Out of orbit: F James Hartnell

AOL and The Huffington Post

2011-11-11T10:14:00.005Z

The Huff is now the main news page on AOL in the UK and its proof readers are to be congratulated on producing accurate, grammatically correct copy. Unfortunately, the front page of AOL is still written by bozos who are unable to spell or to write anything that makes sense. Until the Huff controls the front page as well AOL.co.uk will remain a haven for illiterati.

Today's front page gems (the inside versions of these by the Huffington Post are correct - it's just the usual AOL ace cub reporters who can't write) :

Landlords boast profits in rent boom

Italy to vote crunch on austerity plans

Poppy burning Muslim group faces ban

And the judge said...

2011-07-18T22:48:00.003+01:00

Bank Street Writers
International Short Story Competition 2011
Judged by Joan Park, novelist.

RESULTS

1st Prize £75.00
Parsons and Pretenders (Austentatious) by Andrew Campbell-Kearsey, Brighton.
‘An imaginative title and a good opening line create interest. The writer shows a good use of language and I enjoyed his alliteration and play on words. The reference to celebrities puts the story in time and place and the ending rounds off the story perfectly. Emotion: Laughter.’

2nd Prize £50.00
A Prescription for Horror by Ken Marshall, Torfaen.
‘A clever title sets the scene for this powerful story. I enjoy binary combinations and here we have innocence v testosterone fuelled wickedness. An excellent short story where a lot is said in a few words. Emotion: Dread.’

3rd Prize £25.00
Statues by Sue Johnson, Pershore.
‘Here we have a formidable boy meets girl story. We know how it is going to end but the getting there is enjoyable. The alliteration – clearing clutter, finished by Friday, damage was drop-dead gorgeous, all flowed beautifully. Emotion: Satisfaction.’

Two stories were Highly Commended:

Maiden Voyage by Norman Kitching, Gosport.
‘A good title, a sense of place and a character who we can relate to set the scene for this story. Life gets in the way of most of our dreams but Sadie hangs on to hers and we can applaud her for this. A Twist in the Tale ending is not always successful, but we have it here and it works. Emotion: Surprise.’

High Hopes by Sarah Evans, Welwyn Garden City.
‘An emotional story with a lot of believable dialogue between mother and son. We all want our children to be ‘normal’ and fit in and in this story we share the mother’s frustration when her son doesn’t conform. Emotion: Pity.’

The Hard Traveller

2011-06-08T15:35:00.002+01:00

Thirty years down the line, Dave Sharp now has a top repertoire of his own songs. Some of these refer to his time spent in America where he played alongside many of the big names. His lyrics reflect a troubadour tradition that goes back to Woody Guthrie, in fact some of the songs are what could be called updates on old Guthrie songs.

When you hear a song like his 'Hard Travellin' for the first time, especially if like me your music roots go back to the American folk tradition, it is hard not to be moved by the resonance of the lyrics: the poor are given comfort through religion, there are references to the 'last fair deal' and to a 'vision of the nation'. Guthrie himself wrote a different 'Hard Travellin' and lived that life, travelling around America, championing the oppressed, singing for his supper.

Dave Sharp's version contains some terrific imagery:

Desert roses far from water... three ravens rising, two rivers raging... and so on.

His voice has certainly mellowed since the Alarm days, and has that 'been around' edge that only constant gigging and Marlboros can produce. He is of course living the legend of the hard traveller, gigging all over the country up to four times a week at small venues. He has a particularly strong following in Scotland and Wales.

It is fair to say his overall performance at these gigs - I have seen three of them this year - puts most other solo acts in the shade. I don't see many if any guitarists with his flatpicking skills and I see a lot of guitarists.

I am looking forward to his new material with a new band. The CD should be out in a few months time. Meanwhile you can catch plenty of his stuff on youtube both the more recent solo material and his work with The Alarm. It is worth noting some of the comments by youtube viewers many of whom refer to him as a greatly underrated guitarist, as the engine or powerhouse of the Alarm and so on.

Try to listen to his 'Looking this world over' or to my own favourite 'Mexico'. Great songs. His eponymous website has a long list of gigs to come this year.

David Byrne: Ride, Rise, Roar. The Michael Clark Company: come, been and gone.

2011-01-29T20:55:00.001Z

Two very different dance productions came to Manchester this month. On Thursday 20th January we went to see ‘Ride, Rise, Roar’. This was a film about David Byrne’s tour a couple of years ago and was different in that he had three dancers animating his songs during each concert. Unfortunately, the showing at the Imax in Manchester was very badly advertised and only a handful of people turned up to watch it. Besides the Byrne classics there was some newer material which was very different and exciting. The dancers made a huge difference to the performance. At the end of the film we were ushered to a different screen in the complex for a live satellite link-up where we watched a question and answer session with David Byrne and Stuart McClunie. This was much shorter than we were told it would be by the cinema staff and McClunie only let one member of the audience in London ask one question while he asked loads. He seemed ill at ease with the whole interview and was disappointing. David Byrne, looking as youthful as ever despite the white hair, was much more amenable, probably because he had nothing to prove.

The second event was the Michael Clark Company’s ‘come, been and gone’ at The Lowri on Friday 28th January. This was an amazing show. The first dance under the heading ‘gone’ was from ‘Swamp’ a revival from the 1990s set to pulsating, electronic music by Wire and Bruce Gilbert. This was perhaps my favourite section of the night. The four other sections were set to music by Brian Eno, Lou Reed, Kraftwerk and above all David Bowie. Of course,the interpretation of Bowie’s more popular numbers such as Heroes and The Jean Genie went down a storm. The costumes were mostly by Stevie Stewart. The dancers were Kate Coyn, Melissa Hetherington, (both of whom teach for the Company) Oxana Panchenko, Brooke Smiley, Harry Alexander, Simon Williams and Benjamin Warbis.
This was the kind of performance you could watch many times and experience something different each time. With up to seven dancers on stage, plus the music and sometimes back projection, there is so much to take in that a very enjoyable sensory overload occurs. It was uplifting, it was fabulous. From androgynous costumes to complement Bowie’s music, to a figure stuck with hypodermics while Lou Reed sang about heroin, there was a very powerful connection between costumes and movement and sound.
The dancers rightly received several long curtain calls from the packed house. A whole new performance will premier in London in June. Not to be missed.

Comet (for Chris Woods)

2010-11-15T12:13:00.001Z

Where the high horizon sutures the sky
to Holcombe Moor
way up above the padlocked hut
his dog tailwags up ahead alongside the one
stringvested hillrunner
while he and his alchemist hold
this season-soaked day about them
as they calibrate and calculate
and examine a sclerotic sky for
one sign of it.

But jagged time arcs away
towards Two Brooks and beyond
as the weather presents
a fond bleakness.

Down the generations
it’s a night tingling with stars
that grants his last wish to his grandchildren
now full-grown who step aside for
the ghost of the hillrunner
as they screen subatomic
pointing the autoscope
to capture at last
the faithful messenger sizzling
through an ocean of sky.

Chris Woods visits Bank Street

2010-11-09T09:37:00.003Z

A very well attended November Bank Street Writers meeting in Bolton had the well-known local poet Chris Woods as guest.

Chris started by referring with affection to Anne Hendy, whose recent loss was felt by so many of us, and read from her ‘Snapshots’ collection the poems Pisces, Visit from my Great Aunts and Mother’s Day.

Chris then treated us to a baker’s dozen of his own poems. The first of these was about North West Water digging up his road. Naturally, some of his poetry reflects his locality on the edge of Holcombe Moor. The next poem Racing Time for Ron Heaton referred to a local hill-runner whom he got to know whilst out walking his dog. Another dog walking poem followed this time in the snow. White Walk, just like the previous poems, had striking imagery and a powerful ending, ‘up to my knees in dazzle.’

The theme changed to astronomy and we were treated to On Not Seeing Halley’s Comet where a repetitive affirmation was seen in the comet’s return. Newtonian Analysis dealt with one of Chris’s pet subjects, the master scientist, whilst Hut was about a retreat for writing and meditation. There followed two festive poems, Pumpkin Lantern ( with its final ‘You have changed into yourself’) and Bonfire Night, a vivid poem about children and firelight.

A moving poem for his father, Sealham Harbour For My Father considered the power of the tide ‘as the sea takes the sand and time away’ whilst Seasons For My Father reflected his belief that we tend to associate memories with particular seasons: ‘snow and silence everywhere.’

As a GP he would be expected to write a lot of poems about medecine but in fact, though using medical imagery, not many of his poems are about his job. One that he read for us was Coronary Care. In this poem he addresses the heart directly: ‘my red balloon…my bruised red apple… sweet heart… such love I took for granted.’

To Cows was just that and included the clever ‘the Milky Way their memorial overhead.’

The final poem The Lawn Is Green, about planting a new lawn, referred to with the medical image of ‘a graft’, again involved his children at play on the new carpet and contained a line which certainly made me green with envy: ‘elbowing the distance to one side.’

What struck me above all about Chris’s poetry was that it was considerably elevated above narrative or location poetry through astounding and unexpected imagery and the juxtaposition of the personal and the external, the individual and the panorama.

Thank you Chris for your inspiring poetry!

And the Judge said...

2010-05-24T15:57:00.001+01:00

Bank Street Writers Poetry Competition 2010

What guarantees entry to the No pile? Sloppiness, for a start. Inattention to line lengths, inaccuracy. Teeth don’t smirk, mouths do. Faces don’t chew. Clichés won’t win you any prizes, either. Neither will clunky or archaic language, inversions and poems that strive to be ‘poetic’. Poetry is intrinsically poetic. It doesn’t have to be given gossamer threads and veils. Every noun doesn’t need an adjective. A poem with a good title helps. A title is the door to the poem. But the door doesn’t need announcing and the door doesn’t need to be repeated. That’ll only get your poem in the No pile.
So, what gets into the Yes pile? Poetry that is arresting and original. There were a lot of poems about MPs’ expenses, which probably says something about what’s irking people at the moment, but it did little to make me sit up and pay attention. What caught my eye were a striking use of language, atmosphere, texture, good lineation, a real sense of structure and a willingness to trust the words to work. Of course, words won’t work for you unless you choose the right ones and – to paraphrase Coleridge – put them in their right order.
Dance of the Cobblers has some nice detail in it. I liked Mr Boorman’s drizzling fag and the beeswaxed thread and bottles of dye. I also liked some of the detail in Talecrumbs I Left Myself for Navigation (marvellous title!) and the gentle way it explores the ways we find home.
Swingers caught me by surprise with its ending. I’d thought the poem rather ‘usual’ till I read the last stanza. The notion that a silence can lie beneath our clothes is interesting, but it’s the penultimate line that really catches you unawares – Cool, unsteady, I bandage myself – as if the narrator were somehow damaged by the whole experience. The juxtaposition of cool with unsteady surprises, too. This deserves a commendation. Big Fish is a superb poem. There’s a real sense of place. Time is held in the balance here. Two boys are fishing. The ‘howl of school has vanished’ and ‘giant carp/move slow as blood cells’. The mood is still. I can’t help thinking about Ted Hughes’ famous Pike. There are deep things being alluded to here – war, ‘pockmarked Madonnas/with dirty mouths’. The poet says ‘Some stains never come out’ and we imagine degradation and dereliction, death perhaps. But the fish are ‘lavender’ and they ‘whisker the smoky water’. This is a poem about finding peace in a damaged world. The last line is heartbreaking in its simplicity. I just have a few quibbles with some of the line lengths and perhaps mildew isn’t luminous – it’s black or grey, isn’t it? I’m nitpicking. I’m having to. There’s some very strong work here. I like this poem very much. This is a poet whose work I would choose to read.
Grunting Up gets a well earned 3rd prize. I had no idea that sows sing when they’re being suckled. This poem has a nice physicality. The use of ‘plug on’ to describe the way a piglet will latch onto the sow’s nipple is accurate and inventive. It has a good strong sound.
The 2nd prize goes to Acting Blackbird. The use of language is dynamic and the metaphor of the blackbird as an actor is well-sustained. Not an easy thing to do throughout an entire poem. Well done.
And finally, the 1stprize is awarded to The Rambla at Alfaix. This poem is assured and measured. The opening line reminded me slightly of The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket by Robert Lowell and, because The Rambla at Alfaix is such an accomplished piece of work, it immediately made me suspicious. I had to Google a few lines just to make sure it wasn’t nicked – ‘small dark oranges hard as want’ for example. There is so much detail here – ‘livid pomegranates//split open in the dust’ ‘fine dots of rain//sharp as pipa shells’ ‘a single slit of weed’. Small things have a way of bringing larger ones into focus. They contrast with the flood, with the memory of a river, abandonment, injuries. We’re never told what happened and the narrator doesn’t conjecture. We are given the freedom to inhabit the poem, to walk, to experience the season of drought and neglect. Like the previous poem, dereliction and damage and a certain poverty are suggested, but the tone couldn’t be more different. Only one nitpick here – the fourth stanza could be a couplet to complete the overall sense of unity in the structure. But really, this is very good work. I’d certainly be thinking of publication if I’d written this.

Pat Winslow

New deadline for poetry comp

2009-12-16T15:32:00.001Z

The Bank Street Writers' International poetry Competition will now close on JANUARY 31ST so you have a few more weeks to send in those winning entries.

