Little Universe

by Natalie Ann Holborow

The poems in Natalie Ann Holborow's third collection, Little Universe, are an exploration of tumultuous human emotions and nature's ever-present rhythms.

Lives bustle within a busy hospital's walls, humming against the Gower landscape that stretches beyond its windows. The tiny worlds of a wide cast unfold as they deal with their own emergencies, losses, recoveries, hopes and histories.

Medical students stride along the corridors in rubber shoes, scars running the lengths of their lives. A janitor is crying in the Gents, watching the flowers at the hospital entrance shrug themselves back into earth. The biblical Lilith offers knowledge from one woman to the other. And somewhere in the distance, a bunker dissolves into gold upon Pennard's shoulder, dusk folding to sleep on Rhossili.

The characters in this book are all bound by the undying pulse of existence – yet their stories serve as a reminder that despite these stark contrasts, life persists.

Genres: Poetry

80 pages, Paperback

Published April 3, 2025

Reviews

[Glenn Barker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Natalie Ann Holborow is a captivating impressionist, and a master in the art of fusing narrative and imagery. Her third full collection, Little Universe, is a harvest of raw beauty, awe and grit.

We accompany the narrator in their travails, through a sense-driven riptide that merges their inner and outer landscapes.

It is an absorbing and earthy narrative of invention, where dream states and imagination intrude reality, and invite us to believe. All this is permeated with the relentless impact of a vulnerable life.

Beyond this is her skill in drawing the reader into her chromatic world and her images, bearing her soul throughout with passion.

And she conjures those images with aplomb, a talent that invites us to travel with her, in this dazzling and absorbing collection of Welsh Writing. You must read Little Universe.

[Tôpher Mills · Rating 5 out of 5]

Captivating writing, with a disturbing knack for choosing just the right elements of her subject matter, make these the most entrancing poems.
From the constellations to her grandfather’s hospital bedside, from mythological Greek heroines to the cockle pickers of Penclawdd and from the fears of girls who run to the joy of her infant nephew putting the solar system’s planets in order, she makes tantalising connections that often have a profound and startling effect. Natalie Holborow has a vivid and precocious talent and has become a must read poet.

[Jamie Woods · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful and elegant poetry, capturing the everyday and the interstellar.

[Rea Bailey · Rating 4 out of 5]

So beautiful! Need to read all her other works now!