Fire Songs

by David Harsent

The poems in David Harsent's new collection, whether single poems, dramatic sequences, or poems that 'belong to one another', share a dark territory and a sometimes haunting, sometimes steely, lyrical tone. Throughout the book - in the stark biography of Songs from the Same Earth, the troubling fractured narrative of A Dream Book, the harrowing lines of connection in four poems each titled Fire, or the cheek-by-jowl shudder of Sang the Rat - Harsent writes, as always, with passion and a sureness of touch.

Genres: Poetry

80 pages, Paperback

First published August 5, 2014

About the author

David Harsent is an English poet and TV scriptwriter. Harsent also writes crime fiction novels under the pseudonyms David Lawrence, David Pascoe and Jack Curtis. He has published eleven collections of poetry which have won several literary prizes and awards. Legion won the Forward Prize for best collection 2005 and was shortlisted for both the T.S. Eliot and Whitbread Awards.

He lives with his wife, the actress Julia Watson and their daughter in London.

Reviews

[Mark Friend]

David Harsent’s Fire Songs is challenging and at times elusive, working together as one tight collection that builds upon and around its fiery themes and motifs. It presents the reader with some haunting imagery, evocative phrasing and an emotional intensity.

This collection took my mind back to an old argument - whether an artist/ writer should need to explain their work, or should the work stand for and by itself, independent of explanation. Whilst this argument is often stated as an either / or preference, there is also a middle ground where the writer/artist could offer you a few more markers to ensure the reader finds the track, without having to explain everything.

However, with a little research and advice , the reader can also achieve that for themselves. As I approached the end of my first reading of this collection, I was labouring to hold it all in mind when I came upon The Guardian’s review which to help me to see Fire Songs in its unity. There are also a few YouTube‘s of David Harsent reading and offering some context for a few of these poems. I found both these additional supports helpful.

Some of the pieces in this collection that have grabbed my attention were; Sang the Rat, A Dream Book, Fire: love songs and descants, Dive, Songs from the Same Earth, and Fire: a party at the world’s end.

At times, I found Fires Songs hard work but definitely worth the effort.

[Jennifer]

I had a hunch I might find the 2015 TS Eliot Prizewinner hard going and so it was. Why does dark in poetry terms seem to mean so literally unable to see? My understanding felt mostly fleeting for all that the words were beautiful, haunting. The subjects too, when I could tell what they were, seemed worthy of investigation and description and the way they were placed in the collection worked too - the sequence of Fire poems, the sequence on the manifestations of tinnitus. They were grubby, gritty, gruesome.

One poem, Bowland Beth, stood out for me, finishing the book on the closing date for voting on Britain's national bird and when 3 more Bowland hen harriers have disappeared, at a crucial time in breeding, lending further weight to the notion that somebody is out for extinction. It is not just that birds of prey are beautiful and topical creatures, so a subject I approve of, but the poem itself stands out in its style, and simplicity. It reminds me of the lovely "For I Will Consider my Cat Jeoffrey" Harsent captures the impact that seeing a bird of prey in flight has on the viewer (we do not need to save them only for themselves but for us too) and implicitly contrasts the hen harrier's predation with human "she would open her prey in all innocence/there being nothing of anger or sorrow in it."I followed up the book by watching David Harsent on YouTube introducing the poem and then reading it. Not going to forget that in a hurry.

[Zara]

I read this at the same time as A Brief History of Seven Killings, thinking it might be a bit of light relief from the horror of Jamaican violence. The opening poem was rather a shock therefore: a grisly piece of verse about Anne Askew, Protestant martyr burnt in 1546, describing how her flesh boiled and melted. These poems hovered between the disturbing and the beautiful. It made me think of something on a list of potential interview questions, "Should poetry be easy to understand?" The language of these poems is not too difficult, the imagery simple, but I was often left a bit unsure about what the poem was actually about. 'A Dream Book' especially was intriguingly confusing. I loved the 'Tinnitus' series of poems, dispersed through the sequence, for their simplicity and beauty. Some poems, such as 'Sang the Rat', were gritty and nasty. I felt that I lost interest in some of the longer poems, apart from 'Dream Book' which I was hooked by even though I didn't understand it! Although some of them had strong political messages, I didn't feel that many of the poems left me a changed person.

I have mixed feelings about this poetry collection. I loved certain poems but was left cold by others. I thought the theme of fire running through was often eloquently and movingly dealt with, some of them so lyrical that it really merited the 'Fire Songs' title.

[Caspar "moved to storygraph" Bryant]

first David I'm kind of most perplexed by his reviewers who compare him to all sorts of other people and oddly too. I think Fire Songs is kind of brilliant in its way and the theology it weaves with is unique enough for contemporary poetry I just feel his form can trip things up perhaps that's part me so I need an Attention read but it seems a battle within itself

[Evie]

I bought Fire Songs because it contains the poem Bowland Beth, and I thought it worth owning for that reason alone. Having read the whole thing, I can safely say David Harsent has written one of the best poetry collections I've read.

I find it hard to talk about books I loved intensely. I'll just say that here are poems about fire and rats, tinnitus and music, apocalypse, war, ice, man's connection to and destruction of the natural world. The voice feels prophetic and rapturous.

Some favourite quotes:

"Rapacious like us prolific like us omnivorous like us prodigal like us/unremitting like us like us a killer of its own kind"

"The way this winter sun slants through the branches to bed/down in the fire, taking light, giving light; the way smoke rolls low across the garden and holds among fern and dogwood"

"The bed-time story is fire, the fairy-tale is fire, the promise of light/to a dying man is really a promise of fire./Though rivers unload, though seas grow higher,/ though standing rain is a day-long widening wall,/ it will be fire, it will be fire, it will be fire..."

"bird-tracks on ice, scentless depth of water below"

"My last sight of you will come as you pass the window,/your look-and-look-away a sudden gleam in the glass."

[Eve]

Perhaps this was not the best book to try poetry for the first time and however much I may have enjoyed the experience of reading David Harsent's works in Fire Songs I was very much out of depth 70% of the time. What captivated me was the lyrical structure of his work, not using punctuation (which I've only ever seen done in The Road by Cormac McCarthy but this is by no means a comparison of who did what best only a statement of fact.) and the lexicon used in this particular collection of his works.

[Juliano]

David Harsent's 'Fire Songs' kept me sane during my hellish commute today (thanks, London). I was somewhat conflicted about this collection: some of the poems, while I could appreciate the craft and control, didn't seem to be doing much that was new or interesting. However, the sequences/sets of poems (Tinnitus, Rat, and especially Fire) were extraordinary on their own and in how they built together into a larger mosaic. 'Fire: end-scenes and outtakes' was one of the most immediate poems l've read in a while.

[Alan Stuart]

Difficult, disturbing, prophetic, dreamlike. The Fire songs are especially vivid and challenging.

[Judith]

I really enjoyed these - & shall be reading more of David Harsent’s poetry. However, these aren’t for the faint hearted as some of them are truly graphic.

[J Grimsey]

A book of poems which is interesting and complicated, I must read it again.

[Arminas]

Idėja gera, įgyvendinimas nekoks

[Sanjuro]

There are some poetry collections that are inaccessible, but reflective, and bring all sorts of associations to one's mind. Then there are collections that are inaccessible, but only because they are a convoluted mess. I may be in the minority on this, as this collection is fairly well received, but I found this to be the latter. After each poem, I sat, thinking, trying to make even the least bit of sense from the words I just read through, to no avail. Just not a collection I connected with at all.

[Ben Doeh]

Bought the book at the TS Eliot Prize readings the night before he won it.