Nou in infrarooi

Lying in an MRI scanner, the speaker lists what to think about: every sunlit beer bottle there will ever be, the first picture of a giraffe, whatever is wrong with his nerves, and the things that only infrared can show. That gap between the seen and the unseen runs through poems that mix physics, metaphysics and science fiction with travel through places near and far. Memories come back sharp and sensuous: two boys chatting from phone booths in Colesberg, a child sure that Skylab’s foil rained into his room, the cosmonauts Leonov and Gagarin. A father drives a Land Cruiser with a hand on his grown son’s shoulder, and stays as silent as the sea. Love poems, two elegies for a friend and fellow writer, and a search for belonging complete the book.

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About the book

Form

Poetry

Length

96 pages in the original

First published

2023 by Kwela

Author's age

51 when first published

ISBN

9780795710728 (original)