Rum

Taking the rum bottle you rinse
out the sweet sugar film and force a red
candle into the void

Each evening we light the wick, replace
it when flame melts into nothingness,
only the wax

remains, the liquid drips hardened
around the neck like the frill
of some long extinct lizard

I nurture the long drops like children
noting the growth and checking
for weeping fragility

What are poems but the flickering
huff and waft of the smoke
when the candle

gutters in the coil that sneaks past
reason and sense, the spaces
where emotion gets in

through the gap of the window frame
and my glass is tilted in the hand,
the liquid is burning amber

and the flame in the eye
is burning amber

crouching tiger

To be in the desert, together again.

Christmas Poem

Be: Magazine

Did anyone ever tell you you look like a young prince out of the 'Arabian Nights'?

LITERaTE ILLUSTRaTE : review of the night

This was an event held at The Boars Head Gallery in Kidderminster. It was an interesting concept asking poets and artists to combine words and artwork and submit them for a competition. I enjoyed working on the piece. It was nice to get the paint out and do something creative other than sit with my notebook.

The gallery is a wonderful space to perfom in with fantastic artwork on all the walls. There is a facebook page that you can join if you are interested in finding out more about exhibitions and events.

I read but it was not my best, I was exhausted and could feel the tight grip I was keeping on myself, resulting in a slightly over-anxious performance. It didn't help that I read three feminist poems one after the other. The men in the back row of the room looked a bit unsettled and then they all went for a fag straight after...coincidence~?!

Must remember to mix in a few poems on other topics to give the audience a break from the strong messages in those types of poems I suppose. I seem to write a lot of poems lately that are angry or curious about how women are treated/placed in society, having a daughter makes me reflect on these issues more than I did before she was born.

The poem I wrote for the event was called 'Ambition and Expectation' and was about those things being personified as two creepy masked women watching me...very odd indeed! The other poem I read which is on the clip is called Bikkja and I am very pleased because it is going to be published in Be:Magazine in February.

Youtube clip of the two poems




Bobby Parker was host for the night and performed two poems that were full of manic energy and imagery, he had control of the words and made them twist and bend into the shapes he wanted.

Delphine de Noire had a quieter stage presence but it was effective in the way it made everyone sit forward and listen. Her wolf poem was one of my favourite of the night. She came second in the final competition with her piece 'Multiple Lacerations'.

Sarah James perfomed three poems at the event but she also recored her artwork poem and there is a youtube clip of her reading it plus the ones on the evening. It gives a real glimpse of the gallery and atmosphere of the night. Watch it here. It was an excellent set, 'At Night' was an interesting poem which used a lot of rhyme which worked well.  She also performed one my favourites from her collection 'Into The Yell' which is which is about 10 different options of things to do before you die.

Catherine Crosswell is always entertaining to watch as she has a very professional performance style. She has poems that packed full of words, that play with different meanings and puns and she never slips up, it all sounds effortless and I like the way she drifts into lines that are sung and alters her pacing from rapid to slow almost line by line. 'Thief' was another highlight of the night.

Kate Wragg's artwork 'Hanging On' won the competition and it was very clever and the idea was simple which was refreshing, it was beautifully painted and everyone liked it.

Jo Langton is an exciting poet. Her ambitious collection of art postcards were excellent and I thought they brought an interesting viewpoint to the comp. She read two poems from her collection 'Fill the Silence.' This is available here

Sarah Tamar's 'Meltdown' was the third place, I voted for this one, I loved the intensity of it. Sarah read very well and held the audience's attention. Her poem about Father Christmas was perhaps, the biggest success of the night. Very festive and witty in a way Sarah does so well.

Raven Brookes tuned up late but she handled it with style, getting up and reading despite having no time to sit down, I am glad she did because she read so well. Her villanelle was really excellent, they are tricky things to write but Raven has nailed it with one. The hypnotic repeating lines made the poem stand out in a night of incredible poetry.

I always like to be surprised at poetry nights and for me the best part of the night were the two poems by George Payton. I thought he was just there to watch as he had no artwork included in the competition but he got up and performed in the second half of the night. I really enjoyed his poems and his whole performance style, I especially liked the witty way his stoner poem ended as he forgot the words, almost in a cloud of smoke, he is either incredibly clever or his shambolic pothead persona is true to life: I imagine it to be a bit of both.

I can't sleep

I am waiting for it to snow.

All the Whiskey in Heaven by Charles Bernstein

Not for all the whiskey in heaven
Not for all the flies in Vermont
Not for all the tears in the basement
Not for a million trips to Mars

Not if you paid me in diamonds
Not if you paid me in pearls
Not if you gave me your pinky ring
Not if you gave me your curls

Not for all the fire in hell
Not for all the blue in the sky
Not for an empire of my own
Not even for peace of mind

No, never, I'll never stop loving you
Not till my heart beats its last
And even then in my words and my songs
I will love you all over again

Arvon course is a gift of peace and quiet so I can write

Being a mother of young children is stimulating and wonderful. They are loving and responsive and interesting to watch as they grow and learn new things.

