Carol Rumens has always confronted the personal with the political in poems which are remarkable for their imaginative daring and their engagement with other lives. Often set against the background of Eastern Europe, Russia or Northern Ireland, they are filled with a powerful sense of loss and exile. She draws on a wide variety of characters and voices to dramatise the realities of suffering and persecution, or to write direct, honest accounts of love, separation, death and displacement. Publication celebrates Carol Rumens's 60th birthday on 10 December 2004