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A high corner of the apple tree shakes
as a thrush pecks and pecks at one of the last apples.
The sun slants onto the thrush and the apple
which has a crater in it.

This is what apples are for,
to be turned into song.

'Crater'

In Moya Cannon's new collection, Hands, the commonplace is transfigured by an attentiveness that jolts us into wonder.

The poems sing of deep connections: the impulse to ritual and pattern that, across centuries, defines us as human; a web of interdependences that sustain the 'gratuitous beauty' of the planet. Hands travels in time and space, mapping journeys we make as ageing, illness, and the deaths of parents shift our responses to our place in the fabric of the world, where we live in the grace of love and sunlight.

Soundpost
Reed-Making
Driving back over the Blue Ridge,
Openings
Still Life
All this green day
Only the shadows
October
Val de Luz
Farrera Light
No Good Reason
Hands
Orchids
Yesterday I was listening on the iPod
Parisii
Little Skellig
Sea Urchins
The Fertile Rock
Lady Gregory at Cill Ghobnait
Nausts
Eliza Murphy
Crater
The Magician’s Tale
In the Underground Car Park
Brought to Book
Loch
‘We Are What We Eat.’
Alma,
I thought
Two Doors
Green Cities
Swans at Nimmo’s Pier
The Washing
The Train
Halloween Windfalls
Death,
The Red Tree
Hedgehog
RNA
Consider the Cocosphere
Blue Saxophones
The Important Dead
In the Lava Pipe
The white cyclamen
Flowers at Loughcrew
Apples and Fire
Harmonic Vases
He looks so carefully
Midday at Stockholm Airport
Night Road in the Mountains

Moya Cannon has published five collections of poetry, her most recent being Keats Lives (2015) from Carcanet Press. Her poems reflect preoccupations with landscape and seascape, with archaeology, with music, with language itself and with our visceral attachment to the beauty of the earth. The work sings of deep connections – ... read more

'In this new collection, Moya Cannon, through intent attention to light and sound and the natural materials that produce them, touches the very principle of life itself. Hands is a profoundly moving set of meditations on what it means to be alive, physically and emotionally.'
Bernard O'Donoghue Praise for Moya Cannon 'These wonderful poems lay down not just a landscape and a history, but a music which is all their own, through which the reader can enter a unique dialogue between elegy and celebration.'
Eavan Boland
'In this new collection, Moya Cannon, through intent attention to light and sound and the natural materials that produce them, touches the very principle of life itself. Hands is a profoundly moving set of meditations on what it means to be alive, physically and emotionally.'
Bernard O'Donoghue 'Its sterling qualities are manifest and manifold: a deep interiority and soaring lyricism, and an ability to produce what Tim Robinson has termed 'geophany', a showing forth of the earth.'
Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill 'The intensely lyrical musings on life, landscape and love stir the heart, disturb the settled thought and, more in this collection than in the earlier, soothe the soul. Like her fellow northerner, Seamus Heaney, Cannon digs deep with the pen. And whilst the theme of sea voyaging and water inform the titles of both her books, that which the earth throws up is of equal fascination.'
The Cork Examiner 'Her newly published second collection, The Parchment Boat contains the subtly evoked passion and meditative restraint that was distinctive in Oar, her first collection.'
The Irish Times 'All the journeyings envisaged and chronicled by Moya Cannon are to be sought in a remarkable symbiosis of humanity and the 'natural world', a perceived and felt unity of creation which goes light years beyond any mere empathy of imagining. I should not be surprised if a few of Moya Cannon's phrases become, in time, part of our 'poetry-talking': 'the faulted hills', 'the room-sized fields', 'the clay part of the heart.'
Poetry Ireland Review
'Complicated things happen simply in these poems. The Burren's dove-saints hatch out under the eyes of raptors; old wooden sailboats of Connemara take root in salt water. Moya Cannon's style is as discreet as the advance of spring over her favoured landscapes. It is good to have a collection of her work to hand, for deep re-reading.'
Tim Robinson

