Doughnuts, Thieves and Chimpanzees

This is the second of Alex Wharton’s poetry collections, following up quickly two years after the first. Alex is the Welsh Children’s Laureate, has honed his craft on school visits across the nation, and this collection has something of the air of a workshop about it. His strength seems to be in performance, and, as well setting out some rollicking rhythm and rhyme, including one or two raps and songs, he offers encouragement and advice to his readers to get on the poetry trail themselves. With limericks and haikus, he sets out examples of simple poetic forms that he feels will be within the range of his readers, and he also looks at the possibilities of the challengingly named Ekphrastic poetry. This means writing a poem inspired by a piece of art or illustration, in his case one or two inspired by the work of Rhi Smith, his own illustrator on this occasion. It’s a collection full of energy and enthusiasm that offers plenty of thoughts and ideas for getting young people interested in poetry.