The Rainmaker Danced
John Agard illustrated by Satoshi Kitamura
Hodder Children’s Books

There’s always plenty to delight and to contemplate in any book of poetry from John Agard and so it is here in this new offering of some forty poems, beautifully illustrated by Satoshi Kitamura

Embracing a wide variety of themes and topics from Mosquito …

to maths and marriage, the poet offers something to suit all moods.

Some such as Line really bring you up short with its final: ‘Then they sent him / to the frontline / where he learnt / of a thin line / between breathing / and not breathing.’

As does Progress which concludes thus: ‘it takes a second / (maybe less) / to press / a button.’

There are humorous offerings too. Take Homo Ambi-thumb-trous with its prod at mobile phone-obsessives; and Government Warning! wherein the powers that be issue notice of a tickle-free zone.

Like all Agard’s poetry books, this one has something for everyone and deserves to be shared and discussed in all upper primary and secondary classrooms, as well as being for all lovers of contemporary poetry.