{"id":322,"date":"2025-05-01T10:04:51","date_gmt":"2025-05-01T10:04:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.openbook.org.uk\/chainlink\/?p=322"},"modified":"2025-05-01T10:04:51","modified_gmt":"2025-05-01T10:04:51","slug":"review-blossom-hibbert","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.openbook.org.uk\/NLR\/2025\/05\/01\/review-blossom-hibbert\/","title":{"rendered":"REVIEW: Blossom Hibbert"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

REVIEW: suddenly, it\u2019s now<\/em> by Blossom Hibbert (Leafe Press)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is a strand of poetry, among a certain demographic of its twenty-something practitioners, which is increasingly informed by workshops, degree courses, social media echo chambers and an almost aggressive approach to networking and self-publicity. Homogeneity ensues; a sense pervades of poetry being written to a silently agreed upon \u2018house\u2019 style.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s a delirious and intoxicating shock to the system, then, to encounter Blossom Hibbert\u2019s debut pamphlet suddenly, it\u2019s now<\/em>, a heady rush of raw talent fuelled by the sheer love of words and their possibilities. It\u2019s like a Mahler symphony after hours of hold music; a David Lynch film after the thin gruel of anodyne studio product.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Freighted with a back cover endorsement from Martin Stannard (not the easiest reviewer to please, by a long chalk), suddenly, it\u2019s now<\/em> is a smartly put together piece of work; certainly one of the most confident statements of intent by a young poet I\u2019ve seen in a while. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bookended by two long poems, both echoing the pamphlet\u2019s title at their conclusion, a series of shorter pieces unspool through the mid-section. Hibbert\u2019s facility with structure as a means of engendering a dialogue between the poems is evident. Extra layers of meaning emerge; whispers of suggestion ghost into the reader\u2019s consciousness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With one foot in the quotidian – eating breakfast, drinking coffee, lazing away a \u201clanguid afternoon\u201d – and the other readying itself for a wild, potentially stumbling leap into entirely different territory, Hibbert relishes the spark that results; the moment of ignition when the unexpected flares across the page. Poetry as incendiary device.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Take this for an opener: \u201cI only want to read my book and sleep and run and buy magnesium by the \/ bucketload\u201d [\u2018magnesium\u2019]. It\u2019s brilliant: a prosaic list of perfectly reasonable requests suddenly upended by that what-the-fuck magnesium reference, a sudden shift in tonality emphasised by a jarring line break and the almost comedic \u201cbucketload\u201d. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

suddenly, it\u2019s now<\/em> fizzes with this kind of thing. A few favourites: \u201corange lights woosh over the train tracks on the ceiling, provincial \/ station I sit and sip inside\u201d [\u2018solipsism of the morning\u2019]; \u201cyou obsolete thing, you. eating words in front of me, challenging me \/ to a battle of silhouettes\u201d [\u2018glenmorangie in the station\u2019]; \u201cwhilst you are out on shift, I think to split an atom \/ exactly in half. hiding under freshly milked sheets \/ watching how far apart \/ each half can fight\u201d [\u2018bats in the room above\u2019]; \u201ckitchen and breakfast room announcement: poetry is dead!!\u201d [\u2018dear dearest\u2019].<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dark wit. Retina-scorching images. Language slammed around like an eight ball. suddenly, it\u2019s now<\/em> introduces an exciting and innovative new talent, voice fully formed and hellbent on going her own way. Blossom Hibbert\u2019s next-big-thing credentials are writ large. Poetry isn\u2019t dead; it\u2019s looking to the future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Neil Fulwood<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

REVIEW: suddenly, it\u2019s now by Blossom Hibbert (Leafe Press) There is a strand of poetry, among a certain demographic of its twenty-something practitioners, which is increasingly informed by workshops, degree courses, social…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":534,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,21],"tags":[33],"class_list":["post-322","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poetry","category-reviews","tag-may-issue"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.openbook.org.uk\/NLR\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/MAY25.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.openbook.org.uk\/NLR\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.openbook.org.uk\/NLR\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.openbook.org.uk\/NLR\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.openbook.org.uk\/NLR\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.openbook.org.uk\/NLR\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=322"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.openbook.org.uk\/NLR\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.openbook.org.uk\/NLR\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/534"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.openbook.org.uk\/NLR\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.openbook.org.uk\/NLR\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.openbook.org.uk\/NLR\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}