In Lonnie's Lament Ken Bolton considers life in 'difficult times' and attempts to register change in the feel of eras as we pass from one to another - a 'history of the vanishing present'. An inquiring focus ranges across heroes, friends, footballers, old cartoons, and people observed in the street, in conversation and in art. Bolton explores how we define ourselves against others, and how our views of them define us. These poems are philosophical, but always amusing, and range from dreamily associative, to snapshot and argument, to travel sketches and the comical.