Poetry Competition

2009-11-10T21:04:00.002Z

Now is the time to earn some serious dosh for Christmas or Divali or whatever...

Bank Street Writers
International Poetry
Competition 2009

Poems up to 40 lines, any subject and style.

Judge: Pat Winslow

Closing Date: 31st December 2009

Cash Prizes: 1st £75 2nd £50 3rd £25

All winning entries will be published in the internationally circulating "Current Accounts" magazine. Some commended entries may also be published at the editor’s discretion. A free copy of “Current Accounts” will be sent to each entrant whose work is published.

Please send your poems, fees and entry forms to:

Bank Street Writers Poetry Competition 2009,
Jolyon Coombs, 37, Carslake Avenue, Bolton BL1 4BT

CONDITIONS:

• Poems must be in English, must be unpublished and must not have won a prize in any other competition.
• They must be typed or word-processed, with the title at the top of the page, but the entrant's name must not appear on the poem itself.
• A completed entry form must be enclosed with each entry or set of entries.
• Entry fees: £3.00 sterling for the first entry, £2.00 for each subsequent entry by the same person. (Cheques payable to "Bank Street Writers".)
Winners will be notified by 1st February 2010. No person may receive more than one prize. The judge’s decisions will be final and no correspondence will be entered into. Manuscripts will not be returned - please keep a copy.
Please enclose an s.a.e. marked “R” if you wish to receive details of the results.

Many thanks to our sponsor, Sweetens Bookshop, Bolton.

ENTRY FORM

To: Bank Street Writers Poetry Competition 2009,
Jolyon Coombs, 37, Carslake Avenue, Bolton, BL1 4BT

NAME:

ADDRESS:

I wish to enter the Bank Street Writers Poetry Competition 2009 and enclose £............ payable to "Bank Street Writers" (£3.00 for the first entry, £2.00 for each subsequent entry). I accept the Conditions of the Competition.

signed…………………………………………… date………………………

POEM
TITLES: 1)
2)
3)
4)
(continue overleaf if necessary)

This form may be photocopied if required
Please ensure that you have completed all necessary sections!

Smile

2009-06-29T23:20:00.004+01:00

Somewhere between saffron and terracotta
but south of tangerine the patchouli of a smile
slips soft into this slowing evening
folds into a harmony of
synaptic electric blue
and dorian aquamarine
lifts the last hours of the day
out of the dove and the slate and the jet
up into amethyst cobalt
delphinium cornflower
the warmer blues of connection.

Reflections of barley lampshades
khaki washed Rodins float on
midnight indigo outside the
panoramic window whilst inside
champagne shadows blur into
the lamplight mute the knifed angles
the harsh ivory cornices
the razor-edged leaves of a plant
that hears everything in emerald
and the smile shimmers
reverberates golden through the night.

Short Story Comp Results

2009-06-29T23:18:00.001+01:00

Bank Street Writers
International Short Story Competition 2009 Results
Judged by Gaye Gerrard
Well-known Lancashire writer, broadcaster and publisher

1st Prize: £75.00

‘Making Sense Of It,’ by Joan V. Park

Judge’s Comment
This is a powerful and poignant story of commonplace experiences told with intensity and clarity. It is enriched by the poetic style and a light touch of humour.

2nd Prize: £50.00

‘Talking to Maurice’ by Brindley Hallam Dennis

Judge’s Comment
The simplicity of this story is captivating. Gentle irony and pathos are combined beautifully in its unexpected ending

3rd Prize: £25.00

‘Cohen’s Legacy’ by Charlotte Matthews

Judge’s Comment
The structure is unusual and the reader is drawn quickly into this compelling piece. The ominous refrain contributes to the mounting tension as the story moves inexorably towards it disturbing conclusion

Highly Commended:

‘Still The same Old Catherine’ by Judy Walker

Judge’s Comment
Reversals of roles and emotional challenges within a mother/daughter relationship are explored in this story. It is both light-hearted and profound.

The above will be published in the Autumn edition of Current Accounts magazine.

A prizegiving celebration will be held at 6.30.pm.on Tuesday 11th August at Sweetens Bookshop in Bolton to which all are invited. Our thanks to all who entered.

Poésie de foie gras

2009-06-14T10:19:00.002+01:00

The voices of my education
cajoled coerced caned me until Yes
I remembered Adlebloodystrop and could
parrot a wet sheet and a flowing sea as
I walked beside the fag factory where
all our mothers worked
as I listened
with a host of phantom listeners
to gold flake accents on black and white TVs
on black and brown radios
as I repeated the lines of an
elegy in an outside toilet that left the
world to darkness and to me.

Such a pilgrimage were not sweet
it was the worst of times
facing the true north of cliché and predictability
in the old dispensation
with alien teachers clutching their gods
and us leaning cool on the wire fence
standing on our tongues
as the girls wiggled past
drinking anything
in pubs and cafés as we smoked our youth
spoke of novelists
musicians playwrights. But poets?

They were all dead and
would have conveniently remained so
if I had listened to the voices of
my accursed education:
understanding is clever
provided you understand
in one particular way which
in your particular case
will be denied to you.
So I struggled with
the naming of parts
had nightmares about vorpal blades
and wondered how the hell
eye could rhyme with symmetry.

Waiting is hardest when you are
all eager for the treat but not sure
what you are waiting for
but the weather as always
turned around I saw through
the folly of their understanding
missed fewer chances with the lords of life
realising that a cloud is never lonely
wrapping my tears in an ellum leaf
and delaying the deadly onset of
cyrrhosis of the ego.

Blind Atlas in concert

2009-05-10T11:38:00.001+01:00

Authentic Burritos sound from local band.

International Short Story Competition

2009-02-05T10:36:00.001Z

Bank Street Writers International Short Story Competition is now open with prizes of £75 £50 and £25. With a 1500 word limit and a deadline of 1st June 2009, this competition usually attracts a large entry and winning it is indeed a sign of literary eminence. Most British writing groups will be sent entry forms but a copy can also be obtained from fjameshartnellATaolDOTcom (replacing the capitals with the usual signs).

There should also be copies of the entry form on the Bank Street website (http://freewebs.com/bankstreetwriters/ ) and on the Write Out Loud website (www.writeoutloud.net)

Happy Writing!

Recent Italian Poetry from Erri De Luca and Roberta Dapunt

2008-10-06T19:06:00.001+01:00

I was fortunate on a recent trip to Italy to pick up the latest collections from these two poets. Finding very new poetry seems to be just as hard in Italy as it is here. Most bookshops carry very little poetry and publishing houses with the exception of Einaudi seem to play safe with the old classics.

Erri De Luca: L’ospite incallito 2008 pub Einaudi Turin ISBN 978-88-06-19261-7 67pp. €8.00

L’ospite incallito (The inveterate guest) is the third book of poetry by Erri De Luca, who is perhaps better known for his many prose works. The book is in four sections: Effetti personali, Natura, Historia, and Persone. Within these sections are recurring themes which preoccupy us all: life and death, war, opposites and dualities, love and relationships as well as the de rigueur (for a Neapolitan linguaphile like De Luca) poems on accent, dialect and language such as Da noi, L’estate del ’43 and especially Proposta di modifica:

‘ C’è il verbo snaturare, ci dev’essere pure innaturare
…
M’innaturo di te quando t’abbraccio.’

Some of these poems derive their impact and weight from a catalogue or litany of examples. In L’ospite incallito it is all the different ways and places where he has been a guest; in Prontuario per il brindisi di capodanno, it is all the different toasts one could propose; in the excellent Da un verso di Marina Z, it is all the different places where celestial attraction exists.
Other poems reflect De Luca’s political life and interests but seem to me to be more observational than expressive. For me, his exceptional poetry is that which deals with his relationships: Maniera, Coincidenza col padre, Il nome: Aldo De Luca amongst others. With its great range of subject matter, this collection will appeal to all sorts of poetry lovers.

Roberta Dapunt: La terra più del paradiso 2008 pub Einaudi Turin ISBN 978-88-06-18583-1 49pp €8.00

This is Roberta Dapunt’s third collection, the others being OscuraMente (1993) and La carrezzata mela (1999). The title ( The Earth More Than Paradise) comes from a line in the first, untitled poem of the collection:

‘Perché solo è il corpo ad amare la terra più del paradiso,
nient’altro che la carne a mangiare il pane e bere il vino.’

Roberta Dapunt’s poems are unusual and special because she uses an almost classical economy of phrasing rather than the more everyday style of some of her contemporaries, without ever sounding contrived or precious, and also because she includes some poems written in her local Ladino with Italian translations beneath.

Her faith is confirmed daily by the regular dependability of rural life, by the inexorable rolling in of the seasons, especially winter.

‘Tutto è qui nella riservatezza rurale che ripeto
mattina e sera’
(from Di ritorno dalla stalla)

The silence and the solitude of life on a mountain farm inform her work where reflections on religion, birth and death, the family, and the writing process itself are all woven into days spent in the cowshed, the vegetable garden, the fields, and within the confines of her room. She is immersed in the land, looking after it as if it was her house (La mia confessione fedele); the hay and the dung and the solitude are her covenant (Di ritorno dalla stalla); she is so at one with the seasons that winter is inside her (Un altro inverno); when she has died she knows she will be the hay that is eaten, the floor of the cowshed, the silence that devours time between morning and evening (Ora che posso obbedire a me stessa).

Other poems deal with the difficulties of writing: her coarse,smelly hands waiting for her to write something (Mie mani); being sorry that she has no regrets at all about her poetry (penitenziale); inviting a pretend friend to sit and listen (le intime riflessioni, i); realising the room where she writes is her refuge (ibid,ii); repeating her words in the dark so that they enter her soul (ibid, iii); while writing, being transported to the dark of the cowshed (ibid, v).

Local characters are described with acute observation in other poems. There are also the heart-searching talks between the poet and God which alone are well worth reading.

The most moving poem in the collection for me is ‘Padre, questo viso sepolto’ with its simple but universal regret:

‘se solo ti avessi incontrato di più e baciato.’

If only, indeed. Roberta Dapunt has an authentic, honest, appealing voice in these poems and I am sure we will be hearing more of her in the future.

Cern

2008-08-28T23:01:00.001+01:00

Accelerating around this bolgia
for a fortnight: now it’s time.
These collisions will explode
the pondering of centuries.

The Atlas detector’s 1000 megapixel subatomic
camera surveys a billion points of impact:
the world’s fastest lenses blink, focus smugly,
million-gig computer banks across the planet
hum hungry for data, for deity.

Fifty years’ thinking destroyed in a millionth
of a second, unless Atlas finds the Higgs boson,
God particle, universe glue. Seed of dark
matter, dream until now. Birth and decay.

Hawking, who has lain with God, predicts these new
man-made black holes will self-destruct.
The rest of us wait in ignorant, fearful humility.

This is the second dawn of creation:
new dimensions arc and crackle
around the essence of life distilled
in the genesis machine
and God withdraws his hand.

Goodbye George

2008-04-20T18:15:00.000+01:00

Mister Dow Jones plays FTSE with Nasdaq
said it once, debit lunch, credit crunch
snaps at the hotspurred heels of the Texan idiot,
president illegitimate, resident illiterate
reassuring as he bites his sound:
‘There is no slowdown.’ Oh, really?
Not going to Motown then, George, to see
a Detroit slump, feel a stagflation bump,
foodprice hikes, oilprice spikes?
As the demon dollar skydives
fat neo-con handjives won’t save the trophy wives
by their Hockney pools where the pizzaboy drools
and the suntan rules, cos the smart money’s gone,
solid gone post-Enron
and the tenants of Malibu, Dana and Marylou,
wait in the downsize queue
while you, George, sharp
as wrinkled linen trousers, parp
and gloop in the quicksand of
your final hours, your towers burned,
nothing learned from Najaf to New Orleans,
from Kyoto to Gitmo,
from Nero to Zero.

Current Accounts 25: The Talent of Suzanne Richardson Harvey

2008-03-06T12:20:00.000Z

This latest Bank Street Writers’ magazine contains something for everyone from fairly ‘standard’ poetry to absolutely exceptional verse, with two short stories and an essay.

Dealing first with the local writers, Martin Caplan’s two poems are preoccupied with time. The second poem talks of cancer treatment and the unlikelihood of a cure: Watching us wither from day to day…Divesting us of our persona / Along with our hair. A bleak prospect.

Next is Bill Kelly’s ‘ramble’, set as an assignment in 2007, a series of apocryphal, essay-related meanderings. Not the easiest topic to write about. Some of Bill’s deliberate false links are positively serpentine.

Ann Hendy’s The Hike is one of those poems that reward the more one reads them, moving from direct narrative into more powerful, personal territory, the land of bittersweet regret.

Pat Turner’s Wuthering The Storm, a visit to Bronte country, is travel poetry with a difference and a killer last line. A very different piece is Joyce Neil’s Whispers, a fine poem of personification. Raymond Dean’s Ruthlessness in Nature is a witty piece. Raymond is better than most at rhyming, endstopped poetry and never fails to entertain. Tony McNeile’s Lost Freedom turns out to be not what you first thought and works on many levels.

Neville Southern is one of the best storytellers in the group: his One Short Sleep Past is a brief, eerie tale which should not be read last thing at night.

