Christine De Luca

Review of Dat Trickster Sun

At the heart of Christine De Luca's new collection is a deeply thoughtful appraisal of time and love, and the way they entwine. Loss, sadness, transience - all unblinkingly portrayed and accepted - do not overpower the resonant engagement with life, the keen observation and delight in the natural world, the joy to be found. Other favourite themes of hers also recur here, such as the importance of words and language, and the poet's constant striving to reflect and record life as it passes.

Description is polished to a shining choice of words: the 'trussit chic' of sunflowers, for example; the starlings who 'gadder apo fences, staves o rispy notts'; on the plains of Manitoba, 'cinematic/ open fields, bare now, but handsome in/ a russet livery like old trains rumbling/ between elevators'; in 'Dis material wirld' the volcanoes of Iceland are vivid: 'aald aert spewin her guts up,/ flames spunkin fornenst ice, a azin furnace, black ess.'

The theme of the temporariness of life returns again and again in this collection, most overtly on the beach in the stunning poem 'Discontinuity', where you 'sense a fault-line vimmerin/ trowe you: dis side or dat?' Sometimes there are glimpses of roads not travelled - 'tizin places you'll never win tae' ('Dat trickster sun'); or the cluttering of life - 'barely braethin in case a Mad Hatter/ comes loupin at you, burdeened wi/ lost opportunities, missed appointments.'

Yet the overall mood of the book is positive, joyous, full of wonder. In 'Annunciation' 'this life, stroked by the sun/ washed again and again, is a rub-a-dub of love. / Life at the cliff edge is precarious, precious.' The sunflowers ('Naethin but big flooers') are 'gorgeous fae foo bloom ta widderin.' 'What's in a name?' is pure defiance:
let me spend a day parked by Suilven.
...if the name I chose for you eludes me.
I'll still sense mountain, water, love.

Balancing 'Discontinuity', much later in the book, comes the lovely reflective 'A meditation apö takkin wir time' where a kind of resolution is reached:
Daylicht's shorter, but
Da sun's still haddin. Da mantra man be 'noo',
while we touch a mintie inklin o da present.
A'm re-settin da clock, bendin time, mizzerin hit
bi da slow sab o watter trowe floss; da niff o moor.

Dat Trickster Sun manages, against the poet's prediction, to greet and sing at da sam time. It is a beautiful song of a book, and it echoes in the mind. Christine De Luca is at the top of her game. This is a mature and memorable collection, and a quality production by Mariscat Press.

Review of 'Dat Trickster Sun', Laureen Johnson, The New Shetlander, No 269, Hairst 2014, September 2014