The Hat

Bubbling over with humour and life, the poems in The Hat paint pictures, evoke smells, conjure sounds and encapsulate events both contemporary and historical. One poem imagines how different school classes laugh, from 'the hiss of skis on snow'  to 'blue whales when they blow'. Another poem lists different cow artists, including Picowsso and Oscar Cowkoschka. Haikus, nonsense poems, nursery rhymes and love songs all feature, as do themes of the weather, school, animals, ghosts and even smelly socks. The eponymous last poem tells the story of a hat which starts off on Chaucer's head and is tossed, hoopla'd, dropped and bartered through history on the heads of famous poets, whose best known lines are quoted in the poem.