Cormorant

Elizabeth Parker’s second collection, Cormorant, explores the creature of the title from all angles. The bird itself however is always untameable and irreducible to human impressions. It is a ‘Devil Bird’ (‘Dart’), ‘omens in a dying beech’ (‘Cormorant’), the bubble of an underwater diver, an enemy of anglers, or the elusive subject watched by humans. Parker plays close attention to the city of Bristol and its inhabitants whether they are human or more-than-human. There is a powerful depth to place here, which is full of carefully observed details about a live and independent natural world, but human history and human losses also resonate.