IN this, his first collection of poetry since being appointed Poet Laureate, Andrew Motion shows courage and candour as he charts private and public realms with deft technical skill.

Picture This celebrates the Queen Mother's 100th birthday. Its lyrics are charged with nostalgia: the plunging necklaces of the Jazz Age; extravagant hats at garden parties; and the grassy Ascot drive. Remember This commemorates her death - her coffin "glides away through London's traffic-parted day".

Mythology marks the untimely death of Diana, Princess of Wales, with the words: "Diana, breathless, hunted by your own quick hounds".

Motion is deeply serious about being Poet Laureate; he pays tribute to an illustrious predecessor, Alfred Lord Tennyson, in The Dog Of The Light Brigade - a poem that celebrates the trivia not usually associated with historic events.

Motion, below, strives to live up to the history of his court appointment as well as living up to his own personal history.

Serenade is a powerful poem about the fate of a horse after it threw his mother "as they jumped out of a wood into sunlight". The accident led to her death.

The Game eloquently describes the capacity for children to erupt into cruelty. It conveys a tension between courtesy and awkwardness that is peculiarly English, as Motion mumbled a humiliating "thank you" to his tormentors after they grew tired of bullying him.

Star Gazing is a beautiful love poem portraying a tender intimacy between Motion and his wife as they lay on blood-red tiles imprinted with the heat of the day. Love's limitless capacity to surprise.

Updated: 09:01 Wednesday, September 18, 2002