Month: July 2012

Angst/

Writing again after a setback

Polite

A few weeks ago I was feeling a bit ‘stuck’ and decided to pay for another ‘Poetry Prescription’ from the Poetry Society. I got the feedback last week and it was less than motivating. Basically my work got sent to the same poet who looked at it last time (I did a ‘PP’ back in 2008 prior to starting to read and write poetry more seriously). He or she was fairly underwhelmed the first time, and gleefully told me in his or her report that he or she remembered having done so.

Sorry about the he/she malarky – I’m not allowed to know who the poet was who laid into my work, ‘to protect their privacy’ – never mind my privacy!

As I explained to Paul McGrane, I’m happy to take criticism of individual poems (which is the point of the exercise) but would rather have had a fresh eye look over the work. This person seems to have made up their mind before even reading the four poems I submitted (based on their prior opinion) and went out of his or her way to make me feel small and useless.

Is this the way the Poetry Society motivates new writers? What a shame. But thanks to the encouragement/wise words of two or three supportive poet friends I won’t let it set me back. OK, I know a lot of what I’ve written isn’t great, but there is some good stuff in there, and I just need to write more of it. Plus, in poetry there are many opinions and this particular critic may never be a fan of mine no matter what I write.

So I’m back writing again, with a few good kernels of poems on the go. Onwards!

Mags & Blogs/

Ambit at the Betsey Trotwood

Took Lucy along to an Ambit poetry night yesterday at the Betsey Trotwood pub, a little island of old London tahn amidst the chaos and cacophony of Farringdon Road and on the edge of Clerkenwell Green.

We weren’t prepared for the evening to start on time, but it did, so we missed a little of Kevin Crossley-Holland, and the upstairs room was COSY, but we really enjoyed the evening. Loved Jim Burns. Three headline poets and an entertaining short story from Eley Williams, plus an interesting open mic (with only one woman reading, most unusual).

Lucy did her bit riding the faders and even mopping up someone’s spilt beer (she likes to muck in!) and I bought a copy of Ambit, after hurling all sorts of unveiled hints about when I might hear about my submissions (I should never have had that, um, 2nd glass of wine). With a 9pm end we sauntered back to the station and had a very civilised ride home bypassing Victoria. And I didn’t get rained on. Result!

Uncategorized/

Poems from the Old Hill

Abinger_fromair

Jeremy Page at the Frogmore Press is producing an anthology of work by poets who live in Lewes called ‘Poems from the Old Hill’ (althought rumour has it that at least one contributor will have moved out of Lewes by the time it’s published – yikes!)

Very proud to say I have two poems in the collection and will be one of the readers at the Needlewriters launch event on October 4th (National Poetry Day) at the Needlemakers in Lewes. There are a frightening number of poets living in Lewes (John Agard & Grace Nichols live just opposite us) so it wasn’t a given that my offerings would make it into the anthology. Anyway, that’s the Christmas presents sorted out!

 

NB the picture above shows my street in Lewes, from a photo taken from a helicopter earlier this year.

Mags & Blogs/

At the Plastic Bag Museum

these are the things
that carried the stuff
that people bought
see those loops
for hands – handles
they’re called

naturally they never
carried boxes
the corners would
poke through
split sides
you can see why

empties got crumpled
thrust into drawers
small thin ones used
to pick up dogs’ turds
the sturdier ones
for kitchen bins

some got buried
with their cousins or
stuck up trees years
later plucked free or
flushed out to sea
to bob in packs

some (not this one)
swallowed whole or
chomped through
by blue whales
wrapped round claws
or tails perhaps

you’ve seen one
you can’t get them
any more but feel
how smooth and thin
logo intact how
perfectly preserved

 

 

(published in Mslexia issue 53, March 2012)

Mags & Blogs/

Bumper latest news

Seagull_dieppe

Lots been happening lately.

Firstly, my good friend and very talented poet Charlotte Gann was shortlisted for the Michael Marks pamphlet award. Although she was pipped at the post it was a wonderful to see her pamphlet The Long Woman make the shortlist for a big prize.

Then, I had the chance to take part in a workshop here in Lewes with Mimi Khalvati. I’ve been on the ‘reserve’ list for a while and there’s now a strong possibility I may make the cut for the autumn dates.

It’s difficult to step into an established workshopping group where everyone else knows each other, and I had decided not to attend as a ‘fill in’ any more, but if I can become a regular member I think that will be much more helpful, for me and I’m sure for everyone else, as It’s not always useful to have a stranger turn up and launch into a critique of your work.

Also in June I finished a short course at the Poetry School with Jack Underwood, all about putting together a pamphlet. It was useful and fun, although I’m not sure I’d do a regular class in Lambeth again as travel to and from isn’t easy – the class over-ran every time and because I had to run for a train it meant I missed quite a lot. More about the pamphlet in another post. Met some interesting poets on the course, including Harry Man, Madeleine Wurzburger, Steve Boorman and Olly Todd.

Although I missed the Brighton Stanza meetup last month and will miss the next (am giving a talk to the London Writers’ Cafe group about blogging) I did make it to the Pighog poetry night at the RedRoaster Cafe in Brighton last week. It was a great evening, with John Davies, John McCullough and Rosy Carrick reading – I really enjoyed Rosy’s performance and was great to finally meet the lovely John McC who I feel I already know a little via Twitter and Facebook – I’m now enjoying reading his book The Frost Fairs. I did read at the open mic (just – they called it a day and then said ‘OK, we’ll take one more reader’) and got a ‘well done’ from John Davies afterwards, which was kind of him.

PS the photo was taken in Dieppe at the weekend, where it appears to be summer.