Koo Press is an independent small press based in Aberdeen and they have given us in ‘Goose Tales and Other Flights’ by Newcastle poet Kathleen Kenny a well-produced and rewarding pamphlet.

The collection is broken up into two sections, twenty five poems in total, fifteen devoted to ‘Goose Tales’ and the remainder to ‘Other Flights.’

The goose poems look at love, sex, fidelity and being a goose:

“It’s cool and clean and I am discrete about my toilet.
I can’t set foot in a house now without the urge to move
my bladder.”

And later in the same poem,

“When Frank says he’s never leaving, I believe him.
Security is a state of mind, and being taken from behind
seems a small price.”

(From MYSELF AS A GOOSE)

Later in, COOKED GOOSE,

Kenny looks at the horror of a partner that ‘Goose’ no longer loves, doesn’t want to make love to,

“The word she dreads
in his mouth, behind his teeth,
crawling out through his beak:
Please, it says.
Then again. Please.

And in UNDER THE INFLUENCE

She keys perfectly into having a violent partner, ending with,

“As if hurting isn’t black

or blue, or bruising.”

But then there is, eventually, hope and the realisation that,

“I am finally long-sighted
and years away from him.”

From THE BOY WHO MADE ME CRY

The ‘Goose’ sequence ends in a dream-like way,

“tell me, tell me:

the naked man in the lake,
the forgotten shoe melting like chocolate.”

Throughout the writing is clear, confident and perfectly at ease with allegory, her goose.

‘Other Tales’ appear lighter. Here we have,

“Sunset. I get dolled-up,
pile my hair into a glitzy clip
and hit the town.”

From HOLIDAY FLING

Now she sees his face in her washing machine,

“bubbles from his ears and nose,

his mouth foaming.
His head going round like a black sun.”

From ALL HE DESERVES

And love features again in,
THE NATURE OF LOVE IS SLITHERY
Here’s the poem in full.

A bronzed woman in a turquoise dress
protects her fluttering skin
against the worst ravishes of love;
when the cold wet winds of winter
come straight through your string vest
like an iced mouth of melon flesh,
red and lonely.

She creates the necessary tension. The lines spare, taut.

The collection ends with,

“I can picture every muscle in your face,
the pink-blue interchanges,

the sating silk of what connects us
with this world.

Love at last
as all that matters.”

From IT FORETELLS RAIN: IT MEANS RAIN

Kathleen Kenny demonstrates controlled assurance and an ability that places this collection in the highly recommended category.

See these sites for more info on Kathleen Kenny
http://www.diamondtwig.co.uk/books/sexdeath.html
http://www.diamondtwig.co.uk/poems/sensuous.html
http://www.diamondtwig.co.uk/poems/workofart.html
http://www.flarestack.co.uk/ourpoets.htm
http://www.geraldengland.co.uk/revs/mg054.htm
http://www.literaturenortheast.co.uk/writers/Kathleen_Kenny
http://www.poetrymagazines.org.uk/magazine/issue.asp?id=515
http://www.northernpublishers.co.uk/books/Keening/review