Cosmic Sadness by Jean Portante, translated by Zoe Skoulding tayi tibble Poetry Book Society's Pamphlet Choice

Poetry Book Society's Pamphlet Choice for Spring 2026

moves between the two

they have been widely published in a range of anthologies and journals including Butcher's Dog and the Valley Press Anthology of Prose Poetry

Flanagan wrote for The Times

the sincere slips in besides the absurd

Cosmic Sadness by Jean Portante, translated by Zoe Skoulding tayi tibble Poetry Book Society's Pamphlet ChoiceCosmic Sadness is a glittering, grief struck astronomy of the everyday, in which kitchens, scaffolding, train stations and gardens tilt slowly into interstellar space. In Jean Portante's long, linked sequences, memory and matter are always in motion: roses drift above language, migratory birds arrive with their beaks nailed shut, drawers open on months, planets and old parents, while the sky behaves like a flooded cellar or a cracked cinema screen.