Month: September 2012

Angst/

So this is what happens when I sit down to write

US strip mall

A free evening, and it’s a couple of hours until Downton Abbey (I’ll start watching it at 9, pause it at 9.01 so it starts recording, then start watching it at 9.15 and I can fast forward thru all the ad breaks – sorted!) So I think ‘I’ll dig out some old poem and give it a re-working’ – standard practice if I’m not inspired to write anything new.

Actually I’m a fan of recycling – I’m glad to have kept all the stuff I wrote pre-2009, which is when I tell myself I started taking poetry seriously (ie started READING poetry and realised I was on the Wrong Track) – even though the base material may be, well, base, sometimes there’s a kernel of something which can be dusted off and used. Somehow.

The poem I chanced upon is a little piece written ages ago when I was living in the US and a bit lonely and when I got some leave I used to take myself off on road trips. Ah yes! Cruising along the strip malls, perching my cardboard cup in the drinks holder and pretending I was a native. Surely I can summon up those memories no problem? Except I can’t. It was a while back, and I can’t even picture myself in a left hand drive automatic car, although it certainly happened.

I need to get into the mood – how about some American rock anthems? I used to LOVE singing along to them as I negotiated the I-5. A quick look on Amazon and I’m sampling ‘Babe’ by Styx (1979, their only number 1, apparently) and of course ‘Is this love?’ by Whitesnake. ‘China in your hand’ – ugh, that singer was so FLAT as she approached the chorus. But hang on, Amazon only gives you a few seconds of the song. I need to hear these in full – bring on YouTube. I’m listening to “Babe’ and reading the comments from people who met their first true love when this was playing. Then I remember a slightly embarrassing scene in a Florida piano bar when I sent a request to the players for ‘Babe’ and included the unnecessary details ‘English! Staying at the Hilton!’ on the request slip. Oh dear.

But back to the poem. Unfortunately by this time I am too far gone down the one-way street of lowbrow memories and general tackiness to be able to pull together anything of literary merit. And Downton is on in 20 minutes. Ho hum!

Readings/

Pighog night in aid of breast cancer charity

Charlotte Gann at the Redroaster

Charlotte Gann at the Redroaster

A very good evening yesterday at the Redroaster in Brighton: always lovely to hear Charlotte Gann reading, including some of the goodies familiar to me from her pamphlet ‘The Long Woman’ and some new poems I’d had the privilege of seeing ‘in development’. And she looks so striking under the lights! The photo is taken rather at a distance, sorry about that – but I opted for comfort over the benefits of being close to the action – the leather sofa at the back was just too tempting to ignore.

Clare Best explained her connection with the cause and read from her collection ‘Excisions’ – and just as at the launch of it at the Needlewriters there was such a charged silence while she read. Very moving. Plus Clare has such a calm, expressive voice – actually I could imagine her taking over from Harriet Cass at Radio 4. Must suggest it!

During the second half Kim Lasky spoke about her work with women undergoing treatment for breast cancer, and we heard poetry written by three of them, one of whom read her own material and told us she’d never written anything before this – testimony to the power of creative writing therapy I guess.

During the interval I had an interesting conversation with John Davies from Pighog Press, who said he’d heard my name mentioned in various places – ooh, I thought, that sounds promising – “what, you mean to do with poetry..?” “Um, no….” Oh well! At least I’m on the radar, sort of!

Very nice also to catch up with Julia ahead of our both reading at the Needlewriters next week – we swapped tactics although didn’t get as far as discussing outfits. He he!

Mags & Blogs/

Bad Robot Poetry

Yesterday was the launch of a new ezine, Bad Robot Poetry. Not sure where I read about it but I just think the title is so cool/groovy/excellent* – love the idea of BAD robots. In fact even just robots.

Lots of heady, ALT poetry on there already, including some stuff in Javascript or php or something – ha ha! Plus some creative screenshots. I particularly enjoyed the ‘How well do I know you’ sequence from Ben Beutel-Gunn (I’m not even sure if the names are real!)

Inspiration perhaps for the current Magma call for poems about ‘the soul and the machine’?

Anyway, more about Bad Robot in this promo video by founder/editor Catherine Woodward:

*delete whichever 2 adjectives you find the most ridiculous

Poet's Tips/

Workshop with Mimi Khalvati

Aren’t we lucky in Lewes? A bona fide A-list poet comes down here from London each month to offer her wisdom and help us improve our writing. And I am finally in! After a year or so of champing at the bit I now have a place, and enjoyed my first ‘official’ workshop on Saturday at the salubrious venue of Lewes Bus Station. As well as Mimi there’s also a fantastic line-up of poets in the group, so I feel really privileged.

