Tweetspeak Poetry

  • Home
  • FREE prompts
  • Earth Song
  • Every Day Poems—Subscribe! ✨
  • Teaching Tools
  • Books, Etc.
  • Patron Love

Poets and Poems: David Russell and “An Ever River”

By Glynn Young 2 Comments

The idea binding the poems of An Ever River, the new collection by British poet David Russell, is found in the title poem. In fact, it’s found in the title of the title poem. Life is a river, an ever river, flowing forever through time, containing and absorbing natural and human creation and memory. The river swallows pollution, sludge, war, monuments, and palaces, and cleanses them all.

The collection’s 26 poems address such creatures and natural phenomena as whales, earthquakes, “eco-thunderstorms,” and scorpions, and then go on to include humans’ natural phenomena, like panic, progress, dreams, mid-life, old love letters, and even cremation. The natural and the human blend together—or perhaps the human phenomena, good and bad, are extensions of the natural.

In one poem, Russell writes about clouds, but not the familiar clouds we see in the daylight sky. These are the clouds of past wars, and how we consider past wars, wars that flow into memory, even as nature moves on in its “happy ignorance.”

Clouds

In chroniclers’ minds
past wars all went full circle,
making great urban filth destroy itself
so that the finest flowers and shrubs
could sprout at random.
And birds, in exultation
or happy in their ignorance,
made rills of melody
now man had passed them by.
But now, with ice and poison,
for one full year enthralled, embalmed,
and after that, growth’s circle
jarred shuddering in mid-turn,
can even a worm
or an amoeba celebrate?

The poems are filled with metaphors and allusions to the natural world, sometimes so jarring and unexpected that we have to stop, go back, and reread. Does it really mean that? And then we reread the poem and discover a second meaning, a second understanding. In “Clouds,” the birds may be singing “now that man has passed them by,” but the fact is that man has passed them by, and something else is happening.

David Russell

Russell is a poet, singer, songwriter, literary critic, and writer. His poetry collection Prickling Counterpoints was published in 1998. His speculative fiction includes High Wired On and Rock Bottom. He’s published several romances, including Self’s Blossom, Explorations, Further Explorations, Therapy Rapture, and Darlene. His CDs include “Bacteria Shrapnel” and “Kaleidoscope Concentrate.” Russell lives in the United Kingdom.

An Ever River is what might be called “eco-poetry,” but it is more than that. It’s a reminder that we are part of a larger whole, and that larger whole continues, sometimes damaged and sometimes mended, but it continues, nonetheless.

Related: David Russell reads “A Child Unheard”

Photo by Adam Selwood, Creative Commons, via Flickr. Post by Glynn Young.

Browse more book reviews

__________________________

How to Read a Poem by Tania Runyan How to Read a Poem uses images like the mouse, the hive, the switch (from the Billy Collins poem)—to guide readers into new ways of understanding poems. Anthology included.

“I require all our incoming poetry students—in the MFA I direct—to buy and read this book.”

—Jeanetta Calhoun Mish

Buy How to Read a Poem Now!

  • Author
  • Recent Posts
Glynn Young
Glynn Young
Editor and Twitter-Party-Cool-Poem-Weaver at Tweetspeak Poetry
Glynn Young lives in St. Louis where he retired as the team leader for Online Strategy & Communications for a Fortune 500 company. Glynn writes poetry, short stories and fiction, and he loves to bike. He is the author of the Civil War romance Brookhaven, as well as Poetry at Work and the Dancing Priest Series. Find Glynn at Faith, Fiction, Friends.
Glynn Young
Latest posts by Glynn Young (see all)
  • Poets and Poems: L.L. Barkat and “Beyond the Glass” - May 22, 2025
  • A History of Children’s Stories: “The Haunted Wood” by Sam Leith - May 20, 2025
  • World War II Had Its Poets, Too - May 15, 2025

Filed Under: article, book reviews, Books, Britain, Ecopoetry, Poems, poetry, poetry reviews, Poets

Try Every Day Poems...

Comments

  1. Katie says

    November 7, 2019 at 6:41 pm

    “An Ever River is what might be called “eco-poetry,” but it is more than that. It’s a reminder that we are part of a larger whole, and that larger whole continues, sometimes damaged and sometimes mended, but it continues, nonetheless.”