But it is also very loud.

There is the constant noise of children chattering or bickering, the hum and swish of the washing machine with it's endless cycle of clothes. The television's chirping blandness, cheerful tunes that get stuck in my head.

The shrieking noise when they are arguing over something is nearly as loud as the joyful noise they make when they invent a running around in circles game or a 'we are roaring tigers' game.

It is noisy, all the time, except when they are asleep. Then it is quiet and calm. But I am too tired by then to do anything useful, let alone be creative or write my dissertation. Not the best environment to be a writer, however I keep going, seeking time in between the chaos.

Yesterday I found out I had been awarded an Arvon grant allowing me to go on a course at the very end of winter. It is in Shropshire and as the picture above shows, it is secluded and peaceful. I am so happy and excited at the thought of silence and time to write. I feel extremely grateful that Arvon encourage and help writers like myself who cannot afford the fee. It is generous and I hope to repay them by coming out of the course inspired and motivated.

The poets teaching on the course are Fiona Sampson, David Harsent and Jamie McKendrick. I am so excited...I've already said that haven't I?!

Mid-Term Break by Seamus Heaney

I sat all morning in the college sick bay
Counting bells knelling classes to a close.
At ten o'clock our neighbours drove me home.

In the porch I met my father crying -
He had always taken funerals in his stride -
And Big Jim Evans saying it was a hard blow.

The baby cooed and laughed and rocked the pram
When I came in, and I was embarrassed
By old men standing up to shake my hand
 
And tell me they were 'sorry for my trouble'
Whispers informed strangers that I was the eldest,
Away at school, as my mother held my hand

In hers and coughed out angry tearless sighs.
At ten o'clock the ambulance arrived
With the corpse, stanched and bandaged by the nurses.

Next morning I went up into the room. Snowdrops
And candles soothed the bedside I saw him
For the first time in six weeks. Paler now,

Wearing a poppy bruise on his left temple.
He lay in a four foot box, as in his cot.
No gaudy scars, the bumper knocked him clear.

A four foot box, a foot for every year.

Where there is life, there is hope...

When I posted that the dog killed the chicken, I wasn't entirely truthful. The gruesome truth was the dog had really hurt the chicken and I couldn't put her out of her misery so I took her to the old chap who lives next door.

He keeps lots of chickens and I knew he wouldn't be as soft as me about it. He was very kind and took her off me. Anyway I thought he would have killed her as soon as I had gone, hence why I wrote the sad post about my chicken being dead.



Yesterday my little boys were playing outside and came to fetch me because he said the old man next door had something for us. Off we went, expecting vegetables or a bag of apples. Imagine my shock and joy when he said, 'Look, one lucky chicken.'

There was Snowdrop scratching around, eating corn and drinking water. She looked bedraggled and pissed off, but I would be unhappy if a dog had attacked me. The old man had rubbed some magic cream of his own invention onto her back and bandaged her up. I have never seen anything like it.

Today the chicken is back in the pen with her friend Bluebell and seems a bit perkier. I have no idea if she is going to make it. Will her skin and feathers grow back? The old man seems to think so. He said, 'Where there is life, there's hope.'

Wolf with white feathers

Our pet wolf.
Snapping and feathering.

Our pet wolf killing our white chicken.
She was called Snowdrop and belonged to my daughter.

The dog always disliked the white chicken, who was bold and would sneak out of the pen to peck in the garden. When the dog was locked in her kennel Snowdrop would peck right outside as if to say, 'Ha! What can you do about it?'

Well the dog took her chance and executed her. It was horrible but I was quick to tell the children they couldn't blame the dog...she was only acting like a dog. It was our fault for not fixing the small hole in the chicken pen. One of those jobs we meant to do and kept forgetting.

Daughter took it very well, 'I'm OK. Chicken's don't live long anyway.'
Older son was very sad, we both cried as we were fond of the silly white chicken.

That's what happens when you domesticate a wolf and keep it as a pet.

Hit The Ode Tonight!!

The Victoria, Birmingham

48 John Bright Street, B1 1BN

Birmingham, United Kingdom

'Hit the Ode brings the most exciting poets from the region, the country and the world straight to the heart of Birmingham. We have poems unlike any others. These are poems which show up like that last night bus you thought you'd missed; poems which double as functioning dream-catchers; poems which sound like ice cream tastes. Good poems, that’s what we have. Come and get them. Our guests this time will be:

From Derby, Joe Coghlan: a writer and performer who blends the rhythms and rhyme schemes of rap with the breathing space of good storytelling.

From Totnes, Matt Harvey: writer, poet, enemy of all that’s difficult and upsetting, and host of Radio 4’s Wondermentalist poetry cabaret.

From Ireland, Catherine Brogan: a multi-talented performer and multiple slam winner, multiple times better than what’s playing in your multiplex.