Here are a few extracts from my frantic note-taking of Mimi-isms, in no particular order… (I know these sound completely random and out of context they probably are, but I’m partly doing it to remind myself of what was said)

  • Don’t say the same thing several times
  • Be careful when editing not to lose the tone, if it’s crucial to the poem
  • On line length, if you’re unsure: find an important line and try using that as your line length
  • Ask yourself “am I going this way or that way?’
  • If you aim high you have more work to do
  • Writing formal poetry is 50 times harder than free verse (I liked this one!)
  • You sometimes need to be bold and not care what readers think/feel
  • Doubt in the mind of the reader is good. Don’t worry about taking things too literally. Sometimes  it’s a sign you need to read more, and read more ‘illogical’ stuff eg Selima Hill. If people don’t understand that’s their problem!
  • Avoid signposting (ie nudging people), plus a few more ‘over used’ words hit the dust (ask me if you really want to know!)
  • Try swapping nouns or noun phrases and see how it sounds – mess things up a bit – to stretch yourself into unfamiliar territory

Happy days!

 

 

Angst/

Please do not put me on after 9.30pm

Stephen Plaice

The autumn poetry scene has swung into action. On Wednesday evening Clare Best hosted an evening of readings at the Needlemakers – something enjoyable from all the readers, a good mix including Jackie Wills, John Davies and Clare herself.

I enjoyed it all but I do tend to very suddenly have a concentration crash at 9.40pm – nothing to do with excess alcohol, I can assure you (I came out with very little cash, and although Charlotte was looking after a basket of fivers – entrance money – for part of the evening, she kept me well away from it. Thanks for buying me a drink though, C!) Sitting with us was a non-poet neighbour-friend who asked us poetry questions which of course got us going. It was all very fine and civilised but I left making a mental note that I hope NEVER to have to read last at an event, and certainly not beyond 10pm.

Then last night was Lewes Poetry, the evening at the Lewes Arms run by Oli Gozzard, famous for its raucous interval limerick competition and near punch-ups during the judging process. I haven’t been to the last couple of events so was looking forward to it. Unfortunately we were late – I dragged Nick along, promising him it wouldn’t even have got going by 9pm, but when we arrived we were just in time for a long interval. Oh good, I thought, the limerick comp! But alas, it has been DROPPED due to ‘public demand’ – what? I miss a couple of sessions and my favourite bit has been ditched because someone got offended. This was Lewes Poetry’s USP, so a big mistake IMHO. Thankfully, Oli read a very rude poem involving ‘coalitions’ and ‘positions’ so managed to slip some welcome hilarity under the radar. I should also mention how fine it was to see Stephen Plaice there (pictured above) – back on the poetry scene, he tells me, so watch out for more from him.

But anyway, I just happened to have a short ditty in my back pocket (!) so when Oli asked if I wanted to read I said ‘yes’ – not thinking of course that being a latecomer I’d be on LAST.

So there I was reading at almost ten pm – so much for my resolve.

 

Mags & Blogs/

Rejected but not cowed

Boo hoo

Oh well … I kind of suspected that the stuff I sent to Poetry London wasn’t going to blow Colette Brice’s socks off. So another sad little SAE plops on my doormat, tell-tale thin. Must do better!

Never mind, I shall blow the dust off, maybe do a little tweaking before trying them elsewhere. (I have a sonnet at the moment that I’m quite pleased with, but it does contain the word ‘erection’ in a context that could be seen to be gratuitous, so perhaps needs  a little work.)

Ambit still have some poems of mine in their intray, which I sent back in May, so I’m starting to wonder if they ever arrived, as 4 months seems a tad slow, even for Ambit.

So I need to get some other stuff off. Do it, woman, and stop talking about it!

Then there’s Saturday’s workshop with Mimi Khalvati looming… I don’t want to waste her time or mine by presenting something half-hearted for workshopping. Do I get out the Poetry London rejects and find out exactly why one of them didn’t make the grade? Do I chance the ‘erection’ poem and hope I don’t blush when reading it (there are men in the group)? Do I try to write something new in the next couple of days..? Ack.

Readings/

Brighton Pecha Kucha Night

Robin Houghton presenting at Pecha Kucha Night Brighton

Robin Houghton presenting at Pecha Kucha Night Brighton

Last Friday I was one of the presenters at Pecha Kucha Night at the Lighthouse in Brighton.

If you’re not familiar with what it’s all about: Pecha Kucha (or PK for short, let’s say) apparently approximates to the Japanese for ‘chit chat’, and it was devised by a firm of american architects based in Japan, who were fed up with having to sit through long, rambling ‘creative’ meetings that went nowhere. So PK is a short format for giving presentations. You have to use 20 slides (no more, no less) and each is shown for exactly 20 seconds. The slides move on automatically and the entire presentation lasts 6 minutes 40 seconds. No chance of over-running or boring anyone!

PK Nights happen all over the world, and they consist of 10 or so presenters who each have a chance to talk about something they’re interested in, to anyone who will listen. The evenings are run by people from the creative community, not-for profit, and the topics tend to be wide-ranging, often fascinating and sometimes hilarious (it’s pretty informal). Last week we had talks on the man who discovered how to treat diabetes with insulin, an impassioned plea to invade the Isle of Man, a talk about teaching animation to kids and plenty other thought-provoking stuff.

