The President of Planet Earth

Irish poet David Wheatley's new book takes its title from Russian Futurist poet Velimir Khlebnikov who, in a state of apocalyptic rapture, pronounced himself the “President of Planet Earth.” In this, the Bray native's fifth collection, he brings a modernist sensibility to bear on questions of attachment, belonging, identity and displacement. Moving between Ireland, England and Scotland (where the author now lives), the book is written in a wide variety of styles, from sestinas and sonnets, some of them in Scots, to concrete poetry. Obscure visions of Jacobite Scotland, Elizabethan Wicklow and a lost father-on-law, are brought vividly to life. Translations from Irish, French and Latin are also a feature