Quiet words that reflect the universal experience of conflict

Letter Composed During a Lull in the Fighting and Other Poems. By Kevin Powers. Sceptre, €16.35. Reviewed by Dermot Bolger.

US soldiers on patrol in the Iraqi town of Al Betra: Kevin Powers' new collection of poetry is based on his one-year tour of duty in the country between 2004 and 2005.

Letter Composed During a Lull in the Fighting and Other Poems

**By** Kevin Powers

**Sceptre,** €16.35

**Reviewed by** Dermot Bolger

.....

As Labour leader Ramsay MacDonald cautioned in the House of Commons on the eve of the First World War: ''No war is at first unpopular. Whatever vices the First World War can be accused of, back then - during its heady early months - unpopularity was not one of them.

In those ...