Then the Hare

Then the Hare is Michelle O'Sullivan's fourth collection.

Michelle O'Sullivan's shy, tentative art has found its way to many discerning admirers. Reviewing This One High Field in the Dublin Review of Books Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin noted how ‘The single moment becomes the special place'. 'This,' she wrote, 'is her third collection; her first appeared in 2012. I had been attracted by single poems before then, but the weight of her three books, and especially this one, convinces me that her work deserves to find its way to attentive readers. Readers who will not try to fit her into any boxes narrower than the big one marked “poets”, who will appreciate her skill with language, her alertness to the deep music of the world.'

Then the Hare displays further examples of Michelle O'Sullivan's precision of detail and feeling, rendering them in her signature idiosyncrasy of syntax and word use. These are countered by an extended narrative, 'A Winter in Milan' and the chancy playfulness of 'On Business'. The result is an intriguing, satisfying whole destined to endure. 

By evening I will have made a few marks on paper
and put them in a place where you might find them.
— 'For a Stranger'