Three very different poems based on the group’s visit to The Lowry are next: Phil Smith’s He Should Talk sums up well Lowry’s affect on those who knew the places and faces he painted:He paints rubbish; looks inside your head. / Tells you what you were. Bill Brierley’s typically terse and brisk On The Good Ship Lowry refers to the design of the building, whilst Raymond’s A Lowri Painting has a clever, whimsical final couplet.

The rest of the magazine contains work from outside the group and this time includes the best in the anthology. Ian Grey’s No Flowers For Lizzie Bolden, Mike Gwynne’s Silver Anniversary and Marguerite Haywood’s The Deciding Words were for me the best of the U.K. poetry whilst David McVey’s short story Pigs at Dawn was eminently readable and enjoyable.

Out of the contributions from abroad, the one outstanding poet for me was Suzanne Richardson Harvey from California, whose two poems Over The Edge and Sonnet For An Unconceived Child exhibited a great grasp of imagery, movement and that finished, professional tone that is so hard to achieve. Particularly well-written. I will certainly read more of her work.

I liked almost all of the other American poems, though the odd one, whilst no doubt written in all sincerity, came across as a little pretentious. The one Australian poem, Found Art, was very good but the (maybe deliberately) excessive alliteration spoiled it for me. From India, Arun Gaur’s Small Places was a beautiful piece, reminding me of many works from India that hark back to a traditional poetry of repetition. The one Canadian entry, Joanna Weston’s Morning Reflected, had a sparse, economical beauty that is hard to convey.

Mindy Abu Barad’s Another Ocean III was a bit flat for me personally – I prefer some sort of imagery to connect with – but of course different readers will relate differently to this. Again, the poem works on more than one level besides the obvious one of diaspora.

To get into print in the non-group section of Current Accounts is a great achievement as there are always very many writers who send in work and we all know that rejection can be disappointing.

F James Hartnell

Recent theatre and cinema

2008-01-19T22:30:00.000Z

As is often the case with comedies, certain characters, not always the main players, get the most comic lines whilst others have to struggle with every line to get the laughs. In the Oscar Wilde pièce de moeurs An Ideal Husband, it was Milo Twomey (as Lord Goring) and Ann Furbank (Lady Markby) who had the plum lines and made the most of them. An immensely enjoyable evening in Manchester with the usual Royal Exchange excellence in both cast and direction and a fine start to the New Year’s theatre. Who could not love Wilde's disparaging views on curates, political corruption, the idle rich and society in general? Times have not changed so very much.

In the cinemas meanwhile, there is an abundance of good films at the moment. The Kite Runner is a beautiful film. The Guardian referred to it as such but also felt it was somewhat manipulative. I never felt that to be so. Poignant, tragic, affirming, real. With respect to another film, The Assassination of Jesse James etc etc, the one point that seems to have escaped the critics is that this is clearly a coming of age film for Brad Pitt whose acting is better here than anything else he has done. He exuded menace, doubt, foreboding, duplicity. A fine performance.

Happy New Year!

2008-01-10T22:15:00.000Z

New Year’s Rezzo – a blog is for life not just for Christmas (roughly quoted from Phil Crippen). I missed reviewing so many good events at the back end of the year and haven’t posted enough largely due to colds and coughs and lack of oomph. Well, for the faithful, here’s some news:

Bank Street Writers presents a new worldwide competition for poetry with serious money prizes – more anon.

Riders at Wood Street, Bolton – a great event just before Christmas and another coming up on 1st February.

Brief Reviews

The African Association Christmas Dinner Dance in Bolton – Excellent!
The Golden Compass – fair to middling
I Am Legend – fair to poor

Chinatown, Manchester, 25th Dec - Excellent!

Overdrive 3

2007-12-07T23:37:00.002Z

Another successful evening of beautiful music. The past two Overdrives have seen classical music and Indian sitars and tabla as the driving force. we were so lucky tonight to have the amazing drumming of Nat Bliney from the African Association to animate the evening.

Overdrive has warped a little to engage more young people involvement - always an essential aim - and it was great to hear performers as young as 14 doing their stuff via scenes from a play and covers of standards from the charts. A one off was the video presentation by Kris of his wrestling exploits - pure kitsch and pure enjoyment for most of the crowd.

So many artists, so much joy. If I had to single out a most memorable moment... it would be David Strickleton's astonishingly good song which he also performed at Riders on Friday: a song that reaches into you, viscerally, an absolute belter. I will hopefully put this on line soon. It is the best song I have heard in years. Huge amounts of creativity and sheer talent on this night and still the throngs stay at home glued to their boxes. Twas ever thus I suppose, but there is nothing that can compare to the real, live thing.

Some generously gave up their spots to allow for youthful indulgence on the part of others. It didn't go unappreciated and hopefully we will make amends at future events. Particular thanks to Gerry O'Gorman who motored from college to get there in time for his spot: a true pro.

With the dynamics shift, I hope we won't lose the faith in terms of Overdrive's essentials of creating new music and pushing the envelope. I suspect Mr Average does not know how hard it is to cooordinate such an enterprise: as with most things in life, there are always those who make allowances for those who won't.

Normafa

2007-10-26T17:25:00.000+01:00

The rich as always breathe
the cleanest air up here where the sky
smiles on oaks and elms
greening Schwab Hill
as far as the finest walking boots
can take you.

Sylvan shrines to wayfarer
saints, lovers on benches
along blue-chicoried tracks,
recently liberated angels
fending off imaginary danger
in the country park
where the old man hires out his crates
of toys to the poorer
families up here on the bus
for a few Sunday hours closer to heaven

drably dressed, pushing their
secondhand pushchairs, taking in
the haze of the Danube far below:
a city forever recovering, a steady
optimism undampened even by
pools of sorrow down on Andrassy.

Pelotons of cyclists spin past
the electric gates of Hotel Normafa,
ten buses an hour ferry faces
up and down these soaring hills
until the sun peels away, dusk
lopes in like a bad dog
crossing the bridges that stitch
this city together.

Light bleeds fast
down these huge boulevards
but the ornate facades of Pest no longer
fear the night.

As taxis weave their diesel webs
over the river up into Buda
the road gets steeper
the granite less staunch
until the lights below are
glitter on a dressing room floor,
until the chic chalet-mansions of
Normafa serrate the hill’s edge.

Silence, balm: the stars kiss
the forest as it closes its last flowers
for another night while down by the river
a million tenants in 60s tenements
dare to dream the democratic dream.

The Brave One

2007-10-11T10:40:00.000+01:00

Jodie Foster's latest film has not been well attended locally until now but at last is starting to get good reviews in the serious press: I suspect it came out at the wrong time with reviewers concentrating on other more hyped productions. In fact, this a good film with plenty of twists and turns and a very credible plot. Foster is a very underrated actor and deserves a lot more column inches for this performance. Recommended.

Hovis remembered

2007-10-11T10:30:00.000+01:00

Last night at The Phoenix saw a very special event: the premiere of Hovis in Wonderland a radio play by Dave Morgan based on the writing of the late local comedian and writer Hovis Presley with Nat Clare as the eponymous hero ably supported by other local poets and actors.

The audience clearly enjoyed the old Hovis humour and the open mic warm ups were also well-received. the whole thing reminded me a little of the Goon Show, particularly with the sound effects. I was there to provide some 'elevator music' as background in the bar, which is a very different thing from performing to a silent, captive audience but which still proved enjoyable. I hope this play gets another airing as it's a good night for the audience.

Another good George Clooney film

2007-10-08T00:00:00.000+01:00

Michael Clayton

Yet another good one from Gorgeous George. Four star ratings from most of the critics and a very enjoyable film. Financed (produced) by the big wheels on the cast, this is a very competent film. Catch it this week or next at your local cinema.

exchange theatre: Henry V

2007-10-07T23:56:00.001+01:00

A very impressive Harry

Elliot Cowan is to be congratulated on an extremely real, credible Henry V: excellent diction, kingly bearing and presence, and in the lighter moments enough for us to be sure he is not a one trick pony. An outstanding performance.

Overdrive Success

2007-10-05T16:59:00.000+01:00

OVERDRIVE 1 : Tuesday 2nd October 2007 at The Phoenix.

There were 20 performances in all:

2 classical pieces by a group from Chorley
3 spots of poetry accompanied by music
2 R&B / rock mixes on CD
2 keyboard-accompanied ballads
3 Nigerian songs
8 new songs accompanied by guitar(s)

Feedback (via anonymous forms) from musicians and audience was totally positive, people especially liking:

‘the bonhomie of the evening’
‘nice mix of material’
‘the diversity’
‘the variety’
‘the classical music group, James Hartnell, everything’ (whoever this was, your cheque’s in the post)
‘safe environment for new talent, appreciative audience, (I) like the environment of the Phoenix, well MC’d’
‘the atmosphere of support and acceptance, the facility to provide a stage for people who haven’t performed before’
‘originality, creative encouragement of event’
‘eclectic mix and interesting idea’
‘the variety of acts’
‘the atmosphere – relaxed and fun’

Participants were aged from about 10 yrs and up and included Amber Milton-White, Abi Idowu, 6 members of the Brett family, Luke Harrison, Mark Jones, Chris McWilliam, Dave Strickleton, Alan Gray, Bill Brierley, Don Parry and James Hartnell.

The next event, called cryptically OVERDRIVE 2 will take place on Tuesday 6th November(date to be confirmed) at The Phoenix starting at 7.30 pm. Details will be sent to those interested very soon. I hope you may be able to join us for OVERDRIVE 2.

Dance: World Premiere of ‘Infinity’.

2007-09-30T20:43:00.000+01:00

Saturday night saw a superb performance by the Rambert Dance Company at The Lowri.

The first piece ‘L’éveil’ , choreographed by Melanie Teall and featuring singer Melanie Marshall singing Kurt Weil’s ‘Je ne t’aime pas’ and Bricusse’s ‘Feeling Good’ explored aspects of femininity in new and thoughtful ways and was well received by the audience.

Then ‘Stand and Stare’, a brilliant look at the emotions behind Lowri’s paintings, choreographed by Darshan Singh Bhuller with music by Bartok took the whole evening to another level.

Karole Armitage's ‘Gran Partita’ set to Mozart featured one of the tenderest of lovers’ trysts ever depicted through dance. Sensory overload indeed.

The final work, the premiered ‘Infinity’ with its visceral electronic music, explored the human condition with clawing gestures and reptilean costumes. The audience went wild and rightly so. This was phenomenally good dance, the sort of performance that is welded into memory forever.
Choreography Garry Stewart, music Luke Smiles.

Astounding, disturbing, memorable, unique.

New Gig

2007-08-23T17:09:00.000+01:00

The first overdrive session takes place on Tuesday October 2nd at The Phoenix in Bolton, featuring newly composed music from a wealth of musicians and composers. A showcase of all that's new and good in music. You saw it here first.

Royal Exchange Theatre: Pretend You Have Big Buildings

2007-08-05T16:44:00.000+01:00

We received a special offer to go and see this play, the winning entry in the Bruntwood Competition by Ben Musgrave. Maybe the special offer was because the play had some poor reviews (which I only read after seeing it) and was thus not sold out.

As a theatregoer rather than hack critic or luvvy, I found this play well worth seeing. It covered a lot of issues and was an interesting production using minimalist scenery descending on pulleys onto the set. Some big names in the cast. I thought the acting was more than competent.

The critics did not see fit to lavish praise on this play, probably because it tries to cover many different themes and most critics seem to need a simple story line so that they can concentrate on other elements of a play.

Lynne Walker, writing in the Independent on Sunday, which is turning out to be the worst of the serious Sundays, found it ‘underwhelming and unconvincing’, referring to the ‘stilted acting’ and ‘patchy narrative’. Lyn Gardner in The Guardian nailed it for me with her rather more generous ‘sprawling play with a big heart’.

I think Musgrave will go on to write better plays but as a debut this was most promising. Billy Seymour’s Steven was the funniest role I have seen for a while. I did not find the acting stilted. This was an ambitious play, which is not a bad thing, and far less formulaic than others I have seen this year.

Andy Mckee - Guitar - Drifting - www.candyrat.com

2007-08-01T21:14:00.001+01:00

Drift to this!

BSW go to the Lowry. 4th July 2007

2007-07-04T17:41:00.000+01:00

Bank Street Writers’ jaunt to The Lowry on 4th July gave us some very useful insights into the artist and his work. We were given an excellent introduction to the man and his life by Susanna and then poet in residence Norman Parry gave us a tour of the site and read some of his poetry based on the Lowry and its art.
A very interesting afternoon which I’m sure will produce some excellent writing from the group later.

Bourbon Street Preachers in Ramsbottom

2007-06-30T22:44:00.000+01:00

I managed to catch the first hour of the Bourbon Street Preachers gig at The Royal Oak in Ramsbottom on this last wet night of a wet June. Amongst the numbers I heard was the excellent Buzz Me Blues, one of my favourites (in fact it was one of the blues I played and sang last weekend at The Crown in Horwich). Other numbers of note were a very good I Put A Spell On You and Mustang Sally, an impromptu rendering due largely to the influx of some twenty or more women out on a hen night. Two of them sang well and provided the backing vocals on Mustang Sally. By then the place was jumping.

