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A review by greg_giannakis
Surge by Jay Bernard
4.0
While like most poetry collections, there were certain poems that fell flat, the ones that didn't were absolutely heart-wrenching. Centred mostly around the horror of the New Cross Massacre, the poems are rich with little gems like "the light that evening turned blue to siren blue" or "every year / I hear summer ask how autumn / can endure / winter's undoing". Sprinkle in references to Grenfell, Windrush/their Caribbean roots, their sexuality and their identity as non-binary, and you have an immensely powerful and all-consuming debut. It's been such a pleasure too to return to my favourite poems again and again, and to get something, notice something more with every read. Can't wait to see what they come out with next.