A very few open mic slots are available - sign up via email 

(bohdan@applesandsnakes.org) or on the door.'

Poetry Bites with Joseph Horgan and Bobby Parker

Poetry Bites is a monthly poetry event based at the Kitchen Garden Cafe in Kings Heath, Birmingham. I have wanted to go to it for a long time but it clashes with my daughter's gymnastics class. During the week Bobby Parker put out a call for a lift on facebook to get to Poetry Bites and it seemed like the perfect chance to go. Gymnastics not quite as important as enabling a poet to read his poetry out loud to an audience!

Bobby Parker

Then I thought if I am driving I may as well fill my car up with a collection of excellent poets. So I messaged Chris Guidon and his beautiful, talented fiance Emma (she paints amazing pictures) and invited them to come.

Then I asked the poet Sarah James if she wanted the last space and she said yes... a whole car load of poets (and one artist and muse) heading for Poetry Bites. What could go wrong?

I picked up Sarah from Droitwich and headed for Kiddy, this went fairly well as I know my way around The Shire, problems began after I picked up Bobby, Chris and Emma.

Does anyone know the way?
No.
Nobody knows?
No.

I had a map.
It was useless.
Actually I was useless at reading the map.

Under pressure to deliver one of the headline acts my brain melted into custard and I sat gaping like a goldfish somewhere in Hagley whilst the people in the back waited for me to find my way. Luckily sat next to me was a calm voice of reason who also had the foresight to bring her Sat Nav thingy.  

Sarah programmed it to bark orders at me in a bored female voice but I was so happy to be able to get there I welcomed every snotty order the Sat Nav directed at me. Thank you to Sarah James for getting us all to Poetry Bites, you are an absolute STAR!

Sarah James

Anyway we got there, on time as well. So what was the poetry like? Let me tell you, but remember I wasn't in official review mode so I didn't write notes on all acts or record all their names. So this is just an impression of the night not a review of every single poet, just the ones that really stood out to me, and relying on my slightly faulty memory.

Jacqui Rowe and David Calcutt were brilliant hosts and it was a very packed audience. There was a chap called Roger, I think, who read a number of observational poems about travelling on buses, I thought he captured some insights into human nature very well and speaking to him before hand it seemed that poetry meant a great deal to him. There was a guy called Chris who performed a powerful poem about the tricks and lies of the media which was excellent. Then there was a female poet who read two poems about a willow and a rowan tree which I enjoyed as I love tree imagery and I liked the pagan symbols about the trees that were layered into the poems. David Calcutt read two beautiful poems, his poetry is so carefully constructed that it makes strong, vivid pictures in my head as he reads them.

rowan tree

Chris Guidon read three excellent poems, I really like the way he writes and I like the way he reads them to the audience, quite mesmerising. One of the poems opened with the lines,

'We came across an abandoned car
still clicking in the snow drift,
poised there like a nervous dog left -
tied to the railings outside some empty shop.'

It was a stunning poem. The last poem was about time spent on holiday with his girlfriend where they were watching a helicopter lift water to release onto an olive grove. The poem was skillfully tense and expectant, filled with sensual, erotic metaphors.

Gary Longdon read a very interesting set of three poems about Aston Hall and he showed off his excellenet performance skills but investing each piece with different pace and emotion. The inspired idea of likening the Jacobean mansion to an alien spacecraft set down in urban sprawl was brilliant and funny.  The Long Gallery poem was clever too, very well observed and a good connection (the image of the walk along the gallery ) to the final poem which was softer, introspective and had a stong central image, things appearing different under the surface, of the layers of grime hiding the oak walls and the last line was so strong.

Sarah James read two poems which contrasted very well. The first was very clever, called 'The je ne sais quoi of it' she was playing with the ideas of linguistics and memory. It felt emotional but not sentimental and had a film like quality. She followed that with a witty little poem imagining the dreams and desires of a fridge. I like the way poets take you places you have never imagined.

Laurence Inman's poem about running was really excellent. I enjoyed it very much, It had so much going on it and he performed it very well.

Adele's poem about her daughter was perhaps my favourite of the night. I identified so strongly with her feelings about motherhood, her relationship with her daughter and coping with people's judgement about having a baby at the apprently incorrect time. Although I wasn't as young as Adele was when she had her daughter (and I loved how her daughter was so proud of her poetic, hippy mum) I had my own share of people thinking I was mad to have a baby as a single mum. Adele cleverly encapsulated many of my own feelings and her poem made me laugh and I nearly cried too. A wonderful performance and talent.

Antony R Owen is a poet I have seen twice before now and each time I hear him read it is a very intense and assured performance, he commands the audience by the power of his voice and his poetry. His poems often make me feel uneasy but at the same time they absorb me. His poem about his father was one my highlights of the night.

Janet Smith came on late in the second half and she cast a spell over the whole audience with her poised and elegant performance. Softly spoken but she holds the audience with her spare, beautifully constructed poems. She read two poems with an Alaskan theme including her stunning poem 'Pacific' which is in three parts. The way Janet says the numbers before each section is like a pause for the audience to take a breath before the next vivid description. To me, her poems feel like paintings made with words.

