink concrete palace steams in mist.
Autumn. By spring I’ll be through,
then it’s back to Pair One.
“…I wish I could write like Nick Blair: furiously funny, tender and sad.” — Hylda Sims, poet and organiser of Fourth Friday
“His poems express sympathy for the exile or outsider.’” — Martin Bates, Poetry as a Foreign Language, White Adder Press
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