A woodworm is the name given to the larvae of a fairly wide array of beetles. It’s also the name applied to a condition of wood when the larvae have been having a meal. What look like holes are more like entrances to small caves, carved into the wood as the larvae eat their way forward.
But the title of a poetry collection?
I saw the name of British poet Matt Duggan’s latest poetry collection, Woodworm, however, and thought not of wood beetles but of Wormwood, the young student being tutored in The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis. Both thoughts might be relevant, however. Duggan writes about the flaws in ourselves and the surrounding culture that, sometimes slowly and sometimes quickly, eat their way through. And, like Lewis’s Wormwood, we are being taught in these 60 poems, not how to promote and capitalize upon the flaws but more to be aware of the havoc the worms of our culture are creating.
To continue reading, please see my post today at Tweetspeak Poetry.
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