Norman Schwenk's new collection,
Book of Songs
, brings together poems and song lyrics of many varieties: love songs and ballads, dance and battle songs, satires and laments; there is a march, a lullaby, a hymn, a rock-and-roll song, a Christmas carol, a birthday song, a cowboy song, and even a song for a klezmer band. His models are the Scots bard Robbie Burns and the Essex singer-songwriter Adrian May, whom he calls his "song-writing mentor". He also pays homage to his American contemporary, Tom Waits, the Elizabethan song-writer, Thomas Campion, and the Victorian lyricist, W.S. Gilbert, whom he describes as "an honorary Schwenk".