REVIEW: The Death of Night. Selected poems by Ndrek Gjini. Pbck. 89pp. Emal publishers. ISBN 9928-04-026-5

By Patrick Deeley *

I have read Ndrek Gjini’s book ‘The Death of Night’, and I am touched by the distinctive style and by the quiet yet forthright testament that these poems provide to nature, family and place. ‘The Balkan View’, ‘The Parents’ Do Not Die’, ‘Game’, and ‘How To Read The Wind’ strike me as particularly impressive pieces indeed. His poetry is both inhabiting and inhabited; it possesses a keen awareness of the sentience of the world and its creatures. He draws us in to muse on the subjects his poems raise. Their distinctive whisper is more persuasive than any shout. The wind is read,the folk memory given voice. The bonfire of nature, as Hopkins says burns on. He tends and attends to it with diligence and compassion.
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*Patrick Deeley served on the Council of Poetry Ireland from 1984 to 1989. He has conducted lectures for post-graduate students on literary exchange programmes at Trinity College Dublin and has read at Cuirt, Galway Arts, Kilkenny Arts, Boyle, Baffle, and West Cork Festival. Seven highly praised collections of his poems have been published by Dedalus Press