Dave Lewis is from Cilfynydd, south Wales. He has always lived in Wales except for a year in Kenya. His first book - 'Layer Cake', a collection of poetry spanning twenty-four years, was published in 2009. He was the founder and organiser of the Welsh Poetry Competition, which ran for twenty years. He also runs the international Maya Poetry Book Awards. This is his first collection of modern haiku. Review:
Dave Lewis is a unique voice in the poetry world. His new collection is filled with a range of vivid, often quirky, word pictures. He is adept at making every word count. Despite its brevity, the haiku is anything but an easy option - at its best, this short and fairly formal poem should make the reader look anew at an everyday event. This Dave does to perfection, for example, "Chain gangs of electricity/on the green mountain/armies marching". His haiku don't always conform to the traditional 5,7,5 syllable format - he goes his own original way, as in a favourite of mine, "Consultant's waiting room/the plant in the window/dead"... who else would have the temerity to finish on that single-beat word, dead? His thought-provoking images have some surprising last lines that take your breath away and will remain with the reader for a long time.' - Moira Andrew