Public footpath

Sir Philip Sidney, accused of lying, said "The truest poetry is the most feigning." Herbert Lomas's poems are of the same WH Auden found them "original and interesting" - they are also unpredictable in their variety, and deceptive in their treatment. He writes with seeming levity about the ugliness of power and the uncivilizing effects of the money economy, about pain and death. His love poems are both humorous and touching. Whatever his subject, the perspective is always unfamiliar and fresh. This book contains Lomas's most extended work to date, `Todmorden', a moving sequence about the Pennines where he was born and spent his childhood.