Category: Blog

Stephen Bone’s ‘In The Cinema’

 

In the cinema by Stephen Bone

I wanted to say how much I’ve enjoyed Stephen Bone‘s first collection, In The Cinema, just out from Playdead Press.

Moving images, set pieces and numerous characters play out through the book, as the poems go back and forth between childhood recollections, reflections on relationships (both the long-term kind and fleeting encounters), and the more recent past. Not new territory, perhaps, but many of these poems have a sparseness and simplicity that I found very compelling.

The title poem, although it appears in the middle of the book, is the shortest, but it encapsulates so many of the themes – the recollection (or replaying) of stories with known or unknown endings, glimpses/reminders of another era … disappointment, the passing of time, acceptance.

Your whispered
words silently
replay themselves –

don’t tell me how it ends
don’t spoil it for me.

(‘In The Cinema’)

The poet picks over every detail almost like an archaeologist, with care, precision and wonderment. There’s a strong sense of touch and the physical – Reluctantly, / a child braced for medicine I open up / to be fed a scoop of decay  (‘Medlars’)  and in ‘Windfall’ – I tidy your bottles, touch your face. Tidy them again. / I pour water, wind your watch. 

There are character portraits of people at their work – a pedicurist,  a hairdresser tending in silence to an elderly man ‘white hair falling from him like ash’ (‘Ash’), and a series of gentle tableaux where we’re looking in from the outside, often to a soundtrack of off-stage music or something being whispered that we can’t quite make out.

In the final poem (‘Voice-over’) a character from the past talks back from a photo, breaking the ‘fourth wall’, as if creating a kind of release or closure. A suitably cinematic effect?

Inevitably, not every poem in this collection worked for me. But overall I was intrigued and moved; there were many beautiful moments.  I found some of the most understated poems the most heart-breaking  – ‘Windfall’, ‘Pre-emptive’ and ‘Doreen’s Bath’ in particular come to mind – and the poignancy of the images stayed with me.

In The Cinema by Stephen Bone, £7.99 from Playdead Press.

Stanza Reps & Reading at Keats House

Last Wednesday I spent a good part of the day at Keats House in London – in the afternoon meeting with around 35 or so Stanza Reps from around the country and beyond, then the evening AGM where I’d been invited to read. Even as I write that I find it slightly unreal. But it did actually happen – I know this because although part of me thinks there are some things in my life I may have invented or imagined, in this case I do actually have photos.

Keats House

Things started well. As I got to Keats House a jay flew in and landed on a bush right in front of me, which felt like a good omen. I’ve only seen a jay once before and not exactly up close. It seems just too colourful a bird to be British (and yes I know we have parakeets but they’re just arrivistes – ooh! I is that a half-rhyme?)

Paul McGrane of the Poetry Society had co-ordinated the Reps’ meeting and it was a great chance to meet up with reps I already knew such as Antony Mair (Hastings), Robert Harper (Shrewsbury), Margaret Beston (Tonbridge), Sarah Leavesley (Worcestershire) and Tessa Lang (Clapham), and others I’d never met – although many of the names were familiar.

We had short readings from some of the reps, myself included, and these were interjected through the afternoon rather than all in one go, which I thought was a great idea. There was plenty of discussion about meeting etiquette & procedure, now to put together an anthology, events and so forth. If you’re not familiar with Stanzas – they’re volunteer-run groups, under the auspices of the Poetry Society, although anyone can attend, you don’t have to be a Poetry Society member. I’m the rep for Brighton, although I live about 7 miles away in Lewes, but luckily I have a ‘loose committee’ of helpers and others who help with things like booking venues. It’s quite a lot of work, but enjoyable – even with the occasional ‘difficult’ customer.

Stanza Reps at Keats House

Hurrah for the Stanza reps and the Poetry Society! A very useful and enjoyable afternoon. With half an hour or so between the Reps’ meeting and the AGM, Robert Harper and I went off to a local cafe for a coffee and a chat about his magazine Bare Fiction. It’s a beautiful-looking book and Robert’s done an amazing job building up the readership and dealing with the avalanches of submissions he gets, PLUS running a successful competition, all in its first year.

Robin Houghton poet reading at Keats House

By the time my reading ‘slot’ came along I was nervous but itching to get up there. I’m looking a bit stiff in this photo – but at least my eyes are open! It wasn’t a huge audience, but it included incoming and outgoing trustees, all the key staff and many fine poets. Also reading were  Suzanna Fitzpatrick (who won the Hamish Canham Prize this year) and Daljit Nagra who was great fun, and whose poem about Krishna pleasuring hundreds of new brides at the same time (which is OK apparently, because he’s a god) was very funny indeed.

Suzanna Fitzpatrick, Daljit Nagra & Robin Houghton  poetry reading

It just felt like a huge privilege to be there and to have those people even give my two wee poems the time of day. And that’s not me fishing for compliments, believe it or not. I know I’m a novice poet and no number of competition successes or published poems changes that fact. I think whether I make it beyond the novice stage is entirely a matter of time and graft. But I’m learning to be patient!

