This is the first large collection of poems by Harriet Tarlo, and showcases all of her shorter poems from the 1990-2003 period. Her work is best described as "radical pastoral," and readers with an interest in English landscape will find Ms Tarlo's unusual approach a breath of fresh air in what has become a moribund area of contemporary poetry.

"sallow" continues a long sequence of poems about the languages
of trees, "halse for hazel" (Shearsman, 2014). "halse for hazel" began
on the hills of Exmoor and sallow explores low lying, wetland
areas, mapping political and environmental pressures. This sequence
includes a collaborative text with Harriet Tarlo and striking images by Irma Irsara.

'I found her work a highly pleasant revelation, at once
thoroughly alert and judged yet delightfully manic and farreaching
in its wildness, risks and resultant freedoms'
David Morley, Poetry...

These poems were all written as part of collaborative place-based projects with the artist Judith Tucker. They emerge from what could be described as fieldwork, poetry based on walking through, and engaging with, place, with Judith, and, increasingly, with people who live in and visit the areas concerned. Some research into the areas concerned has also taken place and contributed to the work. Up until this moment, they have been pieces in flux. Shorter related poems or fragments have been exhibited with drawings and paintings and many of these longer pieces have been read at openings and...