Michael Carding has not moved from being a mathematician to a poet; rather poetry has grown and been nurtured in the fertile bed of pattern. From the music of Bach to the structure of DNA, from learning a new language to Gareth Southgate’s 3-5-2, pattern is the holy grail. Michael has used pattern as the key-stone to gather this eclectic collection into a coherent volume. In mathematics, a line can be straight or curved, continuous or broken, finite or infinite. A line of poetry can stand on its own, develop an idea, change the direction of thought, reach a conclusion or invite our imaginations into the unknown. In fact, it can be straight or curved, continuous or broken, finite or infinite! These poems start with birth, finish with death and visit a few places en route. Life Lines and Cross Lines betray a belief that life on earth is not the full extent of our line. In Longitude and Latitude Michael writes about places, how they affect him and what messages they hold for us all. He teases us with riddles and Converging Lines celebrate the juxtaposition of unlikely partners. Head Lines may already be obsolete yet Lineage & Heritage is proof that some material is never outdated. Finally, there are Punch Lines. Anyone who knows me will have predicted, with a resigned smile, that I will have snuck some humour between the covers!