In his introduction, James Berry explains how these poems developed slowly over a number of years as his means of reliving his Caribbean experiences whilst living in the UK and of preserving those Caribbean village voices, many of whom had journeyed with him in the great migration to Britain in 1948 in search of a new life. These voices, haunting, lyrical, sometimes angry and despairing, articulate the range of experiences of the Windrush generation, honouring his fellow travellers, memories of their rural childhoods and their encounters with the hopes and disappointments of urban post-war Britain.