Turning

'Thurston’s poems always danced, as the early writings here demonstrate, in line and spacing, long before dance as a practice became his poetic focus and his ethical metaphor for other modes of action and introspection. They always measured a world to be moved into, fine lines across fine distinctions. His texts become cues for performance, in performance, but just as important is the insistent voice of the poem as it becomes increasingly the voice of the poet: restless, relentless, carrying us with it. This is all for us: ’in dancing your own rite you don’t/ do it for yourself.’ This is crystallized in the culminating triumph of the lockdown sonnet sequence, ’A Hard Grief’; it reaches out from our shared resignation and hope. We’re all ’searching/ for the shapes that shadowed the meaning/ until the flow showed up’, and Thurston is our invaluable lead.' -Robert Sheppard’Lyrical meditations on selfhood which are powerful and well-crafted’ -Luke Kennard on Hold’A poetic inquiry that is ethical, cautious and defiant at once ... a beautiful, unique book’ -Jennifer Moxley on Internal Rhyme’Alive with pace, dance and wordplay’ -Sarah James on Of Being Circular ’Deeply human and affecting ... reminds us of what poetry is capable of when put under pressure’ -Ian Davidson on Reverses Heart’s Reassembly’Lines of grace, rawness and wondering; this is poetry and reflection rich with exploration’ -Sarah Kelly on Poems for the Dance’Metaphysical dialogues between the dancing and linguistic self’ -Amy McCauley on We Must Betray Our Potential’A distinctive form of synaesthetic experimentation’ -Hazel Smith on Phrases towards a kinepoetics