Mark Granier's second collection, The Sky Road, continues to explore themes that emerged in the first collection, Airborne - nature, death, art, love, travel - though here the road, both actual and metaphorical, is a central motif.
"Mark Granier's new collection brims with prizes by this seasoned practitioner of the lyric form. As in his previous collection, Airborne, these poems demonstrate an unfailing capacity for surprise, wonder and delight at the various world we move about in; this time the idiom emerges with additional resources, such as self-deprecating irony and stylistic aplomb. The poet has been honing a fresh blade with the last century's masters and wields this new instrument with relish."
Seán Lysaght
"These compact, carefully crafted poems are capable of packing a considerable charge. Whether writing about the natural world, the city and its phenomena or about relationships, Mark Granier weighs what he experiences with truthfulness, poise and an attractive sense of what language can do. Refusing to be hurried, he suggests by implication that the reader would do well to follow suit."
Lawrence Sail
"In his deft illuminations of the ordinary world, Granier shows us the thin partition dividing a chilled sense of mortality from that throbbing everyday life we live and try to be aware of. Airborne is at once buoyant and 'down to earth...', as good poems should be."
Eamonn Grennan, on Mark Granier's first collection, Airborne
Mark Granier's first collection, Airborne, was published in 2001. He was awarded an Arts Council Bursary in 2002 and won the Vincent Buckley Poetry Prize in 2004. His second collection, The Sky Road, was published by Salmon in 2008.
"Mark Granier's new collection brims with prizes by this seasoned practitioner of the lyric form. As in his previous collection, Airborne, these poems demonstrate an unfailing capacity for surprise, wonder and delight at the various world we move about in; this time the idiom emerges with additional resources, such as self-deprecating irony and stylistic aplomb. The poet has been honing a fresh blade with the last century's masters and wields this new instrument with relish."
Seán Lysaght
"These compact, carefully crafted poems are capable of packing a considerable charge. Whether writing about the natural world, the city and its phenomena or about relationships, Mark Granier weighs what he experiences with truthfulness, poise and an attractive sense of what language can do. Refusing to be hurried, he suggests by implication that the reader would do well to follow suit."
Lawrence Sail
"In his deft illuminations of the ordinary world, Granier shows us the thin partition dividing a chilled sense of mortality from that throbbing everyday life we live and try to be aware of. Airborne is at once buoyant and 'down to earth...', as good poems should be."
Eamonn Grennan, on Mark Granier's first collection, Airborne
Mark Granier's first collection, Airborne, was published in 2001. He was awarded an Arts Council Bursary in 2002 and won the Vincent Buckley Poetry Prize in 2004. His second collection, The Sky Road, was published by Salmon in 2008.