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The Art of Falling
Kim Moore, in her lively debut poetry collection, The Art of Falling, sets out her stall in the opening poems, firmly in the North amongst ‘My People’: “who swear without knowing they are swearing… scaffolders and plasterers and shoemakers and carers…”. ‘A Psalm for the Scaffolders’ is a hymn for her father’s profession.
The title poem riffs on the many sorts of falling “so close to failing or to falter or to fill”. The poet’s voice is direct, rhythmic, compelling. These are poems that confront the reader, steeped in realism, they are not designed to soothe or beguile. They are not designed with careful overlays of irony and although frequently clever, they are not pretentious but vigorously alive and often quite funny. In the first section there is: a visit to a Hartley street spiritualist, a train trip from Barrow to Sheffield, a Tuesday at Wetherspoons.
The author’s experience as a peripatetic brass teacher sparks several poems. The lives of others also feature throughout, including a quietly devastating central sequence, ‘How I abandoned My Body To His Keeping’: is the story of a woman embroiled in a relationship marked by coercion and violence. These are close-to-the-bone pieces, harrowing and exact.
The final section includes beautifully imagined character portraits of John Lennon and Wallace Hartley (the violinist on the Titanic), as well as Jazz trumpeter Chet Baker and the poet Shelley and other poems on: suffragettes, a tattoo inspired by Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own, and a poetic letter addressed to a ‘Dear Mr Gove’.
The title poem riffs on the many sorts of falling “so close to failing or to falter or to fill”. The poet’s voice is direct, rhythmic, compelling. These are poems that confront the reader, steeped in realism, they are not designed to soothe or beguile. They are not designed with careful overlays of irony and although frequently clever, they are not pretentious but vigorously alive and often quite funny. In the first section there is: a visit to a Hartley street spiritualist, a train trip from Barrow to Sheffield, a Tuesday at Wetherspoons.
The author’s experience as a peripatetic brass teacher sparks several poems. The lives of others also feature throughout, including a quietly devastating central sequence, ‘How I abandoned My Body To His Keeping’: is the story of a woman embroiled in a relationship marked by coercion and violence. These are close-to-the-bone pieces, harrowing and exact.
The final section includes beautifully imagined character portraits of John Lennon and Wallace Hartley (the violinist on the Titanic), as well as Jazz trumpeter Chet Baker and the poet Shelley and other poems on: suffragettes, a tattoo inspired by Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own, and a poetic letter addressed to a ‘Dear Mr Gove’.
- GenresPoetry
72 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 2015
About the author
Kim Moore
9 books35 followersKim Moore lives in Barrow, Cumbria. She has a PhD from Manchester Metropolitan University, and now works there as a Lecturer in Creative Writing.
Her poems have been published in the TLS, Poetry Review, Poetry London, and elsewhere. She regularly appears at festivals and events, her prize-winning pamphlet, If We Could Speak Like Wolves (Smith-Doorstop) was chosen as an Independent Book of the Year in 2012 and was shortlisted for other prizes. Moore won an Eric Gregory Award in 2011 and the Geoffrey Dearmer Prize in 2010. In 2014 she won a Northern Promise award. She writes a thoughtful blog and has a wide social media following. The Art of Falling (Seren) is her debut collection. Her latest poetry collection All The Men I Never Married (Seren, 2021) won the Forward Prize for Best Collection. What The Trumpet Taught Me (Smith/Doorstop, 2022) is her first creative non-fiction book, followed by Are You Judging Me Yet? Poetry and Everyday Sexism (Seren, 2023).
Her poems have been published in the TLS, Poetry Review, Poetry London, and elsewhere. She regularly appears at festivals and events, her prize-winning pamphlet, If We Could Speak Like Wolves (Smith-Doorstop) was chosen as an Independent Book of the Year in 2012 and was shortlisted for other prizes. Moore won an Eric Gregory Award in 2011 and the Geoffrey Dearmer Prize in 2010. In 2014 she won a Northern Promise award. She writes a thoughtful blog and has a wide social media following. The Art of Falling (Seren) is her debut collection. Her latest poetry collection All The Men I Never Married (Seren, 2021) won the Forward Prize for Best Collection. What The Trumpet Taught Me (Smith/Doorstop, 2022) is her first creative non-fiction book, followed by Are You Judging Me Yet? Poetry and Everyday Sexism (Seren, 2023).
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