This collection by Prue Chamberlayne has a gently fragile opener and lesson on the theme of repair with something gleaming in the seams. It is introduced with an epigram by William Stafford : ‘I have woven a parachute out of everything broken…’. The poet’s craft values the cracks, and ‘Lifelines’ is a short six-line exquisite taster of Chamberlayne’s poetry : ‘Damage need not be a cause for lamentation – / consider the mending of ceramic vessels / with powdered gold and lacquer, …’

Chamberlayne uses a versatility of touch for her delving into life, its beginnings and endings. As this collection has taken six years in the making it may not be fanciful that she has been repairing poems as well as making them anew.

The spirit of play enlivens the poetry and shows an access to her unconscious which enhances the musicality when read aloud. Chamberlayne’s choice of forms – some looser, others more structured – is reliable and confident: quite often the use of couplets, at times sonnets or near sonnets which serve well to channel resonances and hold her energies.

The title of the whole collection might suggest the freeze framing of a lizard’s quick-sharp movements and Chamberlayne giving us a breathing mosaic of intense images.