Wall to wall poetry at the moment. Last Monday I ran a workshop on "Writing Our Lives" in aid of the Cheltenham Poetry Festival. I usually do this session in relation to prose writing and with quite varied groups but this one was attended by five highly practiced poets - it had seemed a somewhat daunting prospect but proved an interesting and productive afternoon. Last Thursday I was recording some of my Gloucestershire poems for Corinium Radio ( a rather chaotic morning - a lift was being installed next to the recording studio so readings had to be judiciously timed!). Yesterday we had a really good session at our monthly Picaresque meeting, looking at poetry publications and discussing our experiences of submitting work - the occasional successes and the more frequent failures! Despite some of the kind words of the editors - "Do send us more of your work in the future", "We enjoyed your poems but they did not quite fit with our style" - somehow rejection always feels like failure.
This Friday evening (January 29th) will see the first New Bohemians gathering of the year, a workshop on poetic inspiration run by Jennie Farley. It promises to be a good evening - do join us if you're free (7.30pm at deepspace artworks in Charlton Kings). The following morning sees a workshop on prose poetry with Anna Saunders at the wonderful Cheltenham Anthology bookshop. By Sunday I think I shall be just about workshopped out!
Wednesday 27 January 2016
Tuesday 19 January 2016
Local poems
Looking back recently through the poems that I've written over the last couple of years, I was struck by how many have a local history theme. Iris Lewis, who lives in Kempsford and who was a fellow writer when I was with the Somewhere Else group, has a similar affinity with the background to our local Gloucestershire landscape and I'm delighted that she has agreed to share some of her poetry in this week's blog. Thank you, Iris!
The Place by the Ford of the
Great Marsh
The hiss of Saxon spears.
The Hwicce conquered.
A weed-tangled boy.
The red rose drowned.
Sweat-slippery axes.
A canal is dug.
Vapour trails…
Red Arrows fly.
In the distance
The church bell tolls.
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| Iris reading at the Cheltenham Literature Festival 2015 |
Under new
management
Moored like ships
beneath the sign
the skips are full
of cargo.
Battered tables,
broken chairs thrown
higgledy-piggledy in
the hold,
jostling with
threadbare cushions and
beer-stained carpets
loosely rolled.
Only the sign
remains.
Twelve painted
bells, solid black on white,
sway gently in the
breeze, while in the distance
church bells chime,
twelve notes rippling
across the Cotswold
town.
A new sign, fresh
painted, hangs there now.
Bluebells, dainty,
nodding, on a buttermilk board.
A patch of
springtime meadow suspended
above the tarmacked
road.
But winter comes,
and with it, fog and frost.
Across the rooftops
church bells toll.
A chill wind blows,
the pub sign rocks
and creaking, keens
for something lost.
Seven Hundred
Years of Grief Ago
Water reives a son.
An heir is drowned,
lies in Kempsford’s
marshy ground.
The House of
Lancaster bereaved.
A grief-spurred
gallop, a horse shoe lost,
retrieved and nailed
upon the stout church door.
It still hangs
there, a hoof-shaped heart
framed by a Norman
arch.
A good luck symbol charged with sorrow.
Grief pulses in this old stone porch
Yesterday, today, tomorrow.
Founded
in Anglo-Saxon times Kempsford's original name was Kynesmeresford, meaning
the place by the ford of the great marsh. My poem The Place by the
Ford of the Great Marsh encapsulates the history of the village,
starting in 800AD with the battle between neighbouring Anglo-Saxon
tribes, the Hwicce and the Wiltsaetas. Then, in medieval times, Kempsford
was held by the House of Lancaster. The ‘weed-entangled boy’
refers to the accidental drowning of the young heir to the Earl of
Lancaster, a story which I explore further in Seven Hundred Years
of Grief Ago. Although a predominantly agricultural village, the
great canal-building era of the industrial revolution brought the
Thames-Severn canal right through Kempsford. In modern times our
small village next to RAF Fairford is transformed for a week in July
when we host the Royal International Air Tattoo, at which the Red
Arrows always provide a star turn.
A
constant presence in Kempsford is its medieval church. Nailed to the
door is a horseshoe, reputed to have hung there since the early
fourteenth century. Seven
Hundred Years of Grief Ago
recounts the historical event associated with this. This poem was
chosen to feature as one of the poetry postcards as part of the
Swindon Festival of Poetry 2015. Beautifully illustrated by the
artist Valerie Gibbons it may be seen at
http://poetryswindonpostcards.blogspot.co.uk/#!
along with all the other poetry postcards.
Cirencester
also has a fine medieval church with a ring of twelve bells. In the
past it was common for pub names to reflect the number of bells in
the local church belfry. Cirencester is no exception and it has a pub
called the Twelve Bells. Until fairly recently the pub sign
featured twelve church bells. But as part of a general refurbishment
the pub sign now shows bluebells rather than church bells. This
seemingly insignificant event seemed to symbolise loss and change,
which are common themes in my work and led to the poem Under New
Management.