During the day I even got rid of a number of pamphlets – I won’t say ‘sold’ as I left a pile on the freebies table and… well you can guess what happened!

After all the excitement I had a really lovely time unwinding in the pub with poet friend Lynne – a wise and inspirational person if ever there was one.

Then the reality of the train journey home, carriages packed to the brim with Arsenal fans and people munching smelly food – thankfully I had ‘Gravity’ to watch on my phone, which blotted out all distractions.

(Photos courtesy of Sophie at the Poetry Society)

Poetry competitions: ‘do you not know who I think I am?’

Winners & losers roadsign

I laughed out loud at Martin Malone’s editorial in The Interpreter’s House 57 on the subject of poetry competitions.

What is wrong with us? […] Are we such fragile approval junkies that we need to feel repeatedly validated by our Highly Commended in the East Jokerville 3rd Annual Arts Festival Poetry Competition?” Er, is that a rhetorical question?

He goes on to question what competitions are actually for (“Do they produce some great poetry? Or do they produce great Competition Poetry? Has this notion actually become a poetic sub-genre in itself?”)

Competitions are one of those things that poets are supposed to feel ambiguous about. You know how it is: you shouldn’t appear too bitter if you go in for something and don’t win (the Troubadour winners have already been contacted by the way, and I didn’t get a phone call – PAH!). But then again, if you win something, it doesn’t do to be dismissive in an attempt at modesty (“It’s not as if it were the National!”). And yes, I’m guilty of this – but then a friend pointed out “If you go in for a competition, surely the best possible result is to win?” (ie what the &*$@?* are you moaning about…)

It’s taken me a while but I think I’ve finally learnt my lesson: the best policy is to treat winning in the same way you should treat any compliment – accept it graciously, say thank you but don’t let it go to your head.

Or as Martin says, “A personal rule of thumb with regard to competitions is that they’re all rubbish except the ones I win or do well in. And I’m right: they are all rubbish except those ones. I think I speak for many in the poetry community when I ask the question, ‘Do you not know who you think I am?’ ”  Tee hee!

Vanguard Readings – Six Poets & Anthology Launch

Richard Skinner’s excellent Vanguard Readings at The Bear in Camberwell generally hosts both poets and prose writers, but last night was a poetry special. Somehow I managed to arrived only just in time, but I’m pleased I did as the first reader was my friend Josephine Corcoran.

Josephine’s first pamphlet is ‘The Misplaced House’, out from tall-lighthouse at the end of this month and I think it’s going to be a corker (no pun intended… well, maybe). Reading first (or last!) isn’t always easy but Josephine did a fine job. She was followed by Josephine Dickinson, a poet who I’m not familiar with, but I enjoyed the sense of magic she created in the room and and felt I wanted to know more about her and her work. All the way from Alston in Cumbria, a place I know (and I know how far it is from anywhere), an impressive way to come to entertain the Vanguard audience.

Vanguard Readers 20-11-14

The final first-half reader was no less than Michael Symmons Roberts, reading mostly from his amazing book Drysalter which won last year’s Forward Poetry Prize and Costa Book Award as well as being shortlisted for the T S Eliot Prize. It was a shame that Michael had to leave for his train back to Manchester as I’d like to have spoken to him. I liked his reading style and was fascinated to know more about how he went about writing Drysalter, 150 poems each 15 lines long, over 5 years.

In the second half I moved down the front and consequently the photos are a bit less fuzzy, although I seem to have captured some shut-eye moments in the readers – sorr-eee! Not only did we hear from Matt Merritt, legendary blogger and the official bird watching poet – great to meet him at last – but also Cristina Navazo-Eguía Newton who I last saw performing flamenco in Swindon.  In Matt’s reading I particularly enjoyed the poems from his ‘unpronounceable’ collection hydrodaktulopsychicharmonica from Nine Arches Press. Good thing it’s available to buy online, as I’m not sure I’d be able to ask for it in our local bookshop.

3 more Vanguard Readers 201114

When Cristina took to the floor she commanded it as usual, petite as she it, her personality is ginormous and she recited two of her long poems, entirely from memory, with electricity and panache. Very hard to take one’s eyes off her! The final reader of the evening was our host Richard Skinner who read three poems from the first anthology from Vanguard Editions, by poets who couldn’t be present – the last of which was by Marion Tracy, from her excellent pamphlet The Giant in the Doorway (HappenStance). Richard gave Marion an amazing introduction and announced her to be ‘one of the least well known poets around but one of the best’. Are you listening, Marion?! Hope so!

vanguard #1anthology

It’s always nice to put faces to names at these events, and I was very pleased to meet for the first time blogger poet Clarissa Aykroyd, and to chat with her on the bus back towards Victoria about the various merits of Vancouver vs London and knowing someone from Kamloops.