"Away From Your Desk"

A regular feature in Writing magazine is a page entitled "Away From Your Desk"; every month it suggests writing related activities around the country, events that that might enlarge horizons, facilitate networking, refresh a word-weary brain. Over the last couple of weeks I seem to have taken advantage of every "away" opportunity I've come across and I've thoroughly enjoyed them - the only problem being the return to the desk with all the accumulated minutiae of life (bills, e mails etc) to wade through before being able to crack on with the task in hand!

But I wouldn't have missed the events I was able to get to on the Cheltenham Poetry Festival. Last Tuesday saw our Festival Players performance at the Playhouse. Sadly one of our members was unwell but, at short notice, her place was admirably filled by local poet and author Christine Whittemore. The programme ranged widely over works as diverse as "Ode To A Nightingale" and "The Owl And The Pussycat", covered eighteenth century poets to the very much alive Anne Drysdale and hopefully exemplified "the power of words". The audience certainly appeared very appreciative.

Reading with Robin Gilbert, Frances March,
Christine Whittemore and Peter Wyton

On Saturday David Clarke led a fascinating workshop at the Suffolk Anthology on Poetry and Museums; some excellent writing came out of it and some intriguing ideas were floated. (If you're not familiar with David's work, do read his blog "A Thing For Poetry" and check out his new pamphlet, "Scare Stories" published by V. Press in March) Later on Saturday St. Andrews hosted an inspirational reading by Owen Lowry. Tetraplegic following an accident, Owen, who at 18 was a national judo champion, describes his portable ventilator as "a vanity-case sized thing with batteries, about the size of a Filofax"; his poems are delivered in time with the ventilator's input. My poetry group colleague Christine Griffin read at the same event. Christine's poems are always powerful - thought-provoking and often of real contemporary relevance. Although I had heard it in preparation, "Flight", evoking so vivid a picture of villagers scattering before attackers, moved me to tears. Overall an excellent event.

Christine Griffin