Gone: Satirical poems: New & Selected published through Greywacke Press who published his earlier collection of satirical poems, Ballad, Satire & Salt - A Book of Diversions, from which selections have been made for Gone, brings together a diverse range of metrical constructions including villanelles, sonnets, raunchy ballads and whimsical ballades. There is an invigorating, sardonic edge to Oliver's poetic, driven by an often oblique and dark humour. The ballad, for instance, is a demotic form, but it takes a particular skill (one Oliver owns to a high degree) to write with the kind of verve...