One theme of ‘a swim or dive’ is to be explored through blank verse (in iambic pentameter), written as a single stanza which is also ‘a sustained piece of poetic description’, to a maximum length of twenty-four lines. Alongside weeks devoted to subjects such as ‘Sonnet (Petrarchan)’ or ‘Sonnet (Shakespearean)’, there are looser, more ‘open’ investigations. Each exercise is supported by selections of existing poems for recommended reading; one or more of these are reproduced. This curating is a reflection of Albiston’s formidable command of poetic technique, both in her theoretical understanding of it, and in the way it can be employed in the actual creation of a poem, as attested to across her own oeuvre of eight poetry collections to date.

While the focus in these selections is on poems by Australian poets, there are also selections from overseas poets and seminal masters of poetry in English. In this regard, The Weekly Poem can also be enjoyed as a wonderful anthology, thrumming with poems that are alive to this diverse art. There is a highly useful glossary of essential poetic terms.