With this new collection of poetry Sheenagh Pugh confirms her place at the forefront of modern British verse. A subtle and adept technique, combined with a sharp wit, keen eye and pointed sense of humour, creates poems of memorable cadence and theme.
The title is taken from the remnants of a sign outside a hospital, now closed, that features in the moving reminiscences of an elderly passenger on a bus. Other poems invoke such varied characters as a Welsh pirate, a superb fiddler, a mediaeval woodcarver and Buffalo Bill. The wild and beautiful Shetland Isles provide inspiration for a number of works, including 'Voices in Mousa Broch', 'Sailing to Islands', and 'Under Way'. A final section is devoted to several of the author's noteworthy translations from the German of Andreas Gryphius, Friedrich Von Logau and others. "Sheenagh Pugh's work's accessibility is a feature of the clarity and inevitability with which she can pursue intuitions into territories of luminous significance."