John Williams reviews THE CLEAR DAYLIGHT by Peter Branson, first prize winner of the Littoral Poetry Book Competition, 2020/21
The Clear Daylight
Peter Branson
Littoral Press
ISBN 9781912412327
ÂŁ8.50
The Clear Daylight is a perfect title for Peter Bransonâs prize-winning collection, because it does shares a clear vision of the world enhanced by technically accomplished poetry. It offers a refreshing exploration of the natural order, human relationships, innocence, experience, along with poems of political commitment. Particularly impressive is his metaphorical power, deepening and widening our experience as we see how âLove conquers allâ in this âworld rubbed rawâ.
Branson is a champion of the vulnerable. Adept at capturing the richness of life, he is nevertheless disturbed at the sight of injustice and his responses can be disturbing. This tension is explored repeatedly in the collectionâs broad scope and integrity. It draws on the murder of MP Jo Cox and the Manchester bombing in 2017 as well as the Covid epidemic in the present day, and takes us to the remotest times in the ceremonial killing of âPete Mossâ, the Wilmslow bog man. The theme of vulnerability and corruption returns as Branson enters deeply into the world we share with animals, an arena of loss, beauty, anger, hope and love.
In poems like âFirst Rites Beyond Red Hillâ a child looks into the adult world which is âtwenty stops awayâ and is attracted by the allure of the townâs bright lights, but with a growing awareness of its dangers. Youthful intimacy is also imperiled, but by intolerance in the sensitively written âCelibacy Unsprungâ. The apparent innocence of the instinctive world of nature succumbs to human predation: we encounter a dazzling aviary as eagles, woodpeckers, hobbies, buzzards, crows, owls and curlews flash before our eyes in their uneasy coexistence with civilization. Bransonâs genuine delight in birds, their forms and movement, âall warp speed dart and diveâ, shows a powerful gift of observation. On the one hand, he is alarmed as the sparrow hawk kills in âSanctuaryâ, but at the same time he acknowledges its necessity in the natural order of the food chain. He addresses the work of painter Samuel Palmer in âGoatsuckerâ and, one senses, an admiration for John Clare and Hopkins in the enchanting âdeer fleeting in their fey retreat like ghostsâ or âan elfin mist creeps by despondent/ with hindsight,â in âBig Picture Showâ.
Branson takes the reader into family life, too, in poems like â Shearing Timeâ where we meet a father, about whom we are toldâHis vice to grasp all things/ mechanical, that was his therapyâ. Meanwhile the mother is described as âa conjuror behind closed doors, she mine,/ me hersâ. Similarly warm treatment is given to the uncle in âFixed Oddsâ, whose lungs, damaged by a lifetime on the dusty building-site, didnât prevent him placing illicit bets at the secret bookies that his wife condemned as a sin. In âThe Doll Collectorâ we find an affectionate account of an old woman, a dedicated doll collector suffering from Parkinsonâs disease aged ninety-one, for whom the âstrict orderâ of the dolls in their box gave her last days stability and focus.
In a number of virtuoso pieces, Peter Branson turns his hand to traditional song. His aim is always true and the result is never less than stirring as he juxtaposes historical events with todayâs perilous issues. âBelieve!â, the opening poem in the collection, parallels the events of the Peterloo Massacre in 1819 with the Thatcherite destruction of the minersâ strike in the 1980s. âJohn Barleycornâs Lamentâ takes the traditional folk ballad and puts Adam Smith in the dock as the originator of todayâs rampant capitalism, pollution and climate change and shows how âweâre at the tipping pointâ. âAt the Dying of the Lightâ leads us to the tragedies of the Manchester Arena bombing in 2017 and the destruction of the Arndale Centre in 1996 with the conclusion â religion stirred with politics / makes an explosive mix.â Yet in the ironic little poem âVer Sacrumâ, sacred spring, the song collector refines the labouring manâs words for choirs to sing in church, just as the poet, articulate and ceremonious, refines his own collection, too.
Peter Branson is a very accomplished poet. The Clear Daylight demonstrates his wide virtuosity and subtle awareness of place and detail and deserves to be widely read.
.