Iris Lewis
Saturday 9 January 2016
Once upon a time
A real "blast from the past" yesterday, walking around the Blaise Castle estate in Bristol with our dog. When we lived in the area it was a popular place for walks - and for stories. Like many mums of small children, I would make up stories to keep my two amused on walks (especially when we got to the "Pick me up!" stage); Blaise was where the "More Please Fairy" came into existence and her exploits kept them walking for many a mile. When they got a bit older it was stories weaved around the folly on the hill - tales of knights and dragons, dungeons and dreamers.
But the real favourite was the story of Thermopylae. In the museum at Blaise was a toy section and in it sat an elderly, somewhat threadbare teddy bear. For some reason I decided that, many years before, this bear had come all the way from Thermopylae in Greece to live with a little girl in Bristol. Even when she grew up this girl kept all her childhood toys; having no children of her own however, when she died an old, old woman, Thermopylae and his companions went to live in the museum. But the curators did not realise that he could work magic; they did not know that he could open his glass cupboard at night and sneak out into the woods to play and picnic there .... and so the story went on!
In the museum one morning, as I was regaling the children with Thermopylae's latest adventure, a lady tapped me on the shoulder and asked if I wrote my stories down. I hadn't realised that I had been overheard by a professional children's author! "You really should, you know, there would be a real market for them". I was hugely flattered but never followed up on her advice. Yesterday, a quarter of a century later, I began to wonder if I actually should ...
 |
| Blaise folly - "As it grew dark one winter evening ..." |
But the real favourite was the story of Thermopylae. In the museum at Blaise was a toy section and in it sat an elderly, somewhat threadbare teddy bear. For some reason I decided that, many years before, this bear had come all the way from Thermopylae in Greece to live with a little girl in Bristol. Even when she grew up this girl kept all her childhood toys; having no children of her own however, when she died an old, old woman, Thermopylae and his companions went to live in the museum. But the curators did not realise that he could work magic; they did not know that he could open his glass cupboard at night and sneak out into the woods to play and picnic there .... and so the story went on!
In the museum one morning, as I was regaling the children with Thermopylae's latest adventure, a lady tapped me on the shoulder and asked if I wrote my stories down. I hadn't realised that I had been overheard by a professional children's author! "You really should, you know, there would be a real market for them". I was hugely flattered but never followed up on her advice. Yesterday, a quarter of a century later, I began to wonder if I actually should ...
Monday 4 January 2016
Local happenings
Yesterday evening Buzzwords got off to a good start for 2016 with a workshop and reading by Josephine Corcoran. I had met Josephine before at Poetry Swindon events but this was my first opportunity to hear her read her work and I thoroughly enjoyed it. She read several poems from her pamphlet "The Misplaced House". Many of them are about memory and forgetting; I found the one that really stood out was "Stephen Lawrence Isn't On The National Curriculum" - an extremely moving poem that will certainly stay with me.
Buzzwords is run by Angela France, who is now Cheltenham's Poet in Residence. She has a monthly column in the Gloucestershire Echo, our local newspaper, on the third Tuesday of every month and in it she is featuring various Cheltenham poets. Do look out for the column if you have the chance - so far it has featured Alison Brackenbury and Robin Taylor Gilbert, both excellent writers, and Angela has a wealth of talent in the area to choose from - we are blessed with an abundance of interesting, creative poets here.
 |
| Josephine Corcoran |
Buzzwords is run by Angela France, who is now Cheltenham's Poet in Residence. She has a monthly column in the Gloucestershire Echo, our local newspaper, on the third Tuesday of every month and in it she is featuring various Cheltenham poets. Do look out for the column if you have the chance - so far it has featured Alison Brackenbury and Robin Taylor Gilbert, both excellent writers, and Angela has a wealth of talent in the area to choose from - we are blessed with an abundance of interesting, creative poets here.
Friday 1 January 2016
Happy New Year!
Dreary, damp weather here to welcome the New Year but there's so much to look forward to in 2016 it's difficult to feel down with it. This morning my friend Anna Saunders sent me a poem that really encapsulates the feeling of a fresh start and, although it's entitled Poem For A New Day, it seems ideal as a poem for a New Year -
Poem For A New Day
Something's moving in,
I hear weather in the wind,
sense the tension of the sheep-field
and the pilgrimage of fins.
Something's not the same.
I taste the sap and feel the grain,
hear the rolling of the rowan
ringing, singing for a change.
Something's set to start,
there's meadow-music in the dark
and the clouds that shroud the mountain
slowly, softly start to part.
Matt Goodfellow
And another friend, Richard Hensley, sent me greetings that I pass on to all my writing friends and colleagues everywhere - "May your keyboards always be active, your prose deathless; may publishers worship at your feet and may you never lose your grip on reality (unless you want it that way!)". Here's to a happy, healthy and productive year for us all.
Poem For A New Day
Something's moving in,
I hear weather in the wind,
sense the tension of the sheep-field
and the pilgrimage of fins.
Something's not the same.
I taste the sap and feel the grain,
hear the rolling of the rowan
ringing, singing for a change.
Something's set to start,
there's meadow-music in the dark
and the clouds that shroud the mountain
slowly, softly start to part.
Matt Goodfellow
And another friend, Richard Hensley, sent me greetings that I pass on to all my writing friends and colleagues everywhere - "May your keyboards always be active, your prose deathless; may publishers worship at your feet and may you never lose your grip on reality (unless you want it that way!)". Here's to a happy, healthy and productive year for us all.
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