Hurricane Center
El nino stirs clouds over the Pacific. Flashing TV screens urge a calm that no one believes. The police beat a slouched body, crumpled like a fist of kleenex. The news racks are crowded with stories of pestilence, war and rumours of war. The children, once sepia-faced cherubim, mutate to monsters that eat, eat, eat. You notice a change in your body's conversation with itself, and in the garden the fire ants burrow into the flesh of the fruit.
Price
£7.99
Author(s)
Geoffrey Philp
ISBN number
9781900715232
Pages
67
Price
£7.99
Classification
Poetry
Country setting
United States of America
Jamaica
Publication date
01 Feb 1998

Geoffrey Philps's poems stare into the dark heart of a world where hurricanes, both meteorological and metaphorical, threaten you to the last cell. But the sense of dread also reveals what is most precious in life, for the dark and accidental are put in the larger context of season and human renewal, and Hurricane Center returns always to the possibilities of redemption and joy.

In the voices of Jamaican prophets, Cuban exiles, exotic dancers, drunks, race-track punters, canecutters, rastamen, middle-class householders and screw-face ghetto sufferers, Geoffrey Philp writes poetry which is both intimately human and cosmic in scale. On the airwaves between Miami and Kingston, the rhythms of reggae and mambo dance through these poems.

Geoffrey Philp was born in Jamaica. He now lives and works in Miami.

Variations

Geoffrey Philp

Geoffrey Philp is a Jamaican author of poetry, short stories, novels and children's books. Philp teaches creative writing at Miami Dade College and has a Master of Arts in English from the University of Miami. Peepal Tree has published eight of his books (with a ninth forthcoming). A huge supporter of Caribbean books and writers, he posts interviews, fiction, poetry, podcasts, and literary events from the Caribbean and South Florida on his blog. In 2022, he was awarded the Silver Musgrave Medal for outstanding merit in literature.
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