Mal Dewhirst read an interesting poem about his time in Ireland as part of the Cork/Coventry poet exchange which complimented the poems Joseph Horgan would follow with later. Mal reads very well and his poems are crafted so the listener can go on the journey too, with the poet as he observed his surroundings in Ireland.

Joseph Horgan, was originally born in Birmingham, to Irish parents but has lived in Ireland since the 1980's. He obviously has a close connection to the city and it made his performance feel very special and quite emotional as the audience recognised the descriptions of Birmingham in his poetry. He had everyone in the audience hanging off every word. His poems were short and I liked that, it takes skill to be succinct and convey so much. He read a poem about watching his sisters washing their hair in the sink, chatting and gossiping, full of life and the hair seemed to me to symbolise innocence, childhood happiness and it ended with the sisters moving out and cutting their hair short. It was one of the best poems I have heard this year, I loved it. It was a pleasure to hear him read.


Bobby Parker was on fire last night, he read last and was extremely relaxed and confident. Reading from his collection 'Digging for Toys' he picked out different poems on various subjects but all were well received by the audience. He made them laugh, gasp, bellow and cheer. He explored difficult themes but never wallowed in misery, he has a lightness of touch that allows the audience to share his sense of humour. His poem about his feelings of fear before his wedding called 'HGWell's' was a typical example of his skill. Surreal, humourous on one level, it has layers below that explored his relationship with his girlfriend, family and the conventions of marriage. It was excellent. I also thought his poem about his love for his daughter was extrememly clever. To write about his baby smelling of piss may seem horrible but in the skillful hands of the poet Bobby Parker it is an expression of deep and pure love that doesn't need sentiment or pretty similies. He writes poetry that has the ring of truth about it and that is very talented indeed.

I also read but I will leave someone else to write a review of my poems.

The defence of Guinevere by William Morris

sketched by Rossetti (Lancelot?)

    But, knowing now that they would have her speak,

    She threw her wet hair backward from her brow,

    Her hand close to her mouth touching her cheek,

    As though she had had there a shameful blow,

    And feeling it shameful to feel ought but shame

    All through her heart, yet felt her cheek burned so,

    She must a little touch it; like one lame

    She walked away from Gauwaine, with her head

    Still lifted up; and on her cheek of flame

    The tears dried quick; she stopped at last and said:

    O knights and lords, it seems but little skill

    To talk of well-known things past now and dead.

painted by Morris (Arthur?)

The Liebster Award

Today the extremely talented and kind poet Sarah James chose this very blog as one of her five choices for The Liebster Award. Wow! It was a lovely lift on a grey day. So I want to say a massive thank you to Sarah James and explain what it all means...

'Liebster is a German word meaning dearest, and the award is given to up-and-coming bloggers with less than 200 followers.

If you receive the award, you should:

1. Thank the giver and link back to the blogger who gave it to you.

2. Reveal your top five picks and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog.

3. Copy and paste the award on your blog.

4. Hope that the people you’ve sent the award to forward it to their five favourite bloggers and keep it going!'

Here are my 5 choices for the Liebster Award, all are blogs I visit often (I would have chosen Fergus McGonigal because I am always loitering on his blog but he got an award already today and one is enough for any poet):

Chrissy Dano Johnson: silver fin of hope is a place to find daily posts of haiku, verse, fiction and real life. Beautiful, intense writing that I never get tired of reading and luckily Chrissy writes a lot.   Diane Perry: working 2 write is a blog written by a passionate and hard working writer who is  crafting her writing and sharing her journey. The blog is interesting and always has good tips and inspires me to write more.   Charlotte Turnbull: the deadliness of leisure is a sharp, witty and surreal blog that has meandering thoughts and questioning posts, reviews, dialogue and prose. It always surprises me and that is a good thing. The writing can be hilariously scathing.   Melanie Ann Green: inkmeup designs this is a lovely blog that showcases the wonderful artwork, feltmaking, prints and designs of Melanie and I often visit to ponder what I will buy next.

	Gary Longdon: Garyswordz is a brilliant blog because it has excellent poetry to read and an invaluable list of what's on in the poetry world as well as film reviews, blog lists and general artistic trivia.

a life dedicated to pleasure and poetry

'All women together, ought to let flowers fall upon the grave of Aphra Behn... for it was she who earned them the right to speak their minds.'
Virginia Woolf

a little cottage in the woods

I want to live here with just the foxes and badgers for company.

Rorschach Inkblot Test

Wolves in profile, heads tilted back

Howling either side

Of a Shaman.

Butterflies 

Blur into the shape

Of the vulva.

Two African women

Leaning over a cooking pot

Sharing stories.

The next is a monster;

But it is important to note

He is affable.

A bat.

A cat that has been squashed

Flat and pasted into

A collector’s book.