The Bourbon Street Preachers lineup included keyboards, drums, bass, guitar and vocals/harp/squeezebox. At times, this approached a decent Cajun sound. I had the impression that the gig was going from strength to strength as I left for another appointment. You could call these mature players but they laid down a good blues beat and some tasty solos on harp, guitar and keyboards, just the tonic needed with our ridiculous weather.

Write Out Loud Poetry at Middleton 24th June 2007

2007-06-25T21:14:00.000+01:00

From the top: poets Gemma O'Neill, Greg Rodrigo, Gordon Zola and Carol Pickering.

A warm welcome was given to some newcomers at this WOL event . We all hope that they will read next time. Only about 20 people this time, but quality work was performed. After MC Paul Gonzo Blackburn’s introduction, the first session started as Dave Morgan read ‘Promotion’ a witty rhymer about getting on and being ‘a complete and utter bastard’. Then Greg Rodrigo did his ‘London’ an interesting view of the impersonality of the southern capital. Gonzo delivered his ‘Economic Refugee’ where as usual he asks people for money.

Katie Haigh then read us her ‘Searching’, a thoughtful piece. Norman Warwick’s ‘The Cost Of Gold’ looked at funding for the Arts going down the drain while the Olympics gets everything. but who will ‘paint their portraits, tell their story’?

Carol Pickering’s sociopolitical piece ‘Reflections On Life’ looked at different individuals who cannot be made to write. Gerry O’Gorman’s ‘Engerland Expects’ dealt in nice juxtapositions: ‘there’s carnations round the lamp post and there’s holes in the road’. Then Mr G Zola performed his ‘Food Of Love’. This was excellent, typical, Cheese at his best. Seamus Kelly’s first telling, witty piece was called ‘Flash’. Gemma O’Neill read her ‘When I was Five’ a very good local accent piece that I’ve heard before. I read ‘The Keeper of Turton Tower’.

After the first break, we read in reverse order, so I started with one called ‘Leon’, then Paul did something which may have been called the Best Poem or it might have been his Intro Poem – sorry I missed the title. Gemma did her ‘Location, Location, Location’, good, competent stuff: ‘Everyone knows my street’. Amongst others ‘a middle-aged mini-skirted lush’ lives there.

Seamus read ‘Only In My Dreams’, a very good, powerful piece about habitat destruction in Western Ireland:’unnatural lines of unnatural trees’. Then Mr Z did his ‘Mr Tambourine Man’ ‘Not even Coldplay could fix you’. Gerry read ‘The Regal’ about past times at the cinema:’a panavision treat’. Carol did her ‘Lost Love’, a formal piece, (possibly a pantoum?) . I liked ‘in my Icarus fantasy I flew’. Norman gave us a chilling tale about a preacher who puts fornicators to the sword. I don’t know if it was deliberate but there was a distinct reference to Dante’s Paolo and Francesca for me in the line ‘He saw two souls that took to flight’. Katie’s ‘Awake’ struck a chord with her fellow insomniac poets: ‘Will I ever escape the madness, the chaos awake.’

Greg then gave us his political piece about Tony Blair’s smile which went down well. Dave finished the second session with his ‘Arrested Poetry’ a useful snipe at the ether-breathing upthemselves who cast nasturtiums at those of us who don’t write arcane, twisted-imaged, uppity bollocks: ‘doing time for committing rhyme is the doggerel poet’s fate’. The final session was a random one where Gonzo stuck a pen in the list to choose who read next. Briefly, because this is already a long review, Gerry: ‘I’m the joiner. When I’ve finished, it works, it’s fixed’. Danny Sleddon’s (hope the name’s right) ‘Slow To Go’ was also read by Gerry. We hope Danny will write more good poems and read them next time. Katie’s ‘Musicbox’ personified beautifully the little ballerina model in the box. Seamus gave us an excellent ‘Just Too Much’ with a killer last line.

Greg talked of war: ‘I am in the middle of reality’. Dave delivered an irreverent, punful ‘David Attenborough’s Deep Blue Sea’. Gemma read a piece about the leader of her gang ‘All she ever got at home was a Dad who was drunk’. Greg did more of his engaged approach to the world.

Mr Z then became Terry Dactyl in a plea for dinosaur equality. Loads of puns and dino jokes. I did my ‘Fast Crowd’ about locals in rough pubs. Norman finished the evening with a love poem called ‘This Is The One’ which really hit home: the safest road running south out of hope and north out of fear’.

My apologies if any of the names or quotes are wrong. This joined-up writing takes time. This was the first time I had heard some of these poets and they were as competent as any. As some of the newbies commented to me, there was a really good range of styles and deliveries. Middleton is not an event to be missed, people. My favourite of the night was Norman’s last one but there were many others that came close.

Artists at The Crown, Horwich Sunday 24th June 2007

2007-06-25T21:05:00.000+01:00

From the top: Rachel Appleton Band, John Cleys, Sandra Cleys, members of Write Out loud including the famous Gonzo attempting to read the smudged notes on his hand.

24th June saw an extra Riders event at the Crown in Horwich. It was to have been in the beer garden (car park) but the weather forced us inside. This was an interesting gig as it coincided with Horwich Carnival, bike races, Morris Men, various drunken groups and all sorts of other attractions. Horwich was actually hermetically sealed for the day with only the more intrepid motorists getting anywhere.

Things eventually got underway when a tardy Gonzo poet surfaced and MC’d the occasion. After Paul’s inimitable ‘Intro Poem’, I was shoved on first, kicking and screaming, to play a few instrumentals and blues for 20 minutes. Then the magical Gordon Zola did a great stint including ‘The Mating Game’, ‘Folk song’, ‘Blackpool Rock’ and ‘Sweet Rapper’. All these went down very well with a loud, fluid ever-changing crowd.

Then the star of the gig, Rachel Appleton did her first set with her band. I’d heard these before but they were still great songs with that lilting, haunting voice of hers. She too seemed a little perplexed by the odd nature of this carnival gig but her stuff was very well received.

After the break, Paul read his ‘Economic Refugee’ then I did an old blues and two of my own songs, ‘Flustered’ and ‘She Knows’. Even Paul seemed to like ‘Flustered’, so now I know. Dave Morgan regaled us with his Hovis poem, one about daffodils, another about Harry San, a Green Party manifesto, the Shulpa Shetti joke and his anti-corporate masterpiece. All went down very well.

Gordonzola did his ‘Mr Tambourine Man’ then and Sandra Cleys had the audience in fits of laughter with her poems which range from an ode to dogpoo, Marlene Dietrich style to her excellent piece on being in your pocket. John Cleys proved his stamina and tenacity in the face of a rather chatty audience by rattling off a litany of works without pause for breath. Go , John, go!

Rachel’s second set was all new stuff which I really enjoyed. ‘Blackwood’, an A minor job, was excellent: ‘a year of isolation / summer’s stretching on’. ‘Let Good Things Grow’ was a D key droner which I would have preferred with some sort of middle eight but still very competent. Then ‘Here in the water’ in E and ‘Hideaway’ which was really good: ‘nobody’s gonna teach the kids about the sticks and stones’. The best new number which concluded the set was ‘Forever Long’ , an F modal job with some very interesting changes and some mint lines such as ‘Put all your tranquil vibes around me’. Rachel has a good sound going on here and the addition of percussion this time certainly lifted things.

I presume this was a one-off gig, but it did show that the artists concerned are well-received by the general public, not just the aficionados and no one was booed, bottled or heckled. Well done to all performers.

Withering Wakefield Saturday 23rd June 2007

2007-06-25T21:01:00.000+01:00

On Saturday three of us went to Wakefield Theatre Royal. I love our provincial theatres. The foyer and bar at the Wakefield were pretty original and painted in a wonderful, sleazy green. The main auditorium had what appeared to be a cleaned or retouched ceiling and as much plasterwork and gilt cornice as anyone would want. A delightful little venue.

Our trip was to see ‘Withering Looks’ starring Maggie Fox and Sue Ryding who together with their team make up the Manchester-based Lipservice theatre company. This was superb performance. Both actors have an exceptional ability to interact with the audience. Maggie Fox combines the best of Joyce Grenfell and Frances de Latour, and Sue Ryding is equally adept at contorted expressions. As a duo they have that effortless timing and understanding which only few achieve.

‘Withering Looks’, now in its 22nd year has lost none of its appeal, being as witty and entertaining a tour of the Bronte sisters as ever. However, it is only one in a series of comedies that Lipservice has produced and fans will be looking forward to the forthcoming ‘Live and Let’s Dye’ (with Jane Bond) which starts its tour this autumn.

Trash Press

2007-06-19T13:17:00.000+01:00

Today I found myself in a waiting area with only trash to read. On page 26 of the horrendous Daily Mail the headline reads ‘The British workers denied jobs because they can’t speak Polish’. This extremely badly written piece of tripe by Andy Dolan refers to a comment by a Tory MP Malcom Ross at a parliamentary committee session last week: ‘A woman came into my surgery and told me about her daughter’s experience when she was looking for work’.

Not only did this happen (allegedly) over a year ago, but the MP rather conveniently did not have any details e.g. the date, the woman’s mother’s name, the factory involved. It’s a bit like the Martian I saw yesterday in Morrison’s. I can’t quite remember his name but I distinctly remember him telling me that David Cameron was God. So it must be true.

Note how the Mail reporter extrapolates this single apocryphal statement into a headline implying that more than one person, fictitious or not, (‘workers’) was involved. Of course, a truthful headline such as ‘Tory MP alleges that one girl’s mother told him a story about a year ago but has nothing to substantiate the tale’ won’t sell trash.

Just in case I thought Andy Dolan to be an exception, today’s Daily Express carries yet more evidence of our garbage problem. Patrick O’Flynn (Chief Political Reporter) refers to the ‘tidal wave of humanity which has flowed here from Eastern Europe’ and to ‘importing two million extra people into Britain’. Even the Mail’s exaggerated figures can only come up with 800,000 which we are told ‘some experts’ have quoted – i.e. the racist far right Migrationwatch or maybe the one-cells from the BNP. But O’Flynn’s finest line refers to his abomination of ‘the liberal metropolitan types who dominate politics and the media’. Ah, if only they did!

Il gastronomo

2007-06-16T22:55:00.000+01:00

He’ll be hovering over them, gazing into those
Tuscan cauldrons by now. No mere affairs of the mouth,
these, more slicing time with the gods
at the altar of the garlic-dressed bean.

A flourish of fennel, a dash of James Baldwin,
a kiss of balsamic, a twist of life,
patience cajoling magic deadly deep
within the eighth liberal art.

A week later he flies home, leaving behind
a seasoned wedge of his soul. In Cleveland,
Chianti sales triple as they queue for him,
for his mouthfuls of heaven.

(Firenze, giugno 2007)

Une femme des plus remarquables

2007-05-30T20:09:00.000+01:00

Là où les oiseaux
chantent l’heure, et ailleurs
sous un ciel moins vaste;
partout où l’on connaît la joie.
Sache-le bien:
tout le monde pense à toi.

Mirrorball, Zacc Rogers at The Thirsty Scholar 16th May 2007

2007-05-17T09:20:00.000+01:00

This was a ‘Shambles Night’ with Eddy on the desk, four acousticky acts and two bands.

First up was a duo, John Lowndes and Daniel Clarke. Some promise here but one song was a waste of sound as they both played identical chords throughout. The others were better in that respect. Vocals could improve a little and an investment in new strings on the non-ovation type guitar would be good.

Second was Rondas. Slightly better on quality in both voice and tuning. Rhythmically very good. A bossa impressed me.

Third was the very popular Zacc Rogers. He started with a driving harp and guitar number that stopped the bar in its tracks. Awesome. We were then treated to some fast flatpicking in open D which clearly impressed the crowd. Zacc’s versatility showed in his switching to an open G tuned second guitar for some outstanding slide work. Not only can he do all this but he’s also into jazz. It’s good to see competent playing when there’s so much naff strumming and powerchording around. For the inevitable encore Zacc did a lovely gospel number, possibly called ‘Show me the light’.

Act 4, Andrew Deighton was apparently supposed to have a band with him but they didn’t show. Maybe unfair to judge him just on the solo performance, but if you get up there you must expect some comment and here the guitar was desperately out and the songs ended sort of nowhere.

The first of the two bands, Mirrorball, then played an excellent set. Talking to the other musicians present, it was clear that this is a highly respected outfit whose indie psychedelic big guitar sound has its own very distinctive route. I liked all of their stuff and in particular ‘I Am The Song’ and ‘Heavy Lemon’. You can hear these and other tracks on their myspace site (mirrorballfc). As with Zacc Rogers, there is no substitute for professionalism and musical ability which they had in abundance, turning dissonances around and throwing aural surprises at a delighted audience.

I didn’t see enough of the last band, Carbon Kinetic to do them justice. The opening number pointed up the odd sound problem, as is often the case – the bass was inaudible and the other guitars needed someone on the desk. However, in better ‘weather’ I think they would impress.

A great night with Zacc and Mirrorball totally mint.

Dear Anonymous

2007-05-16T11:03:00.000+01:00

Thank you very much for your comment about the poem. I can see how the ending might seem trite. I was trying to convey the fact that some ‘friends’ treated the situation as out of sight out of mind and also that we lead (and maybe waste) our humdrum existences without much reflexion on the fact that we are able-bodied.
I will consider an alternative ending. Thank you again for your kind and constructive remarks.

