Book cover of The Ghost in the Machine: Poems of Love, Loss, Life and Death

Book description

Poems of Love, Loss, Life and Death
The poetry of Barbara Lennox has been inspired by the natural world, history and mythology, scientific ideas and the many facets of the human condition, from love to loss, and from life to death and everything in between.
The poems are thoughtful, quirky,…

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Why read it?

1 author picked The Ghost in the Machine as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

What makes Scottish poet Barbara Lennox so special is her ability to draw on her scientific background, striking an exquisite balance between a mechanistic view of nature and a more mysterious, creative approach. I love poems about birds and flight and her poems about an owl ("ears inhale every sound"), hawk ("she’s light/ ready for the off/ half-poised for flight"), and the extinct Archaeopteryx, "smeared to a layer of limestone" are some of the finest written. On top of that, Lennox writes astonishing poems about the Scottish Highlands, where I’ve spent some of my happiest times.

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