River Av Ted Hughes

<p>First published in 1983, River celebrates fluvial landscapes, their creatures and their regenerative powers.<br>Inspired by Hughes''s love of fishing and by his environmental activism, the poems are a deftly and passionately<br>attentive chronicle of change over the course of the seasons. West Country rivers predominate (''The West Dart''<br>and ''Torridge''), but other poems imagine or recall Japanese rivers or Celtic rivers, and ''The Gulkana'' explores<br>an ancient Alaskan watercourse. At its core the sequence rehearses, in various settings, from winter to winter,<br>the life-cycle of the salmon.<br><br><b>All this, too, is stitched into the torn richness,</b><b><br>The epic poise</b><b><br>That holds him so steady in his wounds, so loyal to his doom,</b><b><br>so patient</b><b><br>In the machinery of heaven.</b><br><br>from ''October Salmon''</p>