James

Poetry Night at The White Hart, Oldham Sun 13th May

2007-05-14T08:00:00.000+01:00

An interesting mix of poetry on a very wet night.

Cayn White did three – one about chat shows and two about burgers – the first of these a mugging by a burger king and the second about the human contents of certain burgers. All three raised a laugh from the audience.
Harry Ogden did one called ‘Battlesong’ about ‘nations everywhere in tune with perfect harmony’ and some rhymes which he said were excruciatingly bad, though I’ve heard worse; another called ’Sunami’ – ‘it’s now a word we can’t forget’; also ‘A Walk in the Cemetery’ about friends who’ve died.
Carolina de la Cruz did two cathartic pieces: ‘Past, Present, Future’ about physical abuse which I’d heard before but still had impact, and ‘The White Lady’ about drug abuse. Both very powerful pieces.
Paul Broadhurst gave us ‘Election Near’, another about the environment and one about a stag do. Paul sells collections of his poems in aid of a local hospice, a very worthy cause.
Gregorio Rodrigo, a new face, read one on war – ‘this is a soul which is overflowing’ and another about English politics and Tony Blair’s smile. I hope we may hear some of his poems in Spanish in the future.
Paul Blackburn, the Poetry King, treated us to his shuffle poem ‘Dawn Walk Through Misty Moonlight’, ‘Change’ and ‘Joy’. All well received.
Melanie Ross read two – the first an erotic fruit market piece and the second an absolutely outstanding piece about the poet looking for inspiration called ‘Little Monsters’ I think.
I read ‘The David Miles Exhibition’, ‘Met’, ‘The Joy of Shopping’ and ‘Doty’s Mackerel’.
Tony Ryan read his well received poem about an MS sufferer ‘being in awe of courage so rare’ and the pensive ‘Dark Waters’ – ‘I was the plopped pebble whose ripples folded…’
Gordon Zola unleashed an entertaining standup routine about nursery rhyme characters and, for a change a song/poem ‘The Troubadour’s Lament’ which went down well.
Dave Morgan gave us two excellent efforts, one about football and the other a homage to Jack Kerouac.
Scott Devon did a splice of two poems about being high on poet-ry and also recited part of a Simon Armitage poem ‘Out of the Blue’ which was enjoyed. Julian did an anniversary elegy to his late father ‘go, proud Polish pilot, fly…’
and the lovely ‘If I could write like Neruda’ where we were told ‘forgetting is long / but love is eternal.’ He also finished his compering of the evening with his witty ode to the Rhubarb Triangle.

Maybe at times a little more serious or somber than usual tonight (I blame the rain) but still very enjoyable and the best poems were extremely good.

Last week

2007-05-13T10:09:00.000+01:00

Last week I saw Terre Haute, a play about an imaginary meeting between Gore Vidal and Timothy McVey; saw The Lives of Others, a German subtitled film about the Stasi; visited the David Miles Exhibition at The Lowri (see previous entry); I recited some poetry in Wigan; and went to an acoustic evening at The Howcroft in Bolton. Quite a mixed week. Here are some of the players from The Howcroft: Stewart Warburton, Ron Callow, The Rev Mick and Dennis Dodds.

The David Miles Exhibition

2007-05-13T09:52:00.000+01:00

He says he has to fill more sketchbooks, these retro
diaries of his mind. Within the mobiles (are there 300?)

I hear the faint buzz of silhouette interaction, I sense him
at work, suspending these fleeting, imaginary folk

reduced to pure line, I feel them through their day.
They move, they cast their shadows. Melancholy slides

into the changing gaps between them. I’ve seen
this crowd before on the slope of the Arndale,

waiting for trams outside the Arena, checking in
at Terminal 2. Lowri’s people. David catches contours,

dines on dimension. He outlines these lives, contains
their presence in this cream-walled Salford space

too briefly. He’ll have to let them go home soon.

Scream of consciousness

2007-04-23T18:47:00.000+01:00

the fashionista turns to beige
the S & M-er locks his cage
the herbalist consults her sage
the plagiarist insults his page

the atheist stands centre stage
the eagle swoops and screams in rage
the green can’t live without his gauge
and zeitgeist quickly comes of age

the seer sees but wants to suck it
the pessimist still needs his bucket
and every Nan must have her tucket
with the Union Gap and Gary Puckett

a million pound bonus in the city
three streets away kids plead for pity
the gangsta thinks he’s cool and witty
but the exit wounds are none too pretty

the pendolino leaves the track
while babies cry from crack and smack
the fascist flies his union jack
a death a minute in Iraq

Da Vinci stirs and checks his code
the warriors love their wars and woad
the rucksack hides its hideous load
when will the next red bus explode

another day of hows and whys
another big mac coke and fries
it’s gimmee gimmee oil and lies
and gods and lies and men and lies

the fashionista turns to grey
the S & M-er gasps all day
the herbalist drowns in the bay
the eagle seeks a different prey

Padparadscha

2007-04-23T10:19:00.000+01:00

Wallace’s hands are trembling as his loupe surveys the stone,
as the old man sits before him, all parchment-skinned and bone.
Wallace’s pulse is pounding, as the peach-pink jewel gleams.
Could it be a Padparadscha, the stuff of sultans’ dreams?

The old man says ‘The setting’s worn but I think the stone is fine;
it’s been in the same family since 1789.’
As Wallace checks the massive gem, his head is in state:
the Chelsea filter says it’s real, the growth lines run dead straight.

Now, even at the bottom price, he ought to pay the earth
but he wonders can this old man know what a Padparadscha’s worth?
‘I bet he hasn’t the foggiest,’ says Wallace to himself,
as he takes his pen and notebook from the hidden counter shelf.

‘Pink sapphire’s very nice’ he says ‘But there’s so little demand
and even at this size we’re only talking… twenty grand.’
The old man’s lip is trembling now, he looks down at the floor.
‘Are you quite sure? Is that price is right? I had hoped for much more’.

‘Take it or leave it,’ Wallace says ‘I can’t pay more than that.’
‘All right,’ concedes the old man, ‘But there’s just one caveat.
I don’t have faith in cheques or banks or stock markets that crash:
If I pop back in tomorrow can you pay me then in cash?’

‘Of course!’ says Wallace, rubbing his hands, and bids the old chap well.
That night he dreams of sultans, of the tales he’ll have to tell,
of how he made a killing, retired on one last deal:
a genuine Padparadscha, and at this price, a steal.

Next day the old man’s back at noon, and soon the deal is done
and Wallace shuts up early and strolls home in the sun.
His future couldn’t be rosier, the sapphire’s in the vault;
that night he reads his paper, breaks out the single malt.

But as he turns to the business page, he starts to fall apart.
The news he reads is like a dagger in his sultan heart:
Chatham in America and Seiko in Japan
Have synthesised new sapphires: Padparadschas made by man.

Slamming

2007-04-16T00:04:00.000+01:00

The Wigan Words 07 Slam involved some 14 slammers, 5 judges and an appreciative audience. Compere Julian Jordon spread his usual bonhomie over the proceedings.
First up was Hilary Walker with a very humorous and well recited piece about Reality TV and the cult of the C list celebrity. This deserved a higher score than it got, but that’s a problem at every slam – the early contestants get lower scores than they should. This was followed by Dan Robinson’s ‘Chalet Love’ a visceral piece on holiday bonking which seemed to be littered with swear words but these were all relevant to the subject matter rather than gratuitous (as so much slammers’ swearing is).
Dave Morgan read his ‘Farewell to the Jungle’ a narrative poem at once poignant, allegorical and humorous. This was followed by a piece by Degsy Jones about absolution. Not his best work, I felt. it seemed cliché-ridden and imageless to me. Martin Higgins’ poem about having the perfect home was competent: it had good rhythm and musicality and the killer last line: ‘Grief dulls this Ikea gloss.’ Gordon Zola recited a rappy work about classical composers that not only had excellent rhyme and rhythm but also involved the audience and went down really well.
Musician and student Shaun Fallows gave us ‘My Hands’. Some nice internal rhyme in this but I think it needs development. As it was it was too short for a slam. Scott Devon recited his ‘Three Nights’: rappy, staccato, with Ionescoan degeneration of language into mere sounds, judicious repetition and varied pace. Well liked by the audience and judges.
Then Peter Crompton took the place apart with his ‘Sex sells’. This had lovely rhymes, beautiful alliteration, humour, varied pace and machine gun, clinical delivery. It was good to hear a true poet at work. A wonderful performance that demonstrated no less than sonic mastery of language. Outstanding.
Baz followed with a poem about creatures that get eaten. Whilst it was witty (‘all you need to do is very quickly evolve’) the scansion and rhymes were not maybe as good as the humour. Lindsay Ashton’s piece again was humorous and had a fair rhythm but needed more work on scansion and some different rhymes. Louise Stoddart gave us ‘Kinky’ and ‘City’. The first was short and sweet, the second a bit listy for me though not without wit and charm.
John Cleys squeezed in ‘Turn Me On: A recipe for Love’,an epitaph, ‘Drive Me Like A Fire Engine’, and ‘Temptation in the garden’. His usual competent,witty verse and, I should add, for me a greatly improved delivery. Monologue Joe was last to perform with a song ‘Jesus has come to Wigan’, a thoroughly enjoyable, irreverent piece about the local delicacy (pies).

After the scores were added up, first was Peter Crompton, second Gordon Zola and third Scott Devon. Peter now has the opportunity to compete in the regional finals organised by Apples and Snakes.
It is worth noting that all contestants scored and performed well, especially the first-timers. Thanks to Gillian Forester for putting on this event. My apologies to anyone whose name is spelt wrongly. These are my own views and do not necessarily reflect what others felt about the performances.

Some of my own thoughts about slams are these: performance poetry is not the same as text-based poetry and often the transition from page to stage doesn’t work. I would like to see more recital and less reading, more poems written with performance in mind rather than a poet just picking something to read out of a sheaf of latest works. Speaking and listening (and performing) are active, immediate skills; reading and writing are reflective skills. What might be a great line when I’ve got time to chew it over by re-reading may not work at all when I can only hear it once.
Rhythm, musicality and aural fireworks sometimes but not always characterise the best slam poetry. Those whose slam poems use rhyme need to be just as good at metre and scansion as the best of the text-based rhymers. Too often, an otherwise good idea is ruined by lazy rhyme or clunkingly unmetrical phrasing and some slammers would do well to listen more actively to the likes of Tony Walsh or Peter Crompton. The non-rhymers have it easier in a way, though they need to work harder if anything on aural flow.
What to do about the early performers getting unjustly low scores? It might help if there was a longer open mic session (Julian and Paul did one brief warm-up where the judges scored) of brief acts where the judges scored at least six before the main event. In an ideal world, judges would agree on their criteria in advance and not judge text-based poems as highly as performed ones, if that makes sense.
Finally, I see no sense in having five judges and only using the three middle scores. It means that any judge who votes highest or lowest at any time might as well not be there. Maybe a mathematician can enlighten me.

Visiting Raymond

2007-01-22T20:55:00.000Z

As I queue again at the end of the M67
where the traffic never sleeps,
crawl down to Glossop
then across the top of the world,
I’m thinking, what do I say this time?

As the road angel on the dash flashes red,
chirps out its electronic warnings to me
my mind tunnels deep
beyond the black and the brakelights,
I’m thinking, what do I say this time?

As I roll down the bends from Buxton
to Chatsworth, ninety miles behind me,
everyone else going home this Friday night,
or queueing in their chippy,
or buying their lottery tickets,
or getting a few cans in,
I’m thinking, what don’t I say this time?

Just after he was flown home
I first drove the drive, the nurse said
‘you’d better say goodbye, don’t get many as bad as this,’
but that time I didn’t have to say anything:
he couldn’t hear me anyway.

Now, months later, he hears, he talks. Well,
a version of him talks, like a circuit
that keeps shorting out as he switches
and flips in butterfly conversation
that trails off into sleep.

The good leg stretches out,
the good arm wraps itself around him
and the good eye closes.
I pat the blanket.

And as he sleeps
I siphon off from the decades,
from school to now,
the best of times where
we’ve talked, drunk, played cards,
fished, loved our women,
where nothing could change the way we were.

And as he sleeps
I recount the litany of codewords and gestures,
the bridge bids of a relationship
I smell the superglue that welds us
I see how we enjoyed our difference down the years.

And as he sleeps
my headlights slice back
through this High Peak dark,
the guys on their mobiles all ask
how it went this time and between us
we agree: that’s what I’ll say next time,
that’s what I won’t mention next time.

And as he sleeps
we all go back to our chips
and our lottery and our cans
and these undisabled lives of ours.

Billy Boast & The Loose-Eyed Lady: A Panegyric To The Post-Avant.

