an o   an x achieves something that is almost impossible: to write about the processes of making and interpreting art, without any need for us to know or see the originals. Lots of writers write about artwork, but there is always a gap where the original images seem to be missing. Not here. In these twenty-two observational, spiritual poems, Isakova Bennett conducts a quiet debate about what is important to the onlooker... The poems are quiet, thoughtful, striking... devotional.

Bill Greenwell

an o     an x is a stunning pamphlet. I love how it sits as a companion-piece to ‘Painting the Mersey’ but is an interior sequence rather than exterior – portrait as opposed to landscape. And I think that’s where so much of its power comes from – those tightly worked, focussed poems such as Cup and Peaches (which I love) and Blue Sail – the exquisite Gladiolus and Vase and that final Three Small Jam Jars, where the receptacle theme returns, but that surprisingly dramatic ending,

'You might step out, 
                         feel your feet sinking'

It’s superbly done. Hazel have made a wonderful job of the printing. 

John Glenday

I have been so enjoying the poems and their grace. A peace and distillation and gorgeousness in the language, the objects themselves and all their various contexts. There is also something luscious about some of the poems despite their beautiful, pared back expression. 

Sarah Westcott

to buy a signed copy, email mariax.b@ google mail.com

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