Poets reading their poems...

The Forward prize tried to add glamour or celebrity by bringing in actors to read the poems. As if the poets, lacking in a Rada training course, could not inject the right meaning or excitement to their own words. Don't get me wrong, I love listening to actors read, or rather act, out lines that other people have written.

But there is something very interesting and intimate hearing the inflection the poet chooses to put into their own words, the pauses, the emphasis on certain words I might have skimmed when reading it on a page. Plus, the pleasure of their personal accent, tone, personality that then becomes attached to the poem when I read it in the future and still hear the poet's voice in my head.

Two poems of mine will be published this Autumn

A poem called 'On the Cautious Road' will be published by Helen Ivory at Ink, Sweat and Tears and it was a moment of good news in a bad week when Helen emailed me to say the poem had been selected.
I return to the I,S&T blog all the time to read the excellent poetry so I am very pleased my poem was selected to be included amongst all that talent. It is updated regularly so readers can get a poetry fix when they need one. I like the style of this blog, it is easy to navigate and there is a very quick response to submissions which is refreshing.

 Helen Ivory has a website here, as well as blogging and poems, I really like the 'sketches' go and look at them, they are intriguing.

The next poem is being published by Goblin Fruit, a quarterly journal of fantastical poetry. The tag line is 'come feast with us' and it is indeed a sumptuous collection of art and poetry. Most of the poems have the option of listening to the poet reading the poem which is really effective and brings it to life.

This is what the editors are looking for:

'We want poetry that we can call "of the fantastical", poetry that treats mythic, surreal, fantasy and folkloric themes, or approaches other themes in a fantastical way. Re-write a fairytale, ponder an old story, consider history from an unusual perspective -- really, it's up to you, so long as the fantastical element is there. Since what qualifies as "the fantastical" is easily debatable, however, here's what we're not interested in: science fiction poetry (it's not you, it's us), horror for horror's sake, and poetry that's self-consciously gothic.'

My poem which will be included in the Fall edition is called 'Go Round' and I was especially pleased that it was that one. I work so hard on each poem that they all mean something to me but this poem holds a special place in my heart so I was glad , I think I gave a loud whoop when I opened the email.

Anne Neville 1456 –1485

A ball tossed between men’s hands,
Quickly held and then thrown as if too hot.

A slender reed to be woven,
Thatched into whichever family were rising.

A red rose, a white rose
And between them: one thin girl.

The enemy now becomes our ally,
Marriage and I am now a princess.

He wound my hair around my limbs,
Binding me with long lengths,

So I lay utterly still as he entered me
In those grey, fleeting nights.

Then brutal men decided battles
Must be fought and death must win.

My prince cut down like a sapling,
The tide ebbs and flows to York.

Gloucester may well be the man,
Who murdered my red Prince,

Such a union is odious and desperate,
But it is the only clear pathway.

Protection and ambition combine,
Loveless, yet a throne may satisfy.

I lie utterly still in our marriage bed,
He has my body but not my head.

 

Anne Neville (11 June 1456 – 16 March 1485) was Princess of Wales as the wife of Edward of Westminster and Queen of England as the consort of King Richard III. She held the latter title for less than two years, from 26 June 1483 until her death in March 1485. She had just one son, Edward, who predeceased her.

Anne was a member of the powerful, northern English Neville family being the younger daughter of Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick, called in history, "The Kingmaker". As a result of this, she was used as a political pawn during the series of dynastic civil wars known as the Wars of the Roses.

The only contemporary  image of Anne showed her to have  copper coloured, long hair and a placid face.

I used paintings of women from the right time period to illustrate the poem. There is not much information known about this Queen, no historian recorded her personality or any of her thoughts. She is silent figure. Shakespeare used her to great dramatic effect in Richard III but what she was really like, we shall never know. This poem is my attempt to find her voice.

The dull thump of a rejection letter on the mat.

So, two anticipated letters arrived this week with the news I did not want. No thank you. Poetry rejection letters. It is disheartening to think of my poems out there and an editor reading them and deciding they are not good enough. Poetry can appear simple, a few lines and finished. But the lines hide hours of thought, careful consideration behind each word and comma.

So my poems are spread out on the table. I can see the flaws in them. I also still see their potential, why  I love them.  I know I can write better. So I will, keep learning, keep writing, keep sending them out.

Snippet of Sylvia and Ted talking about how they met.

Two minutes of Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes being interviewed and they talk about how they met and wrote poems to each other. I can imagine the longing and intensity of those poems.

The courtship of poets...

Word and Sound poetry night at Worcester Arts Workshop.

 The venue is atmospheric and intimate. The vibe is very welcoming and chilled out.  All different styles of poets attend making it an exciting evening as you don't know where you will be taken next as the words fill the room. The next event is 17th December 730pm-10.30pm

Tiger, Tiger, your light is dimming...

The last few weeks I have been working on poems about tigers. In the past I have been more concerned with the plight of the orangutan but I have been thinking a lot about the tiger because my small son has developed a great love for them and our house is full of stuffed toys, books and pictures. He also likes me to paint his face with stripes so he can BE a tiger.

A friend posted a link on facebook about a new project to raise awareness about the tiger through art...

"The Tiger Tiger campaign  is an arts and fundraising project, founded by arts for education company The Written Image in May 2010. The aim? – To raise awareness through art.  Its quite simple isn’t it? There are less than 3,200 tigers left in the wild.  By 2022, Tigers could be extinct."

It prompted a surge of thoughts about how tragic it would be to live in a world without tigers. They are so beautiful and graceful, fierce and lonesome, my son loved them as soon as he was old enough to articulate it. I think all humans feel in awe of the big cats. The poem I submitted was chosen to appear on the blog the week. There will be new poems and fiction pieces posted each week so please click on the link and check it out. The travel piece by Andrew Kirby is incredibly vivid.

Tiger Tiger Blog

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