A BOOK of poems honouring the memory of the 96 Liverpool fans who died at Hillsborough and published in time for the disaster’s 18th anniversary has been written by acclaimed local author Dave Kirby.

Entitled Football Culture and launched at Liverpool’s Anfield clash with Arsenal on Saturday, it features poems such as The Justice Bell and Impunity For The Guilty, which reflect on the tragic events that occurred on April 15, 1989.

“What’s strange and a complete coincidence is that when it was completed at the printer’s there were exactly 96 pages – which is exactly the same thing that happened with the last book, Kop Stories, which featured Hillsborough which I did with another Reds writer Nicky Allt ,” said the 48-year-old from Kirkby, who said that profits from the book will go to the Hillsborough Justice Campaign Centre and children’s charity Zoe’s Place.

Mr Kirby, whose play Brick Up The Mersey Tunnels – again co-written with Allt – had a record-breaking run at the Royal Court, is official poet for Liverpool Football Club. Besides Hillsborough, the book also contains other “terrace verse” based on his experience as a Reds fan, writing and football being the two subjects closest to his heart. One, The Pilgrimage, about his visit to Bill Shankly’s birthplace, had the granddaughter of the legendary former Liverpool manager in tears when Dave read it out at the recent launch of a book devoted to him.


The poems have also proved especially popular at the growing number of after-dinner speaking engagements at sportsman’s dinners, featuring ex-Anfield players, that he has been asked to do.


“For me one of the best parts of doing an LFC night is seeing the horrified expression on the faces of a footie audience when the MC announces that there’s a poet coming on,” he explained. “I totally sympathise with them because in the environment that many grew up in, the word poetry is sacrilegious. That’s mainly because over the years academics have hijacked poetry and taken it over the hill and far away.


“On the same lines I called the book Football Culture after the opening poem in the book, which is a reaction to a few people in the arts world whose attitude towards football is condescending and dismissive, as though it’s a meaningless sub-culture, which really winds me up.


He added: “I’d like to think I’m doing my bit for Liverpool’s Capital of Culture status, introducing scallies to poetry.”