Rip Bulkeley

Written partly as a ripost to Reagan's 'Star Wars' military defense programme, it's sobering to realize that there has not yet been a solid international agreement on the use of space weapons, or indeed on commercial exploitation of space either, some 40 years later.

I liked the poem by Marta Emmitt, 'Looking for my mother in Blackwell's. It captures the lure of this great bookshop perfectly. 'An Oxford academic is confused' by Jenny Lewis gets to the heart of talking to academics out of comfort zones at parties. The Jon Stallworthy poem 'The Almond tree' took my breath away.