Two creatures, half woman

Half rabbit, thin and cruel

Poised to bolt.

Mirrored bears dancing

In a pine forest;

They are joyful.

A unicorn and a satyr fighting

On a bank of clouds

With trumpets.

A pair of wizards surrounded

By the magic and claws

Of their familiars.


View the ten plates here... 

Morning Pages

Today I burnt my morning pages when I lit the fire. Curiously satisfying to get rid of them and not horde them like I usually do. My house is full of scraps of paper covered with lines of poetry and half written stories. Diaries from the age of fourteen and all the notebooks I have ever used to write in.

All stored in boxes and drawers. I keep them because they are a permanent record of whatever I was thinking, hoping and dreaming at that age and one day I may want to remember.

But these words are just there for the moment they were written in and can be cast aside, they are impermanent. A release from my constant desire to create words to pin down.

'Morning Pages are three pages of longhand, stream of consciousness writing, done first thing in the morning. There is no wrong way to do Morning Pages– they are not high art. They are about anything and everything that crosses your mind– and they are for your eyes only. Occasionally colorful, more often than not Morning Pages are negative, fragmented, repetitive or bland. Good! Worrying about your job, the laundry, the weird look your friend gave you – all that stuff distracts you from your creativity. It eddies through your subconsciousness and muddies your day. Get it on the page first thing in the morning and move on with your day with a freer spirit.' Julia Cameron

Write! Just write anything!

I have had a severe case of writer's block since July. My Grandfather's funeral (followed by a rift between myself and a loved one) turned something off inside me, something creative. I have spent too much time thinking and not enough time writing.

I knew it was severe because I didn't want to read either. The idea of Ruth not reading is quite astonishing seeing how my nose has been stuck inside a book ever since I worked out how to read.

I normally read three or four books at the same time all located in different parts of the house. A bedroom book, a book balanced on the arm of the sofa, a bathroom book, a book to read in the kitchen instead of cleaning it. Reading in the bath is one of my favourite things and don't worry, I have never got a book wet. Books are my favourite pastime. So losing the desire to read highlighted something serious was happening.

I have a pile of excellent books next to the bed and I could hardly face looking at them, let alone pick them up and read them. They felt so weighty and oppressing. Of course, one of the problems is that I was procrastinating in a major way to avoid facing the books I need to read so I can write my dissertation. Despite the fact I am excited and interested in those very same books. I am fearful of starting such a vast piece of work when I spend all my time hurrying from one domestic chore to the next. Three children who all need loving, playing with, cleaning, feeding, escorting to school, parties, activities. Grandparents to visit and friends to help and be there for. It can be overwhelming and that is before I even start the most important writing I have ever attempted to do. No wonder I am frozen and can't start.

“If you don't have time to read, you don't have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that.” Stephen King

Not wanting to read was not stopping me from doing any writing but it was a symptom of the problem. I had to struggle to write a poem for my monthly stanza group. I didn't read the book for my monthly book group meeting. Things were certainly odd. Things had to change. Reading to my daughter helped break the hurdle. We spent the evenings reading Harry Potter. I was dreading it when she chose it, but her enthusiasm made me enjoy it so much that when we finished book 4 I went off and read the next three. Fast, in greedy gulps. Now I have picked up the first novel in a long time and I am enjoying it. Reading is a pleasure again.

Stephen King is a writer who I admire very much. His memoir 'On Writing' is an interesting and useful account of his experience of being a writer. It is part autobiographical and part a guide to writing, including tips and advice. I read it years ago and I still remember lots of the quotes from it, like:

“The scariest moment is always just before you start.”

That sums up my feeling all summer. The fear of starting the darn thing. The fear of opening my novel and finishing it. The fear of looking at my collection of Queen poems and actually trying to edit them into something resembling a poetry book. Mr King says a writer should sit down every day and just get on with it. He suggests 2,000 words a day should do it. I also like the idea of 'morning pages' one of my creative writing teachers told me about from the book 'The Artist's Way.' Three pages of long hand every morning, that can be about anything, just write whatever comes into your head. Like Mr King suggests it will establish the habit of writing and then you can turn that into something tangible and worthwhile.

So this morning I wrote my three pages. It was hard at first. It was quite a rant about everything I have been worried about. Then it formed the bones of a poem. That is a good start.

Small stones

What is a small stone?
A small stone is a very short piece of writing that precisely captures a fully-engaged moment.
There are no strict rules for what makes a piece of writing a small stone, as there are for forms such as haiku. The process of finding small stones is as important as the finished product – searching for them will encourage you to keep your eyes (and ears, nose, mouth, fingers, feelings and mind) open.
Kaspa & Fiona,  want to help you slow down and fall in love with the world through writing. 
Fiona is a published novelist, therapist, creativity coach, & is very fond of earl grey and home-made cake.
Kaspa is Buddhist priest, writer, therapist, drama enthusiast, & is still learning to play the ukulele.
read my small stone here

Arthur Rimbaud born on this day 1854

 Rimbaud (second to left) depicted in an 1872 painting by Henri Fantin-Latour

The wolf cried out under the leaves
Spitting the beautiful feathers
from his feast of foul.
Like him, I devour myself.

