Crowd Voltage by John McCullough

Publishes 26 March 
 
John McCullough's new poetry collection Crowd Voltage addresses yearnings for community. It probes fragmentation within groups and individuals – disturbances within the body of the crowd and the crowd of the body. Engaging with working-class and queer experiences, the poems move between solitude and togetherness, haunted by ghosts from history as they dream of unity and discover joy in deserted corners.

To be common here is to share not only qualities but stories with many others – to be classed alongside people with similar origins and become connected also to what is commonplace in the world of animals and plants, days and tables. Sky and sea dominate as the speakers search for oneness and completion, confronted by vast silences and the shadow of Brighton’s collapsing West Pier.
 
-----
 
'McCullough is a visionary, a genius polymath. His worlds and miniature observations are deeply satisfying to stumble into. McCullough’s writing feels tender, intimate, zany and yes …cool.' – Monique Roffey