Jigs and Reels came out in May 2013: a chapbook published by Shoestring Press. The central sequence envisages the poems almost as ‘folk’ songs combined into ‘sets’: two poems spliced together to create thematic couplings on the page. The pieces explore issues of family, fatherhood, mortality, and another folk ‘standard’ – the impact of war. The first section of the book dwells on lives of the artists – encounters I have had with a lyricist, poets, a reader of poetry. The final section includes two poems that act as refrains in terms of what has come before, echoing themes illuminated elsewhere in the collection. A film version of the poem ‘Skin’ can be viewed by following this link to Vimeo.
You can read a three-in-one review of Jigs and Reels on the on-line version of the magazine Sphinx – here.
‘Quality will out-perform quantity every time and although this is a slim volume, with fourteen poems contained within the thirty pages, the quality shines through. Chris Jones is a poet who works hard at the craft and in rhyme.’ Keith Bennett, South 48
The book can be purchased either by emailing me, or by going to the Shoestring Press website.