Tony Towle was born and raised in New York City. Now in his 80s, he’s published numerous collections of poems and this, his latest, is brought to us by a Newcastle-based press. It’s a collection that wears its philosophising lightly: “To the next person who asks how I am, / I will respond: “As young as I’m / ever going to be, but I hope not as old,” / because that’s what an old person / might have quipped in the old days”. His work is also threaded through with an oddball humour that really appeals to me: “So a wolf strolls into a hospital… / No, a wolf lopes into a hospital, / causing me to stroll out of that hospital; / or, rather, I jog, even skedaddle”. It’s a fragmentary collection, full of arresting imagery, and suffused with interesting ideas from a restless brain that is still hitting readers up with the good stuff. DP

Published by Kulvert