Uncertain Passage

In 'The Intensive Care Unit as Rainforest', a central poem which provides the title of this new collection, Paddy Bushe snatches a morphine-induced glimpse of a world far from County Kerry's Iveragh Peninsula where many of these new poems are set, realising he is "still migrant, a bird of uncertain passage". This shifting perspective is fundamental to Bushe's work, in which his perennial subjects of music, poetry and place (particularly his adopted homeplace) invite historical and mythical readings as well as the directly biographical. Uncertain Passage is a book of praise for both singers and songs, a book of thanks for luck and travel and wonders, and a recognition that "In my seventy-fifth year, / I know the time is right for planting trees".

"[I]t is something of a miracle that a work which is so instructive and thought-provoking is at the same time so riveting and enjoyable."

-Bernard O'Donoghue, on To Ring in Silence: New and Selected Poems

"... a meticulously crafted book filled with the authentic voice of poetry ...The clarity, honesty and integrity of the work stand out."

-judges' citation for the 2017 Irish Times Poetry Now Award for On A Turning Wing

"A profound exploration of the time and space of legend and poetry, The Amergin Step enables a reader to step beyond our own time and into the mythic past."

-Eil嶧n N?Chuillean壾n