The complexity of human experience is what pulsates from the poems by Roger Robinson in his latest collection, awarded the T.S. Eliot Prize, “A Portable Paradise”. Robinson, in crystal clear language, free of trite embellishments, writes about pain, love, rage, injustice, trauma, hope and resilience. These are the poems to read, reread and relive. You’re a vocalist and lyricist for King Midas Sound – what are the different pleasures of poetry versus music? The collection’s title points to the underlying philosophy expressed in these poems: that earthly joy is, or ought to be, just within, but is often just beyond our reach, denied by racism, misogyny, physical cruelty and those with the class power to deny others their share of worldly goods and pleasures. A Portable Paradise is not the emptiness of material accumulation, but joy in an openness to people, places, the sensual pleasures of food and the rewards to be had from the arts of word, sound and visual enticement – in short an “insatiable hunger” for life. The poems express a fierce anger against injustice, but also convey the irrepressible sense that Roger Robinson cannot help but love people for their humour, oddity and generosity of spirit. Petit, who conducted meetings with her fellow judges Evie Wyld and Peter Frankopan on Zoom, added: “Every poem surprises with its imagery, emotional intensity and lyric power, whether dealing with Grenfell, Windrush or a son’s difficult birth, which is also a tribute to a Jamaican nurse,” said Petit, referring to Robinson’s poem Grace, named after the nurse who cradled his son in neonatal intensive care. Tuama: One of the complexities of literature is the way within which literature invites people to identify with a point of view and with a character in it. And it’s so easy to want to be brought into the point of view of the speaker here, or the grandmother. And I think that there is always a literary and moral and ethical challenge, certainly, for me, is to find myself in at that line, “That way they can’t steal it, she’d say.” When have I been the “they”? When have I looked on somebody else and thought, “Oh, I want that,” and I might have denied that I’m stealing it, but I’m stealing it anyway. And so the literary invitation for me is to think about that line and how that line has impacted me, and how I have been the demonstration of the impact of that line.

His belief in mentoring was rooted in his own experience. “I have had many mentors and one of them was [Booker prize-winner and poet] Bernardine Evaristo , who said: ‘You’ve got talent but you need to hone your craft.’” By his mid 20s he knew that he wanted to be an artist, and that if he was going to succeed he would have to live frugally. “My mentors taught me that if you control your economics you can control your output.” I was told if you get less than 36 rejections don’t say it’s not working. On about my 37th attempt I got published Your poem Beware in A Portable Paradise feels horribly resonant after George Floyd’s murder (“When police place knees/at your throat, you may not live/to tell of choking”). Identity: the speaker has a clear and deeply personal connection to his idea of paradise, which has become part of his identity. These are finely crafted poems, that reveal Roger Robinson’s capacity to tell involving stories and capture the essence of a character in a few words, to move the emotions with the force of verbal expression, and engage our thoughts, as in the sequence of poems that reflect on just what paradise might be. A Portable Paradise is a feast to be carried by lovers of poetry wherever they go.I like an expansive poetic form. I read widely and look at global forms. Toni Morrison, Gabriel García Márquez, José Saramago are influences. I admire Linton Kwesi Johnson. Derek Walcott for his use of English form and Caribbean content. I also access so much good storytelling online; Netflix shows like Top Boy are amazing.

Robinson’s most recent collection is deeply thought-provoking and utterly necessary. Throughout, he displays a level of technical virtuosity few other poets writing today can match. Robinson gets you thinking about those questions deeply. The only paradise-free section looks at the Windrush Scandal as a paradise lost as those wrongs can never be put right.Prize judge and poet Pascale Petit, who is the only other writer to win the Ondaatje for a poetry collection, called A Portable Paradise a “healing” and “profoundly moving book [that] manages to balance anger and love, rage and craft”. I see the word “concealed” there, and I think of headlines where, in London, there might be references to young people of color carrying a concealed weapon. And I think he is deliberately taking this idea of concealed and talking about what do you conceal because other people will deny it and threaten you, other powers will, and people who say that they’re the law-keepers and threaten you with being perceived as the law-breaker. And I think, ultimately, he’s saying that your paradise is a quality of life; but, deeper than that, it’s your life. He said the judges had made passionate cases for various books for months, but Robinson was the unanimous choice in their final meeting on Monday.

I first came across Roger Robinson in the middle of the pandemic, after he won the TS Eliot prize for his new collection of poems A Portable Paradise. Joining a prestigious list of previous winners, including Don Paterson, Ted Hughes, Ocean Vuong and Carol Ann Duffy, Robinson will also be just the second poet inducted into the new TS Eliot prize winners’ archive, which was established last year to preserve the voices of winning poets online for posterity. A Portable Paradise by Roger RobinsonThe book is a long reflection on paradise. And the word is such an interesting word, “paradise.” It comes into Latin and Greek, and English, through an early Iranian language, Avestan, which is the language of the scriptures, of Zoroastrianism. And it means “an enclosed garden”. And so, I suppose often, in English, you think of paradise, speaking of the garden of paradise, Eden. And John Milton’s epic poem called Paradise Lost is about Adam and Eve losing, or being expelled from, Eden. Or people might think about paradise as heaven, as well. Listen to Roger Robinson perform 'Survivor (for the Grenfell Survivors)' on the BBC Late Junction Sessions podcast. The notion of the paradise evokes sensory memories of a distant land, possibly Robinson’s own home country, Trinidad, with references to ‘white sand’, ‘green hills’ and ‘fresh fish’. The poem ends on a cautiously optimistic note, the paradise offering ‘fresh hope’ and the ‘morning’ connoting a new start. A Portable Paradise Context Many of the poems are hugely affecting, whether evoked in a traditional format, short paragraphs of prose or a few lines. Some would imagine that such poems are easy to do, but the skill and graft shine through Robinson’s words.