My contribution was a bit different in that it was more of a performance and less imparting information. I showed twenty photos by the fantastic Simon Dale, and wrote 3 short narrative poems to go with them, which I read out. (I did a similar thing at a previous PK night a few years ago). I really enjoyed it – it makes a change from just giving a reading and the addition of the photos adds another layer of interest. I had some nice comments afterwards which was great. I don’t expect it was everyone’s cup of tea, but I like the idea of introducing new audiences to poetry in a subversive way – and if they didn’t like the words at least they had some lovely pics to look at!

Thanks to audience member Jonathan who took the photo I’ve used here.

Mags & Blogs/

Close encounter

Close encounter on the Tube

So there I was yesterday lunchtime getting on a tube at Oxford Circus on my way to Victoria and home, when I overhear the words ‘Rialto’ and ‘RSPB’ in the conversation to my right. Then, as one of the men in the group turned around I saw his luggage tag with what looked like a ‘The Rialto’ business card.

Could this be.. Michael Mackmin, legendary editor of the aforementioned first class poetry mag? Standing right next to me? I had 2 stops to make up my mind – do I say “excuse me, are you Michael Mackmin?” or maybe the less certain “excuse me, you’re not Michael Mackmin are you by any chance?”

I’ve done this sort of thing before and made an idiot of myself. Once in a restaurant I approached a party of jovial diners with a prominent flag on their table and asked them where in Germany they were from, only to be told they were Belgian, and I had mistaken their flag. But then again, as a teenager I was a tenacious autograph hunter, with no qualms about asking a tennis player to sign his name on my outstretched arm, or nabbing a famous footballer as he waited for his wife outside the toilets at Wimbledon.

So what’s the matter with me? I’m grown up now! Just say hello! What’s the worst that can happen? He answers “Er … no…” and thinks I’m a weird person who talks to strangers on tube trains. Or “Er … yes” and total embarassment from him while I say something gushing about “I thought so – I love your magazine and you gave me my first break and I’m eversograteful!” Or even “I thought so! I couldn’t help but overhear and then I saw your luggage tag…” making me sound like some sort of stalker – I mean, how likely is it in a city of millions that a poetry editor should have a chance encounter with a lowly contributor/reader outside of a poetry reading?

Time was nearly up. I looked at him again, I think I caught his eye. He looked very stern. Probably already had me marked as a weirdo. I wasn’t even sure it was him. But it must be him – how big is the Rialto? Surely there’s only him and Nathan Hamilton who I know is younger… but there are probably others…I hesitated. I hesitated and I wimped out. I said nothing –  NOTHING!

I then relived and replayed the moment in my mind for rest of the day, especially as I quickly found out that he was indeed in London to judge the RSPB/Rialto competition. Couldn’t I have just said hello???

I shared the experience with a poet friend, who admitted she wouldn’t have said anything either. Not only that, but “he’s a poet too – he would have hated it” – which actually made me feel a lot better. I had saved Michael Mackmin from a horribly embarassing moment. Which perhaps is my way of saying ‘thank you’ to him after all.

Books/

Smith, McCullough, Curtis, Lasky at the Red Roaster

The Glass Delusion by Abi Curtis
Brighton at night

Lovely evening last week at the Red Roaster in Brighton, for the launch of Abi Curtis’s new collection The GlassDelusion. Not too crowded, some familiar faces and a really nice selection of work being read.

The Glass Delusion by Abi Curtis

I’ve a soft spot for Abi ever since she and I were involved with the University of Sussex ‘Poetry Soc’ back in her undergrad days, when I was doing my digital media masters and half-wondering whether I should have been on a Creative Writing MA (which was the loser in my ‘either-or’ decision about what to study as a precursor to my new post-marketing post-corporate life.) Thanks to Abi I took part in my first poetry reading in the (now defunct?) Crypt student bar on campus. Very exciting for me to find out years later that she’d gone on to a career as a poet and academic. I loved her first collection Unexpected Weather and her reading/speaking style is gentle, measured and appealing (“It’s only a little poem, and it’s just called ‘Rabbit’…”) So far I’m enjoying ‘The Glass Delusion’ a lot. More about this in a future post.

Strangely enough, I think this was only the second time I’ve heard Catherine Smith reading her poetry – the last time she was at the Needlewriters in Lewes we heard one of her short stories. I have to say I really enjoyed hearing her, and the selection she chose included a very powerful one which she said some have called ‘an anti-marriage poem, but it’s not, it’s an anti-shopping poem’ which kind of made my ears prick up right away. I think it was probably from her collection ‘Lip’ which I need to seek out. Catherine also read from her forthcoming book, and one poem I recognised about her ‘imagined’ daughters, maybe I’d read it in a magazine?

I’ve really enjoyed John McCullough’s The Frost Fairs and John is an engaging reader. It was great to hear again ‘Reading Frank O’Hara on the Brighton Express’ and ‘Sneakers’ – the latter about a shipload of trainers that floated around the world, which I was a bit annoyed about because I’ve always wanted to write a poem about the ‘Friendly Floatees’ – but now it might seem derivative! Would like to have heard him read one of my favourites from the collection, ‘Sleeping Hermaphrodite’ – maybe next time 🙂