Poets and Poems: Luke Kennard and “Planet-Shaped Horse”

When you’ve written an entire book of poetry about the biblical character of Cain, like British poet Luke Kennard has done, it should be a surprise to find his other books of poetry are just as surprising and just as entertaining, and tell often wildly entertaining stories, as the work on Cain.

Consider Kennard’s 2013 collection Planet-Shaped Horse. There is no title poem. He ranges on subjects and a landscape that often seem disjointed and playful while simultaneously discussing subjects as varied as the prophet Elijah and the flatness of one’s elbows. He writes about his own death, stupid words, hermits, the idea of pilgrimage, being a snob and time capsules. A character named Miranda appears in several of the poems, and you wonder if she’s a girlfriend, a literary device, a muse, or perhaps someone who’s keeping the poet honest.

To continue reading, please see my post today at Tweetspeak Poetry.

Poets and Poems: Luke Kennard and “Cain”

British poet Luke Kennard has collected a number of glowing descriptions of his poetry – ingenious, innovative, clever, entertaining, “one of British poetry’s brightest lights,” and funny, among them. After reading Cain: Poems, his latest collection, I would add “playful” and “a dash of mischievousness.”

Luke Kennard

The Cain of the title is the Cain of the book of Genesis in the Bible, the man who killed his brother Abel because he was jealous of the favor shown by God to Abel’s offering. God didn’t smite Cain down for his crime, but he did put a mark upon him and sent him into permanent exile and wandering. The Biblical account doesn’t mention what the mark was, but it must have been noticeable.

In Kennard’s poems, Cain shows up one day at the poet’s front door. The poet has lost his faith and his marriage in the same week, and turned to the solace of beer – a lot of beer, wine-strength wheat beers, in fact. The poet hears the doorbell ring, and there’s an inflatable life-sized Frankenstein doll, behind which stands Cain. (I can’t imagine that the inflatable Frankenstein is Cain’s mark, but it does raise some interesting possibilities.)

To continue reading, please see my post today at Tweetspeak Poetry.