White Tulip is a garland for the flames, a sequence of memoirs in verse for distinguished family and friends, including the pianist Geraldine Swingler, the historians and peace-campaigners Edward and Dorothy Thompson, and the author's uncle Frank, executed while fighting with the Bulgarian Partisans in 1944. China, Ireland, Litakovo, Haworth and Thermopylae White Tulip is a book about love and loss, the living and the dead, History and memory, and the sudden illuminations that force themselves up through the cracks in the pavement.