Le loup criait sous les feuilles
En crachant les belles plumes
De son repas de volailles :
Comme lui je me consume.

Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

"I don't have prejudice against meself. My father was a white and my mother was black. Them call me half-caste or whatever. Me don't dip on nobody's side. Me don't dip on the black man's side nor the white man's side. Me dip on God's side, the one who create me and cause me to come from black and white."

Aphrodite embroidered by Jane Burden

Briar Rose by Anne Sexton

does Briar Rose look happy? I think not

Consider
a girl who keeps slipping off,
arms limp as old carrots,
into the hypnotist's trance,
into a spirit world
speaking with the gift of tongues.
She is stuck in the time machine,
suddenly two years old sucking her thumb,
as inward as a snail,
learning to talk again.
She's on a voyage.
She is swimming further and further back,
up like a salmon,
struggling into her mother's pocketbook.
Little doll child,
come here to Papa.
Sit on my knee.
I have kisses for the back of your neck.
A penny for your thoughts, Princess.
I will hunt them like an emerald.

Come be my snooky
and I will give you a root.
That kind of voyage,
rank as a honeysuckle.
Once
a king had a christening
for his daughter Briar Rose
and because he had only twelve gold plates
he asked only twelve fairies
to the grand event.
The thirteenth fairy,
her fingers as long and thing as straws,
her eyes burnt by cigarettes,
her uterus an empty teacup,
arrived with an evil gift.
She made this prophecy:
The princess shall prick herself
on a spinning wheel in her fifteenth year
and then fall down dead.
Kaputt!
The court fell silent.
The king looked like Munch's Scream
Fairies' prophecies,
in times like those,
held water.
However the twelfth fairy
had a certain kind of eraser
and thus she mitigated the curse
changing that death
into a hundred-year sleep.

The king ordered every spinning wheel
exterminated and exorcised.
Briar Rose grew to be a goddess
and each night the king
bit the hem of her gown
to keep her safe.
He fastened the moon up
with a safety pin
to give her perpetual light
He forced every male in the court
to scour his tongue with Bab-o
lest they poison the air she dwelt in.
Thus she dwelt in his odor.
Rank as honeysuckle.

On her fifteenth birthday
she pricked her finger
on a charred spinning wheel
and the clocks stopped.
Yes indeed. She went to sleep.
The king and queen went to sleep,
the courtiers, the flies on the wall.
The fire in the hearth grew still
and the roast meat stopped crackling.
The trees turned into metal
and the dog became china.
They all lay in a trance,
each a catatonic
stuck in a time machine.
Even the frogs were zombies.
Only a bunch of briar roses grew
forming a great wall of tacks
around the castle.
Many princes
tried to get through the brambles
for they had heard much of Briar Rose
but they had not scoured their tongues
so they were held by the thorns
and thus were crucified.
In due time
a hundred years passed
and a prince got through.
The briars parted as if for Moses
and the prince found the tableau intact.
He kissed Briar Rose
and she woke up crying:
Daddy! Daddy!
Presto! She's out of prison!
She married the prince
and all went well
except for the fear -
the fear of sleep.

Briar Rose
was an insomniac...
She could not nap
or lie in sleep
without the court chemist
mixing her some knock-out drops
and never in the prince's presence.
If if is to come, she said,
sleep must take me unawares
while I am laughing or dancing
so that I do not know that brutal place
where I lie down with cattle prods,
the hole in my cheek open.
Further, I must not dream
for when I do I see the table set
and a faltering crone at my place,
her eyes burnt by cigarettes
as she eats betrayal like a slice of meat.

I must not sleep
for while I'm asleep I'm ninety
and think I'm dying.
Death rattles in my throat
like a marble.
I wear tubes like earrings.
I lie as still as a bar of iron.
You can stick a needle
through my kneecap and I won't flinch.
I'm all shot up with Novocain.
This trance girl
is yours to do with.
You could lay her in a grave,
an awful package,
and shovel dirt on her face
and she'd never call back: Hello there!
But if you kissed her on the mouth
her eyes would spring open
and she'd call out: Daddy! Daddy!
Presto!
She's out of prison.

There was a theft.
That much I am told.
I was abandoned.
That much I know.
I was forced backward.
I was forced forward.
I was passed hand to hand
like a bowl of fruit.
Each night I am nailed into place
and forget who I am.
Daddy?
That's another kind of prison.
It's not the prince at all,
but my father
drunkeningly bends over my bed,
circling the abyss like a shark,
my father thick upon me
like some sleeping jellyfish.
What voyage is this, little girl?
This coming out of prison?
God help -
this life after death?