    Reply
    • David Russell says

      December 10, 2019 at 7:31 am

      I much appreciate your comment. Tell me more about you. Would you like to see more of my work?

      Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Take How to Read a Poem

Get the Introduction, the Billy Collins poem, and Chapter 1

get the sample now

Welcome to Tweetspeak

New to Tweetspeak Poetry? Start here, in The Mischief Café. You're a regular? Check out our May Menu

Patron Love

❤️

Welcome a little patron love, when you help keep the world poetic.

The Graphic Novel

"Stunning, heartbreaking, and relevant illustrations"

Callie Feyen, teacher

read a summary of The Yellow Wallpaper

meet The Yellow Wallpaper characters

How to Write Poetry

Your Comments

  • 10 Ways to Help Your Favorite Introverted Author: 1,000 Words - Tweetspeak Poetry on The Joy of Poetry: As Much as She Could Carry
  • Donna Hilbert on Poets and Poems: L.L. Barkat and “Beyond the Glass”
  • L.L. Barkat on Poets and Poems: L.L. Barkat and “Beyond the Glass”
  • Poets and Poems: L.L. Barkat and “Beyond the Glass” - Tweetspeak Poetry on Love, Etc.: Poems of Love, Laughter, Longing & Loss

Featured In

We're happy to have been featured in...

The Huffington Post

The Paris Review

The New York Observer

Tumblr Book News

Stay in Touch With Us

Categories

Learn to Write Form Poems

How to Write an Acrostic

How to Write a Ballad

How to Write a Catalog Poem

How to Write a Ghazal

How to Write a Haiku

How to Write an Ode

How to Write a Pantoum

How to Write a Rondeau

How to Write a Sestina

How to Write a Sonnet

How to Write a Villanelle

5 FREE POETRY PROMPTS

Get 5 FREE inbox poetry prompts from the popular book How to Write a Poem

Shakespeare Resources

Poetry Classroom: Sonnet 18

Common Core Picture Poems: Sonnet 73

Sonnet 104 Annotated

Sonnet 116 Annotated

Character Analysis: Romeo and Juliet

Character Analysis: Was Hamlet Sane or Insane?

Why Does Hamlet Wait to Kill the King?

10 Fun Shakespeare Resources

About Shakespeare: Poet and Playwright

Top 10 Shakespeare Sonnets

See all 154 Shakespeare sonnets in our Shakespeare Library!

Explore Work From Black Poets

About Us

  • • A Blessing for Writers
  • • Our Story
  • • Meet Our Team
  • • Literary Citizenship
  • • Poet Laura
  • • Poetry for Life: The 5 Vital Approaches
  • • T. S. Poetry Press – All Books
  • • Contact Us

Write With Us

  • • 5 FREE Poetry Prompts-Inbox Delivery
  • • 30 Days to Richer Writing Workshop
  • • Poetry Prompts
  • • Submissions
  • • The Write to Poetry

Read With Us

  • • All Our Books
  • • Book Club
  • • Every Day Poems—Subscribe! ✨
  • • Literacy Extras
  • • Poems to Listen By: Audio Series
  • • Poet-a-Day
  • • Poets and Poems
  • • 50 States Projects
  • • Charlotte Perkins Gilman Poems Library
  • • Edgar Allan Poe Poems Arts & Experience Library
  • • William Blake Poems Arts & Experience Library
  • • William Shakespeare Sonnet Library

Celebrate With Us

  • • Poem on Your Pillow Day
  • • Poetic Earth Month
  • • Poet in a Cupcake Day
  • • Poetry at Work Day
  • • Random Acts of Poetry Day
  • • Take Your Poet to School Week
  • • Take Your Poet to Work Day

Gift Ideas

  • • Every Day Poems
  • • Our Shop
  • • Everybody Loves a Book!

Connect

  • • Donate
  • • Blog Buttons
  • • By Heart
  • • Shop for Tweetspeak Fun Stuff

Copyright © 2025 Tweetspeak Poetry · FAQ, Disclosure & Privacy Policy