2007-01-08T19:37:00.000Z

At the South Coast hog roast Billy Boast nearly toast
overdosed on glasnost saw his ghost past the post
last post lamp post bed post evening post
evening all waterfall basketball chainsaw

from the Albert Halls to Arkansas
done it all know it all
walktall bigsmall
freefall at the paintball
veg stall curved ball up against the Wailing Wall
better give his Mum a call no more jobs at Vauxhall
nothing on the eight ball pockets full of bugger all

he’s getting over it
wait a bit
lowered kit
halfwit
double knit armpit faglit unfit
look at her working it looking fit dress slit:
‘Take me to your bedsit? Biscuit? Risk it? Rarebit? Pomfrit?
Twiglet? Niblet? Titbit? Wotsit? Wiggle it a little bit?’

Well she’s a pronoun
on the town
an up and down
green pound
a bodyhound lost and found nightly crowned queen of sound
home fore he can turn around drinks downed hands bound
half an hour of hare and hound helps herself to folding brown

Well he couldn’t unwind it was a real bind
he felt undermined and columbined
redefined red-lined Rick Steined Patsy Klined
woodbined colourblind never mind the bacon rind
porcupined grapevined bottom lined and much maligned.

Well he was mystified
mortified
multiplied
stultified
red-eyed pork-pied legs wide crucified
panfried setaside powerglide penicide
disapplied undenied tightly tied and offside.

Doty's Mackerel

2006-10-05T10:39:00.000+01:00

The Stop n Shop in Orleans
displays its mackerel
as perfectly the same as

they’ve always been
yet folk seem to approach
this counter from the shellfish end

or the middle where the salmon
glitter, somehow avoiding the left
end without knowing why

just pointing towards it when
they want mackerel as if that end’s
off-limits, an altar or a work of art,

revered. The cognoscenti only
buy on certain days, aware
of how the gleam can

fade, the blood-rimmed eye
tire under the lights, weary of
the stares of bargain hunters

chasing reductions, counting
their toes. Just once, a poet
held this hallowed ground,

stood where no one ever stands,
hushed by these black-barred
clones. Someone called security

though nobody knew who.
But everybody said you just
don’t stare at fish for an hour

unless you’re an accomplice,
a unibomber’s mate or a
look-out for a mass heist

about to hit 24 checkouts
simultaneously. No,
fishwatching is a dead giveaway,

it shows you have a real
problem with the world view
of mackerel. As store guards

shouted he moved away
from the counter; as
they aimed their guns

he drew a pen from his
inside pocket, smiling,
oblivious.

On the back of an
old envelope he wrote the words
he had been waiting for

all summer, words that
captured oil on water,
that exalted a uniformity.

First published in iota.

Strategic Fit

2006-06-15T11:27:00.000+01:00

I want you to stretch this envelope
outside the box I want you to scope
this out and I want you to park this
offline with your gap analysis
take this big picture on board touch base
this has to be a best of breed case
I want you to drill down to the bottom line
use your blue skies thinking read my mind

I want value added leveraging
envisioneering santa clausing
futureproof proactive benchmarking
fasttrack headsup bandwidth ballparking
quality vector mindshare management
taking those maybe steps to 100 percent
wow generating 24/7
paradigm shifting to consumer heaven
a synergistic win win win
a three way street we’ll factor in

I want no emotional leakage,
no dropping the ball
no blamestorming, no pencilpointing
no chairswivelling at all

give me 360 feedback
from your helicopter view
throw the fudge out the window
the old roadmap too

I want actionable mind uploads
I want core competent episodes
think greenlaning offroads
think realtime downloads

You what? You what!?

This isn’t the orchestrating capability team?

OK. My bad. Just henhouse that for next month’s teleconference.

Familiar Signs

2006-06-05T20:14:00.001+01:00

Pendle Hill from the north
– not for the weak-kneed.
Out of Downham, like Dante,
on serious slopes you climb
the moor till it glowers
point blank, defiant.

The Guardian called it
‘a moderate walk.’ It is,
from an armchair, on the internet.

Short of oxygen, we struggle
up zigzags past astounded sheep.
Holding the view for a moment
truth flows in:

they hanged the Pendle Witches
but three familiars
Tibb, Fancie and Dandy
shapeshifting from dog
to cat to bear to hare
were never brought to book.

“Tibb once pushed a witch
into a ditch just like this one.”
As I speak, a huge hare breaks cover.

When you wake up at three,
pull back the curtain, it’s easy
to see them swirling on the starpoints,
their baked effigies crumbling in the sparks:

you’ll hear cackling, distant
screams scouring the night,
you’ll feel that gale of recrimination
that bites the scree-slopes, you’ll
understand once you’ve tasted the air
among the cloudberries on Pendle Hill.

Until then, a lame beggar asking
for one penny, a neighbour wanting
an old shirt, a black-eyed woman digging
turf at sunrise: these are the surest of signs.

Readings in Bolton and Manchester

2006-05-26T15:00:00.000+01:00

Two events this week of note. On Sunday 21st May, the monthly Write Out Loud versefest at The Howcroft in Bolton was again an excellent mix of everything that is good about poetry: with some key figures unable to attend but some new faces in their place, the evening was briskly compered by Dave Morgan.

From JMU Liverpool, Rachel Adamson and Elaine Wilson graced the event, promoting issue 4 of ‘In The Red’ and selling quite a few copies on the night. They read some of their fine work from the magazine. The regulars themselves were in fine form. This must be one of the most talented groups in the country, spanning maybe three generations and covering a vast range of poetry from rap to classically inspired verse.

On Thursday 25th , a substantial contingent of Writeoutlouders took the train from Bolton to the Urbis café in Manchester for a citizen 32 event. I felt there were some technical difficulties with this gig. Long narrow bars with the mic at one end don’t seem to work too well. However, the sound was fairly well controlled by DJs Neither-Nor. The organisation of the night was a bit awry.

My own view is that you should not put a headliner on as a compere: the two don’t work together. You need a compere who will keep things moving along briskly, who gets poets’ names right, and who keeps out the way for most of the evening. At first I was puzzled as to why Nathan Jones was reading so much when he was compering, but then I realised that he was billed on the front of the programme as one of the three featured poets. Whilst his poems are resounding, effective and dramatic, and he is a good poet of that type, he should leave compering to someone else with a less serendipitous approach to the job. Maybe it wasn’t his idea. It’s not rocket science to get people’s names right which he didn’t on too many occasions.

The other two billed stars were Segun Lee-French and Mike Garry. Unfortunately, more than half the audience (i.e. the Bolton bards) missed Mike Garry as we had to catch the last train. Segun Lee-French did a good job of singing, reciting and acting the roles in his work. A competent performer. The open-mic slots were equally well-filled, mostly by Writeoutlouders but with some excellent Manc talent too. Two other poets I had not heard before but hope to hear again were Felix and Aftab Ahmed, both of whom displayed exceptional skill. As we’d missed some of our slots because of the train, we had an impromptu reading on wheels on the way home with poetry from Dave, Julian and myself. Poets I haven’t mentioned here also did a good job though I had heard some do the same stuff before. Still, it beats the T.V. where there's been nothing on since 'The Impressionists'.

The magic of Magali Mauras

2006-05-26T14:47:00.000+01:00

A French poet with a great website, Magali Mauras combines a love of the arts with an exceptional, exquisite gift of expression. Here is one of her poems in French and English and her self portrait.

Land

Sur un labour vaste et désenchanté
- Vaste pour un seul homme –
Un vestige celtique tournait sa puissance
Et selon mon regard estampait ce cumulus

Croître en roi

L’arable consumée
Pouvait-elle côtoyer
Le rouge anglais

Opaque d’un voyage

Volubile, un été, elle nouait conte en riant
Aux prairies bouleversées de roches

Simple enfant
Le nuage se glissait
Dans les draps de la mer

© 2006 Magali Mauras

Land

Over a vast ploughed field
- vast for one man alone -
that had lost its magic
an echo of the Celts surged
and as I watched moulded this cloud

You will grow into a king

Could this burnt umber
sit well with English scarlet?

After a voyage through fable and fog
one summer it wove its legend
laughing at the meadows
overturned by rock.

Just a child
The cloud slipped
Between the sheets of the sea.

© 2006 Magali Mauras. Translation by James Hartnell.

Magali Mauras: self portrait.

Magali Mauras vit en région parisienne, en France.
Elle suit son désir créatif et son plaisir des découvertes dans la passion du langage, des arts et de la littérature en explorant plusieurs chemins qui se croisent parfois.
Elle lit la poésie des poètes contemporains ou plus anciens, d’ici ou d’ailleurs, elle écrit ses poèmes, comme on entre en intimité avec le langage, le sien propre et celui des autres, intimité faite de richesses communes ou partagées, fortes ou apaisantes. Son premier recueil Memor amabor n’a pas encore trouvé d’éditeur. Un second recueil se construit. On peut consulter quelques poèmes anciens et récents sur Poemelilas http://poemelilas.blogspot.com/ .
Elle conte des histoires mêlées de poèmes chantés et de musiques. Ses histoires, elle les découvre dans les livres, elle les entend conter en chemin, ou elle les invente.
Elle contemple le monde où elle vit et voyage. Parfois, elle suspend un instant offert pour photographier.
Elle enseigne aux enfants des écoles primaires où l’on apprend à lire, à écrire, à compter pour soi, pour les autres. Un métier vivant et vivifiant.

Mai 2006.

Mark Doty in Manchester

2006-05-06T02:12:00.000+01:00

Last night I went to an event organised by Commonword at St Ann’s Church in the middle of Manchester to hear the noted American poet Mark Doty, author of several collections of poetry including the immensely successful ‘My Alexandria’ and ‘Atlantis’. His work deals above all with love, loss, beauty, and the devastation of AIDS. I was fortunate enough to talk to him briefly before and after he read. When pressed, he described himself as a ‘lyrical narrativist’ and this fits his writing, or most of it.

He read seven poems in all, a mix of old and new work. He started with ‘Esta Noche’ (from ‘My Alexandria’) a major poem about performance set in a Latin drag bar in the Mission area of San Francisco in which ‘Lola stands unassailable, the dress / in which she is in the largest sense / fabulous: a lesson, a criticism and colossus / of gender, all fire and irony.’ Here, ‘perfection and beauty are so alien / they almost never touch.’ I was a little surprised when this and the other poems were received in polite silence and applause was reserved for the end of the reading. Ah well.

Next was ‘House Of Beauty’, a new poem about a beauty parlour on fire, ‘a charred rainbow.’ Here the exploration of what exactly beauty is gave much food for thought. In the third poem ‘Brilliance’, Maggie is a ‘buddy’ or visitor to an AIDS sufferer. This is a beautifully written, moving poem: ‘let me go, if I have to, / in brilliance.’

The next ‘Lost in the Stars’ – the title refers to a Kurt Weill musical – deals with Billy, a drag queen at a benefit night. How despite his incompetence this character was so bad as to be good. Then ‘At The Gym’ looked at weight training poetically and ‘Magic Mouse’, a recent work, dealt with a news vendor selling a toy for a dollar and shouting it out, so that ‘even halfway down the block / he’s altered the air.’ The final poem was one of my favourites, ‘A Display of Mackerel’. Unlike most of the other narrative poems, this is more of a lyrical meditation where nothing happens, no time passes, but the poet ponders the sameness of these mackerel ‘each a perfect fulfilment / of heaven’s template,’ then goes on to wonder whether this uniformity is where happiness is. The ‘fabulation’ of each mackerel recalls the fabulous nature of drag queens in many of his other poems.

There followed a brief question and answer session covering Mark’s life in Provincetown, some fairly standard gay issues, and some interesting comments about the difference between, on the one hand, Olson and the Black Mountain writers with their legacy of open-ended, mind-tracking, atomised sentences where the reader can veer off on one or more paths, and, on the other hand, the clarity of say Elizabeth Bishop. Doty expressed his predilection for the well scaffolded sentence on whose framework he could hang the exquisite observations, elegaic reflections and elegant lyricism that make up his narrative style.

Mark Doty reads his poems deliberately, weighing his syllables without being ponderous, in a rich, warm voice. There is nothing to beat not only hearing major poets reading their poems but also seeing them in the flesh. I’m glad I was there.

Feeling The Bounce

2006-05-02T17:20:00.000+01:00

I recently bought two small poetry collections. The first was Rod Riesco’s ‘Familiar Machines’ (pub Wilderswood 2002) which comprises some thirteen poems by Rod, many of which were previously published in magazines. I’m catching up with various anthologies by local poets. Rod is the secretary of my local Bank Street Writers in Bolton and an accomplished poet. Not one bad poem here. An anthology which will get plenty of re-reads from me.
I wish I could say the same about the other anthology I picked up ‘X Verse and Other Poems’ by Brian Appleton. (I’m pretty sure this is not the Birmingham Brian Appleton, rock historian and musicologist.) A poorly produced, photocopied A4 chapbook of 19 poems, none of which have anything to do with the anthology’s title, ‘X Verse’ is a collection of formal, rhyming poems. Some are appealing in a gently witty way but most suffer from forced rhymes, excessive end-stopping and that grating odd line where the metre goes out the window in an otherwise formal poem. If you’re going to write this kind of poetry, you really need to get to grips with rhythm, scansion and metre. Too many lines don’t work here. Just a couple of forced examples:

from ‘Memory’

Misadventures left behind
Mock the peripheral mind

or from ‘The Fairy Bridge’

The time, the place are right; here do I stay
But my sweet, if only you had said the day.