It's never over

...my kingdom for a kiss upon her shoulder
It's never over, all my riches for her smiles when I slept so soft against her
It's never over, all my blood for the sweetness of her laughter
It's never over, she's the tear that hangs inside my soul forever

Well maybe i'm just too young
To keep good love from going wrong

Oh... lover, you should've come over
'Cause it's not too late

Dear, my compass by Elizabeth Bishop

    Dear, my compass

    still points north
    to wooden houses
    and blue eyes,

    fairy-tales where
    flaxen-headed
    younger sons
    bring home the goose,

    love in hay-lofts,
    Protestants, and
    heavy drinkers...
    Springs are backward,

    but crab-apples
    ripen to rubies,
    cranberries
    to drops of blood,

    and swans can paddle
    icy water,
    so hot the blood
    in those webbed feet.

    Cold as it is, we'd
    go to bed, dear,
    early, but never
    to keep warm.

Dear John Wayne by Louise Erdrich

August and the drive-in picture is packed.
We lounge on the hood of the Pontiac
surrounded by the slow-burning spirals they sell
at the window, to vanquish the hordes of mosquitoes.
Nothing works. They break through the smoke screen for blood.

Always the lookout spots the Indian first,
spread north to south, barring progress.
The Sioux or some other Plains bunch
in spectacular columns, ICBM missiles,
feathers bristling in the meaningful sunset.

The drum breaks. There will be no parlance.
Only the arrows whining, a death-cloud of nerves
swarming down on the settlers
who die beautifully, tumbling like dust weeds
into the history that brought us all here
together: this wide screen beneath the sign of the bear.

The sky fills, acres of blue squint and eye
that the crowd cheers. His face moves over us,
a thick cloud of vengeance, pitted
like the land that was once flesh. Each rut,
each scar makes a promise: It is
not over, this fight, not as long as you resist.

Everything we see belongs to us.

A few laughing Indians fall over the hood
slipping in the hot spilled butter.
The eye sees a lot, John, but the heart is so blind.
Death makes us owners of nothing.
He smiles, a horizon of teeth
the credits reel over, and then the white fields

again blowing in the true-to-life dark.
The dark films over everything.
We get into the car
scratching our mosquito bites, speechless and small
as people are when the movie is done.
We are back in our skins.

How can we help but keep hearing his voice,
the flip side of the sound track, still playing:
Come on, boys, we got them
where we want them, drunk, running.
They'll give us what we want, what we need.
Even his disease was the idea of taking everything.
Those cells, burning, doubling, splitting out of their skins.

Watermaid (ii) By Christopher Okigbo

'...So brief her presence-,
match-flare in wind's breath-
so brief with mirrors around me.

Downward...
the waves distil her:
gold crop
sinking ungathered.'

HOOT to stop procrastination

I just flicked onto an article about procrastination as I was frustrated with my tendancy to clean/bake/walk around in circles or write pointless blog entries rather than just get on with my work.


It really said 'how to stop' but I like Hoot better.

Now I am going to hoot like an owl and see if that helps when I don't get on with stuff.

There is no more sombre enemy of good art than the pram in the hall...

When I had my first child I worried about the baby being born healthy, how I would cope on my own, how to be a good mother. I didn't think about how it would effect my creativity. I didn't give it a thought...my mind was too full with anxiety about getting the baby out of my body and then taking care of it.

When it happened the birth was straightforward and looking after her was a joy. I came across this quote by Cyril Connolly a few years ago and read it in a slightly shocked way because my creativity exploded when my baby was born.

Of course I was exhausted most of the time, living on three hours sleep yet I had to write and paint whenever I could. I would sketch the baby as she slept. Write poems as she breastfed, well scribbled them down on a pad balanced on my knee. There are times when I could scream because I am working on a poem or story in a snatched moment when the children are playing outside and they come in and interupt me for the fourteenth time but I just swallow the annoyance and on focus on them for a while, let the poem simmer until I can come back to it.

It means that when I can write there is a frenzied urgency to it, I have to make the most of the time I have. I also want to make my children proud. It's no use thinking 'I want to be a writer' and not do anything about it. So there is a determination to learn new skills and sharpen my talent until I can look at a poem or story, sketch or painting and feel satisfied that it is the best I can do.

So I do not agree with Cyril Connolly's miserable prediction about motherhood and having children in the home. I think having a child transformed me into a more productive artist and I wouldn't exchange it for the peace and quiet of an empty hallway. Although I do wish I had someone to do all the laundry for me.

can poetry change anything?

Poets for CHANGE

Women are brutally murdered in Guatemala,
Thrown in the gutter and the authorities
Don’t investigate, shrug as if to say well,
It’s only a woman and yes, it is happening now.

Women can be raped by their husbands,
The law says so, in Nigeria, Morocco
Saudi Arabia, so many other places you visit.
It’s only a woman and yes, it is happening now.

Women are married before they are women.
Forced; it is a word filled with fists and bruises
And it is not a historical event. She is sobbing but
It’s only a woman and yes, it is happening now.

