Book reviews: Universal themes of life in Riptide and in Liffey Sequence

Amanda Bell’s collection concerns the environment, while David Butler is clearly not stymied by any romantic vision of Dublin City

Amanda Bell and David Butler

Among Amanda Bell’s concerns in her latest collection is the environment. However, the poet doesn’t preach, preferring instead to celebrate nature and the elements as well as referencing an iconic artwork that is corralled to convey fear and anguish.

In ‘Sea, My Love’, the power of the ocean and the joy it brought to the narrator is recalled from childhood days at the seaside. “The rollers that we surfed!/The way my father stood/with arms outstretched, to hold you back /tide foaming in his wake.”