John Williams, author of poetry collections Reading Lesson in the Lifersâ Wing ( Peterloo, 2009), The Model Shop (Waterloo Press (2011) and  On Lipstick Beach (Poetry Plus (2017), studied English at the University of Durham and did postgraduate work at the Universities of Manchester, Sheffield and Newcastle-Upon-Tyne. He taught in schools and was Senior Lecturer in English at University College Chester. He contributed entries on Greimas and Malinowski in Key Thinkers in Linguistics and Philosophy (Edinburgh University Press) and is currently running the Poetry Stanza in Staffordshire while working on his next poetry collection, Wild Ride.Â
The Clear Daylight
May 27, 2021
John Williams reviews THE CLEAR DAYLIGHT by Peter Branson, first prize winner of the Littoral Poetry Book Competition, 2020/21
The Clear Daylight is a perfect title for Peter Bransonâs prize-winning collection, because it does shares a clear vision of the world enhanced by technically accomplished poetry. It offers a refreshing exploration of the natural order, human relationships, innocence, experience, along with poems of political commitment. Particularly impressive is his metaphorical power, deepening and widening our experience as we see how âLove conquers allâ in this âworld rubbed rawâ.
Branson is a champion of the vulnerable. Adept at capturing the richness of life, he is nevertheless disturbed at the sight of injustice and his responses can be disturbing. This tension is explored repeatedly in the collectionâs broad scope and integrity. It draws on the murder of MP Jo Cox and the Manchester bombing in 2017 as well as the Covid epidemic in the present day, and takes us to the remotest times in the ceremonial killing of âPete Mossâ, the Wilmslow bog man. The theme of vulnerability and corruption returns as Branson enters deeply into the world we share with animals, an arena of loss, beauty, anger, hope and love.
In poems like âFirst Rites Beyond Red Hillâ a child looks into the adult world which is âtwenty stops awayâ and is attracted by the allure of the townâs bright lights, but with a growing awareness of its dangers. Youthful intimacy is also imperiled, but by intolerance in the sensitively written âCelibacy Unsprungâ. The apparent innocence of the instinctive world of nature succumbs to human predation: we encounter a dazzling aviary as eagles, woodpeckers, hobbies, buzzards, crows, owls and curlews flash before our eyes in their uneasy coexistence with civilization. Bransonâs genuine delight in birds, their forms and movement, âall warp speed dart and diveâ, shows a powerful gift of observation. On the one hand, he is alarmed as the sparrow hawk kills in âSanctuaryâ, but at the same time he acknowledges its necessity in the natural order of the food chain. He addresses the work of painter Samuel Palmer in âGoatsuckerâ and, one senses, an admiration for John Clare and Hopkins in the enchanting âdeer fleeting in their fey retreat like ghostsâ or âan elfin mist creeps by despondent/ with hindsight,â in âBig Picture Showâ.
Branson takes the reader into family life, too, in poems like â Shearing Timeâ where we meet a father, about whom we are toldâHis vice to grasp all things/ mechanical, that was his therapyâ. Meanwhile the mother is described as âa conjuror behind closed doors, she mine,/ me hersâ. Similarly warm treatment is given to the uncle in âFixed Oddsâ, whose lungs, damaged by a lifetime on the dusty building-site, didnât prevent him placing illicit bets at the secret bookies that his wife condemned as a sin. In âThe Doll Collectorâ we find an affectionate account of an old woman, a dedicated doll collector suffering from Parkinsonâs disease aged ninety-one, for whom the âstrict orderâ of the dolls in their box gave her last days stability and focus.
In a number of virtuoso pieces, Peter Branson turns his hand to traditional song. His aim is always true and the result is never less than stirring as he juxtaposes historical events with todayâs perilous issues. âBelieve!â, the opening poem in the collection, parallels the events of the Peterloo Massacre in 1819 with the Thatcherite destruction of the minersâ strike in the 1980s. âJohn Barleycornâs Lamentâ takes the traditional folk ballad and puts Adam Smith in the dock as the originator of todayâs rampant capitalism, pollution and climate change and shows how âweâre at the tipping pointâ. âAt the Dying of the Lightâ leads us to the tragedies of the Manchester Arena bombing in 2017 and the destruction of the Arndale Centre in 1996 with the conclusion â religion stirred with politics / makes an explosive mix.â Yet in the ironic little poem âVer Sacrumâ, sacred spring, the song collector refines the labouring manâs words for choirs to sing in church, just as the poet, articulate and ceremonious, refines his own collection, too.
Peter Branson is a very accomplished poet. The Clear Daylight demonstrates his wide virtuosity and subtle awareness of place and detail and deserves to be widely read.
.
John Williams, author of poetry collections Reading Lesson in the Lifersâ Wing ( Peterloo, 2009), The Model Shop (Waterloo Press (2011) and  On Lipstick Beach (Poetry Plus (2017), studied English at the University of Durham and did postgraduate work at the Universities of Manchester, Sheffield and Newcastle-Upon-Tyne. He taught in schools and was Senior Lecturer in English at University College Chester. He contributed entries on Greimas and Malinowski in Key Thinkers in Linguistics and Philosophy (Edinburgh University Press) and is currently running the Poetry Stanza in Staffordshire while working on his next poetry collection, Wild Ride.Â