Women must be cleansed of their sexual parts,
Pass me that newborn or that young girl, give me
My blunt knife, the clitoris is dangerous; she screams
But it’s only a woman,

And yes, it is happening now.

Iseult Gonne

the thunderclap
did not come
where  where  where

are the rolling clouds,
the slim streak
of white anger?

the wind roars
and disturbs the ears
of the Queen

the candle is lit
and blown out
lit and blown out

you cannot create a life
out of a dead baby
you just can’t do that

dance on the edge
of the ocean
but peace never comes

eyes are always
watching the shape
my shadow makes

if you bruise and
confuse the leveret
the hare will flee

girl twin Peter and boy twin Finnegan

You're not doing it right...

'I don't know. Poets are always taking the weather so personally. They're always sticking their emotions in things that have no emotions.'

Teddy McArdle

Autumn by Siegfried Sassoon

October's bellowing anger breaks and cleaves
The bronzed battalions of the stricken wood
In whose lament I hear a voice that grieves
For battle’s fruitless harvest, and the feud
Of outraged men. Their lives are like the leaves
Scattered in flocks of ruin, tossed and blown
Along the westering furnace flaring red.
O martyred youth and manhood overthrown,
The burden of your wrongs is on my head.

Autumn, chill and lonely comes

The beginning of autumn;

The sea and fields,

All one same green.

All along this road 

not a single soul – only 

autumn evening comes  

An autumn night;
don't think your life
didn't matter.

 

Will you turn toward me?

I am lonely, too,

this autumn evening.

- Basho

A lovely thing

I like these, so pretty...

Halah by Mazzy Star

Well I think I see another side
Maybe just another light that shines
And I looked over now through the door
And I still belong to no one else
Maybe I hold you to blame
For all the reasons that you left
And close my eyes till I see your surprise
And you're leavin before my time
Baby won't you change your mind?

Surely don't stay long
I'm missing you now
It's like I told you
I'm over you somehow
Before I close the door
I need to hear you say goodbye
Baby won't you change your mind?

I guess that hasn't changed someone
Maybe nobody else could understand
I guess that you believed you are a woman
And that I am someone else's man
But just before I see that you leave
I want you to hold onto things that you said
Baby I wish I were dead

Surely don't stay long
I'm missing you now
It's like I told you
I'm over you somehow
Before I close the door
I need to hear you say goodbye
Baby won't you change your mind?

Sal Paradise wouldn't have got a lift from me...

On the Cautious Road....

then again, maybe he would have

Remember

That day we had got up late,
Hazy with love, your skin
White, your body long and lean.
We were two deer in a clearing
Snatching mouthfuls of grass
Eyes glancing nervously
For the hunter, aware we could,
At any moment, get caught.
Contented, love like a small sun
In our stomachs, we glowed.
Happiness is a poppy, if picked
The petals turn from ethereal
Skin to bruised flesh so
We were slow, not eager
To face September
Daylight and realities.
We slumped on the sofa
Unable to stop the connection
Hand holding, skin stroking.
The TV bleated, you flicked
Over, were you in the kitchen
Making tea when I called you?
Is this real? It was like a movie
We hadn’t brought tickets for.
We sat in silence, watching the
Second plane fly towards the tower.
People fell like flakes of snow
Away from the choking death.
The smoke and dust settled,
What was left? We didn’t know.
Nothing could bloom
In that environment.

Street by Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin

 
   'And the stairs were brushed and clean,
   Her shoes paired on the bottom step,
   Each tread marked with the red crescent
   Her bare heels left, fading to the faintest at the top.'

Eliza and the Bear by Eleanor Rees

Author photo © Dave Ward

If you read this blog you know I love fairy tale influenced poetry and paintings. This collection of poems by Eleanor Rees explores dreamy, fairy tale imagey, night visions and sensual desires. The images are vivid and there is a feeling of urgency and tension in her choice of words that unsettled and intrigued me.

The title poem, 'Eliza and the Bear' appealed to me immediately as I have always adored the fairy tale of Snow White and Rose Red and one of my poems is based on Rose Red and her bear lover. It could be said I am fascinated/obsessed by animal/human shapeshifting (I should be working on my dissertation on that very theme right now but instead I am writing this review...!)

Rees uses the refrain of 'I did not know my lover was a bear' to document a series of encounters and contemplations about what that entails. The wild and the domestic, the animal and human depths of love. It is a long poem with seven sections but that is very effective as it feels like an epic tale told around a campfire (with a bear snufflling in the darkness of the trees just outside the ring of light from the fire.) The poem is oustanding and my favourite in the collection. It is dramatic and darkly erotic.

“Three Bears” by Krista Huot

'I did not know my lover was a bear.
I did not know he was on all fours all night
crawling the streets looking for the wilderness.
I did not know he wanted to go
back to woods and harsh brackish skies.
I did not know he wished to go.
He never said
Sweetheart I am a bear I am leaving now.'









video of Eleanor reading 'The Changeling'



you can buy the book here...