This collection is called Public & Personal because in poetry I found a form to voice my feelings in a time of economical and political oppression of the poor, the decent, the working classes. In Liverpool and the Northwest of England at open mic nights, I found a platform and inspiration for public poetry that strengthened my own beliefs and connected me with a heritage of English socialist radicals. My experiences in Ireland are only dealt with in two poems in this collection.
The “Personal”, well, are personal lyrics on the themes of childhood, love, love lost or mislaid.
These poems were written mainly in Liverpool over the last 14 years. Two were written in Saudi Arabia and one in Ireland.
The collection contains sonnets, Haikku, a ballad and a “rap”.