Collected Poems includes work from seven books of poetry. The most recent are The Nightfishing (1955), Malcolm Mooney's Land (1970) and Implements in Their Places (1977). The latter two publications were Poetry Book Society Choices. Graham's early poems were written in the 1940s and influenced by Dylan Thomas. They contain a mass of metaphors. Instead of throwing off new insights, or revealing new angles of vision, the images obscure the meaning they are intended to convey, making most of the poems of this period unreadable. In 1955 Graham published The Nightfishing. This long poem remains his masterpiece. It describes a man who leaves a harbour in a small fishing boat to net herrings and who returns at dawn with his catch. The language is rooted in the real world. We hear the bell on the quay, we see the tackle of the boat, and we feel the wind between the shoulder blades...