Blue coffee

Ever since Out Loud in 1968, Adrian Mitchell has been one of Europe's bestselling poets. His poetry's simplicity, clarity, passion and humour show his allegiance to a vital, popular tradition embracing William Blake as well as the Border Ballads and the blues. His most nakedly political poems - about nuclear war, Vietnam, prisons and racism - have become part of the folklore of the Left, sung and recited at demonstrations and mass rallies. Bloodaxe already publishes Adrian Mitchell's Greatest Hits - his 'forty Golden Greats'. This new book brings together the poems he has written since his last collection, On the Beach at Cambridge, appeared in 1985. It will be followed in 1997 by Heart on the Left: Poems 1953-1984, making all his work available in the year of his 65th birthday.