This sort of writing gives me toothache. It’s not just Brian Appleton, who at least gets it right most of the time: too many performance poets wreck their rhyming verse with lines that don’t scan (and I don’t mean when it’s deliberate for some humorous or ironic effect.) All it needs is for the writer to feel the bounce. Maybe these writers can’t dance or ride a bike or swim? There may be some sort of coordination or balance problem with those who ain’t got rhythm. Who knows?

'Shawnie': a pragmatic approach to dialect.

2006-04-29T00:20:00.000+01:00

'Shawnie' by Ed Trewavas pub Tindall Street Press, Birmingham 2006. ISBN 09547913 8 X.

Written in Knowle West (Bristol) dialect, this first novel by Ed Trewavas gives a disturbing perspective on an abuse-ridden, dystopian, white-trash estate in Bristol, where the drunk, the drugged and the damaged perpetuate their abused and abusive existence. Whilst some of the baddies get their just deserts, the final message, besides the obvious one that we are all dysfunctional in our own way, is that there are those so damaged as to be beyond rehabilitation. The novel seems to support the view that a predilection for abuse can be hereditary. Some survivors might question this theory these days. The novel poses further interesting questions besides those of social theory and the nature of the abusive personality.

Most teach-yourself-to-write books advise the avoidance of dialect as publishers are less than keen on it. This in itself makes 'Shawnie' a brave effort. The author has adopted a pragmatic approach to rendering the Knowle West dialect. (My family and some of my friends are from the area, and I went to school there and later frequented some of the pubs mentioned, so I have more than an academic interest).

Dealing with dialect is not easy because:

a) if the entire text is put into dialect the result can be unintelligible even to speakers of the dialect, or at best of very local appeal, because a full transcription requires so many neologisms or non-standard spellings;
b) in the case of this particular dialect, there are many unspellable sounds so that a full rendition of the text would require a substantial glossary;
c) consistency is paramount.

The author captures most of the dialect accurately. Where it is just not possible to reproduce the exact sound, he opts for a standard spelling. An obvious example of this is the appendage ‘look’ which throughout Bristol has the meaning of ‘ if you see what I mean’ or ‘you understand’ and equates roughly to the South Walian ‘isn’t it’ or the Lancashire ‘tha’ knows’.

“cos e’s really clever look and I ain’t.” (p.2)

“even when e was a babby, three years old, look.” (p.6)

The problem with 'look' is that, in the dialect, there is a glottal stop at the end rather than the ‘k’. The actual sound is possibly nearer ‘lut’ without saying the ‘t’.

More interestingly, Trewavas uses a different amount of dialect in different parts of the text. In direct speech he gives us the full treatment – every word is rendered into dialect (with the exception of those like ‘look’ mentioned above.)
However, outside of this, where the characters are reflecting in internal monologue, a half-rendition is used: the letter ‘h’ may get dropped but vowels and dipthongs remain standardised. (I should explain that each chapter contains only internal monologue or direct speech.)

Thus, outside of direct speech, ‘it’ remains ‘it’ but in direct speech it becomes ‘eht’. Reading these two sorts of rendition – the ‘half’ and the ‘full’ – demands for a while a kind of secondary suspension of disbelief: it also causes one to consider such questions as ‘What accent do I think in? Do people not think in dialect?’ There is no doubt that the book would not have worked with everything rendered into the full dialect.

You get used to the two sorts of rendition after a while even though occasionally they are so juxtaposed as to be unsettling:

“I mean it weren’t me monthly or nothing.
‘What time’s eht, Shawn?’” (p.5)

Personally, there are one or two sounds which I would have rendered differently: I would have liked ‘ar’ for ‘our’ and ‘awd’ rather than ‘ode’ for ‘old’. I felt ‘you’ was overused and preferred the author’s alternative ‘yowe’ or ‘yuhl’ though these tend to be stressed forms. I found the last chapter inconsistent with the use of both ‘darlehn’ and ‘darling’ and with the last paragraph of internal monologue switching into full dialect. These are small points.

Overall, I think the author has done a very good job. I hope that 'Shawnie' will appeal to a wider audience than that reached by other dialect-written works. It contains some fine writing, deals with important social issues and deserves to be widely read.

Dead on arrival

2006-04-20T07:39:00.000+01:00

These night lanes this my black drive dazzling
headlights wouldn’t change for a second or more
my channels moments only would hear the end
of the track

wouldn’t the lanes change or this a second
dazzling drive would end my moments these black
track channels hear my headlights only for more
of the night

track the headlights drive these channels hear the
lanes dazzling black moments only would or wouldn’t
my night change this end for a second
more of my

Silves

2006-04-20T07:37:00.000+01:00

Where the sandstone shapeshifts
under the wind and spindrift
a riding tern hunts into the sun
collapses
dives
the splash is gone
like these footprints
fading foam-washed into sky.

Limbo

2006-04-20T07:32:00.000+01:00

she swims and spas
she strolls these velvet lawns
she room-services and special-requests
she tickboxes her luxury
she oils and tans
she sunlounges this pristine poolside
she selects and specifies
she ordains a precise cuisine
she mobiles, marlboros
she magazines, manicures
and he plays a round.

The Joy Of Shopping

2006-03-10T15:16:00.000Z

Vespers, then sweet privacy,
chaste shivers as beaded amber
asps over blanched knuckles
and scalding shame pulses
the temple vein.

Whenever she leaves these staunch cloisters,
crosses the gardens tended
by her flighty novitiates
to face the world on Market Street
shopping for essentials,
pavement or sky safer
for her eyes, her soul
than these stockbrokers,
pedlars of Oxbridge opium,
off to an early lunch
while their mistresses luxuriate
in Surrey spas, refresh
their flaxen poise,
she must hurry past too many
gaudy, satanic billboards,
her glance bevelled
from temptation,
from unrelenting torment.
The young, what can they know of guilt?
She flinches at the lapse.

He has so much to forgive tonight:
at her bedside, desperate, daunted,
she itemises disgrace after disgrace,
that familiar pain in her knees and head,
pain for her lifelong love
and she calls him, arms outstretched,
awash with degradation,
shuddering, beyond escape.

He appears, affirms,
embraces, caresses,
forgives.

The scourge bites to the bone.
Smiling, gasping relief,
she kisses his forehead
in pure longing,
holds him to her
starched, unfondled chest
a delicious moment,
then at her desk resumes
her Index Of The Scriptures,
a life’s work.

Nights on the big lake

2006-01-18T04:36:00.000Z

Just after sunset, the Canadas flight in low from the east, a dozen squadrons of fifteen or so. They usually splash down in front of me, but tonight hold height and make for the distant shallows for their twilight, raucous conference. Maybe they can sense me here, well hidden as I am. A wispy, feathering breeze pushes the water towards me, but it’s calm enough to see reflections of the low, broken night cloud and a precocious Venus, always at the front of the astral queue. Midweek, everyone else goes home before now. Even the courting couple don’t turn up in their car on the far shore at dusk: perhaps her unbearable husband got home early.

Last night it was so clear I gave up counting the stars. At dusk a big pike went on the prowl, massive slashes at the silvered surface as she engulfed some hapless fodder fish. Only I know her habits. Three hours into the dark, the other big fish found me and beat me again. When I was getting ready to leave, my headlamp switched on as I gathered up all the gear, the reel on the last rod that I’d left fishing for itself screamed into life. I stumbled, she dropped the bait, I cursed.

I’m back yet again at dusk: it’s still now, flat steely water with just the big flock squawking like stock-market traders, an owl screeching in the copse, water voles fidgeting through the undergrowth, some unfavoured hound howling far out in the night. And I’m prepared. Huge baits tonight. On the top of the gravel works tower, a red aircraft beacon flashes once a second, but the planes I see winking across the sky are maybe a couple of miles up climbing out of Stansted and Norwich, deriding the static stars.

Then, staring hard into the dark, I can just make out a series of sublime head and tail rises as one, then another big, wary, old fish porpoises, moving towards my baited pitch. And then, they are here. By the dim light of the red cycle lamp, I watch the bobbins hanging from the lines. After so many nights, I ought to be less tense about the arrival of the big fish but I shake from the adrenalin as the swirls get so close. The old tiger hunters reckoned you had to avoid thinking about the prey at such times, but it’s impossible. My arthritic old dog sleeps on, always a bad sign. I can’t hold my breath for much longer.

Then the bobbin on the right-hand rod lifts an inch, pauses, climbs slowly to the butt ring – big fish. Twice this has happened in the last month, twice they snapped the rod like a stick of uncooked spaghetti. This time, I lift the rod and far out in the lifeless water an eerie,immense force tries to pull my arm off, thumping and running fast towards the snags and brambles. I turn her and hold on for ten, maybe fifteen minutes as she runs and bores deep, testing my gear and my resolve for that one flaw that she knows has beaten so many others before me, until at last she wallows and comes to the beach where I slide the big net under her, grasp the mesh with both hands and heave my leviathan ashore.

Back up the bank I admire the amber eye, the olive crosshatched flank and those enormous grey fins for a few delicious, boyhood-echoing seconds, before creeping forward and releasing her gently at the water’s edge. She surges away into the depths, drenching me with spray, leaving huge, churning vortices at the surface. Three hours later, the bobbin goes again but, still high, over-confident, I miss the fish. I drive home down empty, monochrome lanes, already planning just one more night on the big lake.

The Mover

2006-01-17T20:19:00.000Z

Eighteenth or nineteenth time, he says, but it won’t be his last.
He reeks of mobility:
well-met and acquainted
kilroyan and fleet,
invariably he’s asked, ‘Why here?’

No answer to satisfy the likes of us.
Work – Relationship – Sanctuary – Weather
What does it matter? We won’t ever move.

The mover loves his life:
he buys his tape in bulk, packs his memories swiftly
he sees time differently, passes with it
he ups or downsizes experience,
evaporates our ploddy years of
learning about this place with
his breathless insight,
travelling lighter
and lighter…

Before the year’s out,
just the remnants of his silhouette,
half a rumour and
the sign by the wall: To Let.

Met

2006-01-17T20:16:00.000Z

Chairleg-hungry foofighter
sparkly-top princess
ford shadows shopfronts
seconds from acquaintance

weaves his way to alcohol
frothy Friday night

clacks her heels on
chewing gum acned pavement

plunges his hands deeper
into lowslung hiphung pockets

tucks a wayward wisp
behind her three zirconium studs

stumblescuffs his unlaced
semi-faded tribal nikes

bulges her bare midriff
over bootlegs ultrawhite

teeshirt over longsleeve
sequin over skin

colliding at the corner
laser-lock begins

Riverscape

2005-10-18T20:16:00.000+01:00

Noon cadence lilts pylons
caressing levees
swandown balm
ripples shingling
moorhens traffic a jittery acceptance
dragonflies envy kingfisher lines

jittery pylons shingling levees
dragonflies’ balm caressing
kingfisher cadence
lilts lines ripples
a swandown noon traffic
envies moorhens’ acceptance

Glassblower

2005-08-15T11:32:00.000+01:00

Furnace accents in his dyed ponytail, the silver-sleeved gaffer breathes life
into his gather-tipped posthorn, pendulums it to stir and stretch
another glowing soda-sand foetus into growth,
accosts the glare of the glory-hole for just enough heat to spin the magic:
he stands, glances down at pale legs and worn trainers
stares jaded through the window at the winter tourist traffic
and on out into next weekend’s dream-drama
like a checkout assistant whose flat look crawls over your shoulder,
while he spins and he breathes and he spins the pipe intimately.

From the viewing gallery, worshippers gaze diminished, deskilled,
looking down into the heated bear-pit where the half-dressed heroes prowl
and dance intuitively from box furnace to gaffer’s chair,
forming the gather in the dripping wet cherrywood block
rolling the raw glow into life.

As the golden parison inflates and blooms,
as the pipe rolls and returns across the marver,
as the rings are spun on, as the colours are changing,
as soaked pads of last week’s Guardian polish and shape,
the gaffer never rests, a tattooed Tantalus,
chair to glory hole to chair, rolling, measuring, rolling, breathing, rolling,
a squirt from the airline, a polish from the pads, rolling,
conformity confirmed by practised eye through didymium lens.

Split-second collusive, the mate lines up his punty spot on,
the gaffer steadies it dead-centre with the pucellas
and together they roll and pierce the already brittling orb,
transfer it from pipe to punty, shear away and reshape the neck,
and check the spec with a final flourish of the dividers:
time to crack off the work.

Light chipchop around the neck then a single meaty tap a foot up the punty
and the perfect dome drops away, sits ready for its cooling therapy in the lehr.
Even as the door closes the next gather is being rolled, cajoled,
the production line tango resumes.

For days the images sear across your mind,
the metamorphosis sits brooding:
ponder the shift from fusion to fragility,
from shapeless sand to perfect artefact.

Waiting for the cactus

2005-08-15T11:29:00.000+01:00

It’s purple outside:
in ten minutes
it’s dirty milk,
rebellious grey swabs,
faintest eastern pink
cloud wash.

My internal clock
explodes
dead on purple.

Besides the succulent chaos
of a brain ajar
as I seethe through
the muslin
of the nightmare,
ramble rooms,
the constant upside
is not this
stealing of hours:

it’s knowing one morning
I’m going to catch
that cactus
just when its latest
tiny spurt of growth
shatters the terracotta pot.

