Fall Risk

In a stark and breathtaking new sequence of poems, one of South Africa’s finest poets makes sense of his mortal body. The poet’s disability and ill health lead to distress and confinement, but not silence. In Fall Risk, Kobus Moolman finds a way, through poetic and linguistic experimentation, to express what our bodies cannot say for themselves. Reaching back into our elemental beginnings, contemplating silent rock and running water, we find out something new about how we comprehend the inevitable processes of aging and ailing. Embracing minimalism and arresting natural imagery, Moolman develops not only his lauded and inimitable style, but also new ways in which bodily difference and dysfunction can be put into words. As such, Fall Risk is a significant and original achievement.