Peter Bland: Ports of Call

Reviewed by PENELOPE BIEDER

Ports of Call produces poems written since 2000, and continues a general theme of stranger in a strange land, who while richly rejoicing in all that lies before him, is wise enough to know that there will be plenty more to come long after he has departed the scene.

From Malibu to Las Vegas, from northern Greece to the view from his bedroom window, "knowing no one, learning to belong/ so slowly, over a lifetime, barely/ getting the hang of it before it's time to move on".

Like Kevin Ireland (also reviewed today), Bland has long reached a satisfying place where he could happily rest on his laurels and glittering prizes. They have certainly got the hang of it. Nothing seems out of their reach.

Ireland turned 70 last year, and Bland has that interesting milestone ahead of him this year. But their poems appear to have all the time in the world, to gently stroll into our hearts with their lines about something as pure and simple as a walk to a Herne Bay beach or around North Head.

All the time of course, you know that they know that life passes in a flash of light: "no one meant to ... pretend that this pause between day and night/ was anything more than a breathing space" writes Bland in a poem called Sunset with Blind Alleys and Hills.

Publisher: Steele Roberts

Price: $19.95