The Marble Fly is Jamie McKendrick's third collection. The title refers to an image on a Pompeian wall-relief, and fuses McKendrick's interests in the classical world and natural history. The poems themselves are intricate, and they are occupied by various histories: natural and unnatural, personal and impersonal. They are concerned (not only metaphorically) with modes of transport and their relation to the natural world - Darwins's Voayge of the Beagle , the construction of canals, the first aeroplane, spiders sent up into space in Skylab. This book is intended for poetry readers; sixth formers/undergraduates .