Poetry for hospice

Andrew lives in Paris where he is an editor on the International Herald Tribune. Currently working on a major critical study of New Zealand poetry, he was back in New Zealand last year as the JC Stout Fellow at Victoria University – and proposed the idea of a book of poems on death and dying to publisher Nicola Legat at Random House.

“Andrew’s father died about eight years ago, at Mary Potter Hospice. He received wonderful care there and Andrew wanted to do give something back to the hospice community. So he approached Godwit (an imprint of Random House) with the idea for the book.”

Moonlight is a collection of poems by modern New Zealand poets on death, dying, grief and loss. The poets (and in some cases their estates) agreed to waive copyright fees in acknowledgement of the fundraising potential for hospice.

“Poems are the words we turn to when words fail us: when we’re confronted with huge and conflicting emotions, when lives and loves begin and end. Without necessarily seeking to explain anything away, poetry’s rhythms and images console – or give form to our inconsolability.

New Zealand poets write freely, eloquently and powerfully about the mysteries of grief and loss, about endings and new beginnings, but their poems are scattered far and wide among numerous collections. This book brings some of their work together, to create a place where New Zealanders can go when they need words, our own words, for the unsayable – or simply when they want to see what our poets might have learned from the experience of bereavement.”

The poets whose work is featured in Moonlight include Janet Frame; James K Baxter; CK Stead; Bill Manhire; Lauris Edmond; Elizabeth Smithers; Glenn Colquhoun; JC Sturm; Michele Leggot; and Jenny Bornholdt.

Andrew wants hospice to raise as much money as possible through the sale of this book, as a mark of gratitude for the quality of care given to his late father.

MOONLIGHT
NEW ZEALAND POEMS ON DEATH AND DYING

Edited by Andrew Johnston
Published by Godwit
$40.00 including packaging and postage.
All proceeds from the sale of Moonlight will support the work of hospice.

Please email us to purchase your copy.