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Hands Moya Cannon RRP: GBP 9.95 Discount: 10% You Save: GBP 0.99 Price: GBP 8.96 Available Paperback ISBN: 978 1 847771 42 1 Categories: 21st Century, Irish, Women Imprint: Carcanet Poetry Published: November 2011 216 x 135 x 5 mm 64 pages Publisher: Carcanet Press Also available in: eBook (EPUB), eBook (Kindle) Description Excerpt Author Contents Reviews A high corner of the apple tree shakes as a thrush pecks and pecks at one of the last apples. The sun slants onto the thrush and the apple which has a crater in it. This is what apples are for, to be turned into song. 'Crater' In Moya Cannon's new collection, Hands, the commonplace is transfigured by an attentiveness that jolts us into wonder. The poems sing of deep connections: the impulse to ritual and pattern that, across centuries, defines us as human; a web of interdependences that sustain the 'gratuitous beauty' of the planet. Hands travels in time and space, mapping journeys we make as ageing, illness, and the deaths of parents shift our responses to our place in the fabric of the world, where we live in the grace of love and sunlight. Soundpost Reed-Making Driving back over the Blue Ridge, Openings Still Life All this green day Only the shadows October Val de Luz Farrera Light No Good Reason Hands Orchids Yesterday I was listening on the iPod Parisii Little Skellig Sea Urchins The Fertile Rock Lady Gregory at Cill Ghobnait Nausts Eliza Murphy Crater The Magician’s Tale In the Underground Car Park Brought to Book Loch ‘We Are What We Eat.’ Alma, I thought Two Doors Green Cities Swans at Nimmo’s Pier The Washing The Train Halloween Windfalls Death, The Red Tree Hedgehog RNA Consider the Cocosphere Blue Saxophones The Important Dead In the Lava Pipe The white cyclamen Flowers at Loughcrew Apples and Fire Harmonic Vases He looks so carefully Midday at Stockholm Airport Night Road in the Mountains Moya Cannon has published five collections of poetry, her most recent being Keats Lives (2015) from Carcanet Press. Her poems reflect preoccupations with landscape and seascape, with archaeology, with music, with language itself and with our visceral attachment to the beauty of the earth. The work sings of deep connections – ... read more 'In this new collection, Moya Cannon, through intent attention to light and sound and the natural materials that produce them, touches the very principle of life itself. Hands is a profoundly moving set of meditations on what it means to be alive, physically and emotionally.' Bernard O'Donoghue Praise for Moya Cannon 'These wonderful poems lay down not just a landscape and a history, but a music which is all their own, through which the reader can enter a unique dialogue between elegy and celebration.' Eavan Boland 'In this new collection, Moya Cannon, through intent attention to light and sound and the natural materials that produce them, touches the very principle of life itself. Hands is a profoundly moving set of meditations on what it means to be alive, physically and emotionally.' Bernard O'Donoghue 'Its sterling qualities are manifest and manifold: a deep interiority and soaring lyricism, and an ability to produce what Tim Robinson has termed 'geophany', a showing forth of the earth.' Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill 'The intensely lyrical musings on life, landscape and love stir the heart, disturb the settled thought and, more in this collection than in the earlier, soothe the soul. Like her fellow northerner, Seamus Heaney, Cannon digs deep with the pen. And whilst the theme of sea voyaging and water inform the titles of both her books, that which the earth throws up is of equal fascination.' The Cork Examiner 'Her newly published second collection, The Parchment Boat contains the subtly evoked passion and meditative restraint that was distinctive in Oar, her first collection.' The Irish Times 'All the journeyings envisaged and chronicled by Moya Cannon are to be sought in a remarkable symbiosis of humanity and the 'natural world', a perceived and felt unity of creation which goes light years beyond any mere empathy of imagining. I should not be surprised if a few of Moya Cannon's phrases become, in time, part of our 'poetry-talking': 'the faulted hills', 'the room-sized fields', 'the clay part of the heart.' Poetry Ireland Review 'Complicated things happen simply in these poems. The Burren's dove-saints hatch out under the eyes of raptors; old wooden sailboats of Connemara take root in salt water. Moya Cannon's style is as discreet as the advance of spring over her favoured landscapes. It is good to have a collection of her work to hand, for deep re-reading.' Tim Robinson You might also be interested in: Valparaiso Mary O'Malley The Boning Hall Mary O'Malley A Journey With Two Maps Eavan Boland Child Mimi Khalvati	Share this... Quick Links Anvil Press Poetry Aspects of Portugal Audio Books Carcanet Classics Carcanet Fiction Carcanet Film Carcanet Poetry FyfieldBooks Lintott Press Lives and Letters OxfordPoets PN Review Sheep Meadow Press The Carcanet Blog New Poetries VII: Out Next Week! read more New Poetries VII: Zohar Atkins read more New Poetries VII: Rebecca Cullen read more New Poetries VII: Luke Allan read more New Poetries VII: Vala Thorodds read more New Poetries VII: Neil Fleming read more
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