Silverpoint

2005-05-13T12:53:00.000+01:00

Another cheap theft:
picked wild flower,
tide-tumbled pebble,
strand of his life’s gossamer
through the judas grid
on double elephant,
foreign whispers, faint signals.

Shrug back at what’s undrawn,
sidestep beeline
arrowheads of focus,
la page est introuvable
the page cannot be found
all my sites crash at once.

Human channel hop
flits repined, reads walls,
pianoman thoughts
a twisted phone cord.

Deeper – where next?
The hair, why straggle it unflattering?
He would have moulded
northern morning light
yet his eyes disparage sleep,
swim the night pelagic,
writhe at his cursed reflection.

Charred deception arcs
across our times
then crackles.

His silverpoint
plays with shadows,
with parhelion glare
while I can only cross-hatch
with the stump of a jaded 2B.

White Ridge, Baslow

2005-05-04T10:50:00.000+01:00

Experts overhaul us
in Gortex and gaiters,
lurid socks that pulsate
as they clump past.
The two of us,
More M & S and D & G
than Craghopper or Berghaus,
we just don’t go for this
stridy, shrunk pedalpusher,
knotted calf-muscle look.
Leaving off
the Speedos and Birkenstocks
for sensible, preppy chic,
we rockhop, saunter,
amble the eight mile circuit
feeling very Sunday and undemanded.
The experts lap us
in their briskness.
We’d rather hold the views off the ridge,
talk of years to come,
hold hands where the path widens
deep in this Derbyshire autumn.

Table 50, Harvey Nicks

2005-05-04T10:46:00.000+01:00

Light tilts and slides
this Manchester evening,
the curve of Exchange Square
sets in its sweep,
the neon of the Hard Rock Café
slaps the dusk
a freeze frame firework.
Three floors down
street levellers
stride to oases
while Table 50, Harvey Nicks
attends the night,
starched, gleaming, pristine
at the exquisite centre of
the thirty metre restaurant window,
permanently reserved
table for two.

Sat in the gridlock

2005-05-04T10:44:00.000+01:00

Sat in the gridlock
fuzz of brakelights through the windscreen rainfilm
only the dashboard handbrake icon saying
we are not adrift
as condensation steals the tarmac’s sheen
and melts faces in fading machines alongside
for fifteen seconds
till the air-con and the blower
and the recirculator and the heated rear
drive it away and
reshape reality
as defined
(according to engineered, failsafe parameters)
by the engine management system.

Portuguese Dereham

2005-05-04T10:42:00.000+01:00

The castor-wheeled cake stand in La Cascata
back-mirrored, backlit,
hybrid pool table / jukebox / pastry conservatory
sits by the wall watching us all.

Portuguese dialect ripples across the tables
the young men
swagger-smoke their machismo
the women talk
knowingly, nodding, repeating, insistent,
open palm reinforcing the wisdom, today’s truth.

My drained, stained Camelo expresso
could get refilled all day.

I devour the reactions,
relish the beauty of brown eyes
that flicker their pre-lunch ritual acknowledgment
as another steps in from the street.

The slow ballad soars on the hi-fi,
vies with the families’ July voices
and the coffee machine’s urgent noontime shooosh.

Poisoning the macho

2005-05-04T10:40:00.000+01:00

she didn’t have what he wanted:
now he’s hot-wired to hell
jangling the walls
while skanky dogs
bark inside medullar fizzling.

night overload
zooms mach three illusions
binary options whirring cogs
cyan flashes behind the lids.

light on again
stark.

ruthless clock
radio stutter static
life gone tangential
bed battlefield
wake-walking.

he’ll tell her soon:
if you can’t buy decaff
it’s over.

east anglia to the north west

2005-05-04T10:38:00.000+01:00

- screenwash
- diesel
- sandwich (late-date)
- coke
- gum
- music
- zero mileage

up the sliproad on the dual
through the box out in the fast lane
eightyplus way down to forty
single lane cue trucks & tractors

A-Four-Seven concrete heaven
there’s another illegal mobile
join him now unzip my sandwich
load the cd handsfree drive.

king’s lynn ringroad steadyeddy
wronglanesundaydriver slows me
into third swear at the grunter
lurch through roundabout to exit
up the ramp A-Seventeen deadly
read the sign this is a red route:

eighty-three killed so far this year
faded flowers on makeshift kerbshrines
suicidal audi screams past
keen to test out einstein’s theory
barely makes it scammell snarling
nearly number eighty-four.

out across the fens in slo mo
see the migrants cutting cabbages
on the fields since six this morning
working twelve hour days for pennies
pay the gangmaster his bounty
sleep in icecold crowded houses
dream about the distant sweetheart
read again her latest news.

drag on to the sleaford bypass
gatsos threatening twice they’ve had me
moneymaking one-eyed bandits
three points sixty pounds & postage
each & every time they catch you
dreaming at the wheel of fortune
silver city walter mitty
sell the film rights stage the prize fights
literary actuary
billiontrillionzillionaire.

on to newark hit the real road
A-One-M but when I’ve joined it
lakes & river trent to look at
while the holdup lasts forever.

in the name of road improvement
gangs & gangs of orange roadmen
yellow-hatted groups in conference
flashing amber lights on D9s
nothing moving no one working
just here for the calendar shoot.

lose an hour maybe longer
clear the jam to send me wheeling
up the backbone of the country
retford doncaster behind me.

been five hours since the sandwich
coke’s all drunk up gum’s all spit out
see the cooling towers steaming
ferrybridge M-Sixty-Two.

motorway I hate your rhythm
friday night all radio stations
wallow in the carnage horror
queues & logjams hour on hour
here the nightmare traffic madness
crowded crush hour claustrophobic
nothing for it but to fight it
all across the chest of england.

late & later make it latest
longest time it’s ever taken
overtaking weekend thinking
fastlane dozing eyelids falling
blue light red light blue light red.

Defiance

2005-05-04T10:35:00.000+01:00

A bacofoil tickertape of rain
endorses this Saturday lie-in.
That metronomic chrome drip
from off the guttering is back again
shattering against the balcony rail
exploding across my drowsy eyeline.
Mercury droplets slung snug under the rail
wobble and wink as the wind elbows into them
send out their semaphore of flashing silver
disdainful of gravity.

Death of Svevo

2005-05-04T10:33:00.000+01:00

sono sempre stato vecchio, anna
il signor eliot il tls queste macchine moderne
tutti quanti sempre contro
il saltimbanco, il buffone,
l’uomo di fumo dei futuristi
ma infine
ci sono riuscito ecco vedi
l’ultima sigaretta nel diario

i’ve always been an old man anna
mr eliot and the tls these modern automobiles
all against me charlatan joker
futurists’ man of smoke
but i won in the end
there you see
the last cigarette in the diary.

Cognac round the clock

2005-05-04T10:29:00.000+01:00

It was Dominic Dominic (the third), American drinker laureate,
Who introduced me to timebombs one Florentine Friday.

We’d skipped Etruscology, shambled through piazzas:
Found David on duty, the Uffizi closed.

Art deco lamplight swam the chrome tabletops
As we struggled with abstracts, shuffled glasses, synapses.

It got late too early, dawn broke admonishing
We counted sixty-two opportunities
To never, not ever, do this again.

Fast Crowd

2005-04-23T20:15:00.000+01:00

This is a misfit congregation of luckless disciples of the one true faith, irregular regulars ensconced while evening unfolds their non-events.

Airvent in his sandals, a frying pan fat pommade slicking down his yellow-grey hair, sits derided, stares down below stained cavalry twill at his feet, his memories. The change from his twenty spills across his pew, a twenty every night, just a couple of liveners that always turn into eight.

‘Hey, Airvent, give us a song!’

The sacristan threatens excommunication; Airvent shrugs, shakes his head like a wet dog. Two acolyte one-nighters throw glances from the side aisle, no eye contact, no yen for invasive dentistry tonight.

Up at the altar, Pseud, Cool and Twister lean into each other, laugh a witless laugh at cigarillo intervals while the Acne Kid ogles novitiate nuns. Slurred vespers whispers cross the aisle, confessions to anyone who’ll listen but no one ever does.

The watchful high priest leads a final communion, accepts the collect gratefully and the chimed tocsin ends it all. In the churchyard, tuneless hymns swirl into the night. And down the alley, the redeemed rejoice.

Hawk

2005-04-18T19:48:00.000+01:00

Combing autumn,
the waters under the ridge
where the wind stalls,
damp mornings I found her
riding the mist,
traced her soaring.

In freezing dawn I caught her
drinking by the cat-ice,
called hopeful but she
started from the sedge.
I loved the land:
knew where she might hide.

December dusks I searched,
never found where she slept
the starspun night.
Come icebound morning
I would marvel, she would
scribe the sky.

New Year fields lay scorned
in scant amenity,
dour season of the daunted.
Softer days urged
April into May,
the time of yearning.

Arriving early where I used to go
I met her quartering the bluff:
she dived,
swooped to the tree
where she’d been waiting
these empty months.

She held me in her amber
iris of reproach,
gave a ruffling shrug,
then climbed the sky
in aerobatic absolution
of my fickleness.

Leon

2005-04-14T20:14:00.000+01:00

Stars for Columbus,
tears for Tuscan fields,
the doyen of dimension
walks his mongrel dog
through the new age
of perspective.

Behind his measured mind:
airblue, watergreen,
earthgrey and fire of red,
the coloured concord
of his days.

Lives of saints,
tomes quadrivial,
princes’ whims
angled to perfection
in the guttering-candled
library.

About him, the smell of the future.
As his cipher wheels spin out
the code, as his new language
wakes the ancients,
ideal beauty stalks
geometer dreams.

He pauses:
taps the quill
against his chin,
feels the planets
within himself,
escort to the gods.

Wistful now.
Will they remember
the exquisite harmony,
the scholarship?
Or that the pen always
won over the brush,
that he never knew love?

Clinical

2005-04-11T20:51:00.000+01:00

Welcome to AOL…
Do you know who sent you this email?
Yes No
(He tastes that last kiss again, still feels
the squeeze of her hand
and the bump of her hip
playing).

ALT +F
P
ENTER

Drone, chitter, vrone, squish, squish, hmmmmm.
Takes the printed sheet, blows the ink dry,
opens the document wallet and files it:
Emails>Personal> Love.

The scar on my knee

2005-04-11T20:38:00.000+01:00

He was never right not like the rest of us, though he lived in the same street. He’d play sometimes but nothing rough, never too far from his front door. The rest of us, we’d be off down the park before our Mum could look at the clock but he’d never come, always had some excuse or just, ‘I don’t think so - not today.’ Was it his glasses’ thick black frames or that jibby lip he got from his Dad? We quarrelled once over a toy car and the fact that he always beat me at chess so there, and he threw his toy rifle (with a real tin barrel), threw it at me: the circular scar’s still here on my knee. I limped home bravely, howling indoors. I’d never walk again, it was definitely broken, my knee was broken for life or at least until I was nine in five days’ time. He was never right, but he never deserved all those breakdowns, all those years when they put him away on his own. I think he knew all along what was coming, right from the time he threw the rifle: knew he wasn’t like the rest of us, though he lived in the same street.

Your Window

2005-04-11T20:34:00.000+01:00

The view from your window has changed:
at first it was a safety net where my eyes tumbled,
a cue for small talk as the afternoon weather
swerved and backtracked,
a summer greenness, unremarkably steady
against the maelstrom yearnings behind the glass.

As time snaked away across the months
we took to sharing the view from your window:
watched acers blush and scorch into autumn,
leaves sashay and spin,
cobbles glisten sleek under rain.

But after a while I began to neglect your window:
just another piece of furniture,
an unwatched plasma screen where
anodyne footage looped, colours ran and smudged
while we chased after more grandiose
hilltops and lakesides.

One day, arriving, I saw you at your window.
You waved. I felt the view wrap around me.
The next day it was me there, looking out.
I sensed in turn your arrival, the view breathed bright
as you broke into the street,
as the sun sculpted your mouth.

The next weekend, in sharper weather,
we returned from walking around the lake,
strode through the view,
smiled up at your window,
felt its acknowledgment.

Five haikus

2005-04-11T20:23:00.000+01:00

1. Glow worm

Walking back from Stoke
under a deep quilt of stars:
one fell at our feet.

2. Trainspotter

There at the front door -
shocked to find his house number
neatly underlined.

3. Supper on the canal

Behind the pumphouse
a heron waits for roach fry:
the wetlands fondue.

4. The flooded village hears from the Environment Agency

Their cost benefit
analysis informs us
the water is wet.

5. Derriere-ku

Arse and three quarters
stubbornly stuck till sundown:
wedged in the door.

The Beach

2005-04-11T16:57:00.000+01:00

every cast
this july evening
teams of black-barred
blue and silver
tug zigzags
through the shallows
skitter on shingle
gasping alien air

despatched – big-stoned
thuds to their glossy heads
a swift slaughter

dog fox comes down the cliff
stands expectant
sniffs the salted dusk
deserves sushi

we scramble back
up the strand
feet scrunching
deepsunk every stride
lamps of the night’s fishing fleet
nod a mile offshore

halcyon evenings
wind a whisper
sea flat as the sky
the beach yields its secrets
to lovers of the tides.