These poems may sometimes pretend they’re joking but they never really are. And what is it they’re not joking about? Death for one thing, and the fact that we don’t actually know who we are, and the fact that we don’t truly know who our loved ones are, or what art is, or anything else for that matter.
Sometimes it feels as though someone has run off with meaning. It’s no longer to be found where we could once expect to find it, perhaps in religion or in nature or in art, and these poems set off in search of it. Their aim is to see if there’s a way of looking and a way of using language that can bring some meaning back to the world, because without it, we’re lost.
Meanwhile, Trees is Mark Waldron’s third collection, following The Brand New Dark (2008) and The Itchy Sea (2011), both published by Salt.
‘Waldron’s poems are good at building a world, scaling out from close-ups of small objects to galactic constellations that absorb and skew their more recognizable scenes and references’. – John McAuliffe, The Poetry Review [on Meanwhile, Trees]
‘Mark Waldron’s Meanwhile, Trees surrounds the reader in a cyclonic blur of humour hiding a manic urge towards self-destruction. The tone of these poems is deceptively light; glee edged with darkness is the main flavour of this book.’ – Bethany W. Pope, Magma
‘… nobody does a controlled explosion quite like Mark Waldron. Under his inimitable eye events and emotions are slowed to a state of near-stasis, to be scrutinized, schematized, and dazzlingly animated. Meanwhile, Trees, his third collection, presents a rich emulsion of languor and anxiety that I found riotously enjoyable.’ – Abigail Parry, Poetry London
‘This quite astonishing collection should certainly be placed in the library, but carefully, with the most quizzical, ironical and independently-minded of older students directed towards it with glee: they will never have read anything quite like it before.’ – Frank Startup, The School Librarian [on Meanwhile, Trees]
Mark Waldron was born in New York in 1960 and grew up in London. He lives in East London with his wife and son, and began writing poetry in his early 40s. He published two collections with Salt, The Brand New Dark (2008) and The Itchy Sea (2011), which were followed by two from Bloodaxe, Meanwhile, Trees (2016) and Sweet, like Rinky-Dink (2019). His fifth collection, A Straight Up Giant, is published by Bloodaxe in June 2023.
