How to tackle the “What does it mean?” question

“Poems need room for the imagination to engage” says Roselle Angwin in a interesting blog post on creating ambiguity in a poem, not telling the whole story. So here’s a problem I have, and I can’t be the only one! When I take a poem to a workshopping group I really don’t like explaining. Anything.Read more ⟶

January’s off to a great start

Happy New Year! I’m particularly upbeat about 2013 – already there are lots of positive things going on in both work and play (not sure where poetry sits on that spectrum but I’m doing my best to blue the edges, little by little.) On New Year’s Eve I had an email from Helen Ivory toRead more ⟶

Brendan Cleary workshop – drafting poems

Yesterday I was in Brighton at the Pub with No Name (which is incidentally in an area with a pub on each street corner as well as halfway down each street, so not having a name is pretty cocky) for an all-day workshop with legendary Irish poet Brendan Cleary. (Brendan is editor of the recently relaunchedRead more ⟶

Brighton Stanza on top

First the good news: I got a note through a week or so ago from Paul McGrane at the Poetry Society saying my poem had been commended in the 2012 Stanza competition (judged by John Siddique), but the full results weren’t out until today. So what should I find, but that there are 2 otherRead more ⟶

So this is what happens when I sit down to write

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 giveRead more ⟶

Writing musings/ submissions etc

I’ve been grabbing the odd hour here and there to write while my other half watches the cricket highlights each day. I need to submit some new stuff, so I need to write some new stuff. I’ve tentatively been trying to come up with something ‘humorous’ for the Moss Rich Prize. Yes I know I’veRead more ⟶