Theatre Bodies (1990-95) by Carl Köhler. Collage/oil on masonite, 140cm x 90cm. © Henry Köhler, www.carlkohler.comVolume 101, No 1, Spring 2011

"It’s easy to assume that spirituality is an old-fashioned topic: one that poetry outgrew when modernity began. Yet we can reclaim the term, and use it to glimpse what various faiths feel like from the inside. Spirituality isn’t just a way to get lyric lift into a poem – it must colour the poet’s whole relationship to poetry…"

Editor: Fiona Sampson

Cover image: Theatre Bodies (1990-95) by Carl Köhler. Collage/oil on masonite, 140cm x 90cm.
© Henry Köhler, www.carlkohler.com

Poems
Jo Shapcott, Six Bee Poems
Geoffrey Hill, from Clavics
Alan Jenkins, Southern Rail (The Four Students)
Fred D’Aguiar, A Concrete Walk In The Woods
Janet Kofi-Tsekpo, The Wilton Diptych; Yellow Iris
Fady Joudah, Museum
C.K. Williams, Crazy
Jeri Onitskansky, from Me And Marilyn Monroe
Michael Symmons Roberts, from Drysalter
Christopher Middleton, A Saddle For Daedalus
Lavinia Singer, The Mapmaker’s Daughter
Carole Satyamurti, from The Mahabharata
Tsvetanka Elenkova, This Is It
Elaine Feinstein, St Lucy’s Day
Julian Stannard, Late Swimming
Alison Brackenbury, May Day, 1972
Stephen Knight, The Smiles
Milovan Marčetic, Twilight
Paul Henry, Moving In
Colette Bryce, Jean
 
Centrefold
And Spirituality
Maitreyabandhu, The Provenance Of Pleasure
Michael Symmons Roberts, The Cost Of Grace
 
Sean O’Brien, Jo Shapcott: Of Mutability
Don Paterson, The Domain Of The Poem II: The Poetic Contract
 
Reviews etc
David Morley on Reading and Raine
Simon Smith on Brathwaite, Shuttle and Middleton
 
North American Focus
James Byrne on Armantrout, Bialosky and Wiman
Tim Liardet on Bringhurst, Lynch, Stern and Hutchinson
 
Nathalie Teitler on Green, Sansom, Sheard, Houston, Smith and Jackowska
Martyn Crucefix on Abani, Kušar, Haynes and Goodby
 
Endpapers
Clare Morgan, Letter From The Boardroom
The Geoffrey Dearmer Prize 2010 judged by Fred D’Aguiar
National Poetry Competition 2010: poems by NPC Winners