Michael Longley poetry on Warsaw’s Underground

The 2016 edition of Warsaw’s ‘Poems in the Underground’ features poems by Irish poet, Michael Longley

Among poets from eighteen European countries, Ireland’s Michael Longley features in this year’s ‘Poems in the Underground’.

The theme of this year’s ‘Poems in the Underground’ is nature. Three poems by Michael Longley were selected for the project: Rosemary, Gorse Fires, and The Ice-Cream Man. Rosemary will appear on Warsaw’s busy underground system for the month of March 2016. All the poems can be read in Polish and English on the 'Poems in the Underground' website.

Michael Longley is the author of a number of poem collections and was Ireland’s Professor of Poetry from 2007 to 2010. A collection of his poems ‘Od kwietnia do kwietnia’ published in Polish in 2011 was well-received in Poland. He has won many awards, e.g. Whitbread Poetry Prize for ‘Gorse Fires’ (1991), T.S. Eliot Prize for ‘The Weather in Japan’ (2000), and the Griffin Poetry Prize for ‘The Stairwell’ (2014).

Piotr Sommer is a Polish poet and author of many poetry and essay collections. He has recently published a collection of poems ‘Po ciemku’ (2013), a poetic book ‘Fruwajka’ (2015) and a collection of essays ‘Smak detalu’ (2015). He has translated Michael Longley’s work into Polish and his translations were used for the ‘Poems in the Underground’ project.

‘Poems in the Underground’ is a project of EUNIC Warszawa, which aims to contribute to cultural diversity and to strengthen cultural dialogue and exchange.