Sun Bathing in December

At this time of year it's customary for blogger to round-up their books of the year. I find that a hard thing to do in terms of poetry. Some of the poetry I've come across this year was published before 2013, this would include work by Mark Halliday (have blogged about him before) and two stunning books by Catherine Smith: 'Lip' and 'The Butcher's Hands.' I read those two from cover to cover and was struck by the range of subject matter and Smith's ability to write about darker (and therefore rather interesting) aspects of human psyche. I'm looking forward to getting a copy of her latest book, 'Otherwhere.' What an intriguing title. Another non-2013 favourite, also published by the fabulous Smith/Doorstop press was Carole Bromley's 'A Guided Tour of the Ice House.' That book sustained me through a evening of cancelled trains on the way home from Sheffield. Bromley's work is a pleasure to read: clear-sighted, direct and utterly engaging. Poems like 'In Another Life' and 'The Lovers' and 'South Bank and Eston Rotary Club, 1951' really grabbed me and there was so much in the book to curl up into. Funny, sad, wry, honest. I have the book by the bed and keep returning to it, that's a big mark of admiration for me.

So, I'm not done with 2013 yet. I have no doubt that 2014's blog posts will have some focus on things published this year. There's one book I'm going to focus on though and that's Roy Marshall's 'The Sun Bathers' published by Shoestring. Regular readers of this blog will know I have praised Roy's work over the last couple of years. In 2012 his pamphlet 'Gopagilla' was published as a part of a series of our Crystal pamphlets and it was packed with strong, memorable pieces, many of which can be found in 'The Sun Bathers.'




A first collection from Roy is a very huge deal, especially when you've seen a poet's work develop and grow over time. I know it's not just me though. When I read at Beeston Poets in November with Roy a couple of things struck me. Firstly, I noticed the audience was hanging on every word in his poetry and we experienced 20 minutes of lyric power tempered with a plain-spokeness which made the poetry immediate. One of the first times I heard Roy read was at Leicester's WORD! back in 2010, and I heard a remarkable poem called 'No Signals Available' which made me sit up and take notice. That poem is also in the book I'm happy to say. When I read 'The Sun Bathers' many of the poems were familiar to me, not least because they've appeared in a plethora of magazines but also because I've been lucky enough to have seen them at the drafting stage as well. Don't just take my word for it, at the Beeston reading an audience member requested a poem, which shows to me that readers form attachments with these poems. A great sign to my mind. You can find details of how to track down a copy here.

It's hard to pick an individual poem to share with you as there are so many notable poems. Many of these you can find on-line, but you should of course buy the book! My favourites include the 'Leonardo' sequence, 'Presence', 'Rose,' 'A Western Australian Piano Graveyard,' 'Relic' - this list could be longer, you get the picture. These are well-formed poems with a personal edge. They speak to you. As I said many of Roy's poems are on-line, so to avoid overlaps I've chosen 'Cimetero' which draws on the poet's Italian heritage. There are some sumptuous and evocative words and images, 'gellateria' honey heat and scent of rosemary, the child's innocence at the father 'who'll live forever' and the understated sinister sense of death and corporeal decay, colours 'deepening from terracotta to crimson.'

Cimetero

The gate kept a world out: scooters humming
along the road that ran down to the lake,
gellateria and monument.

Lizards froze, slipped into cracks, past photographs
set in granite, chrysanthemums on marble beds,
so different from the grassed churchyard at home.

I loved the honey heat, scent of rosemary
and privet, plots to walk between, adding dates
to calculate the ages of the dead.

One day, a grave, freshly dug, sides shored,
colour deepening from terracotta to crimson,
waiting not for Dad, who brought me here

because I asked, Dad, young and fit who'd live
forever, but for Nonno; next year, behind
polished glass, the face I'd know.

Catching up....

Hi, it's been a long while I know. Can't believe my last entry was back in August. It's been a little overwhelming for me both home and work wise, but I'm trying to remedy things. Some poetry related highlights over the last few months have included attending some excellent readings by Jo Shapcott and Cherry Smyth, as well as being in the audience for Nine Arches Press's first 'Poet-tea' reading in Leicester. Also managed to catch a couple of writing days at The Poetry Business in Sheffield. Other than that it's been EDITING! Yes, EDITING! This hasn't been easy. Over the last two or so years, (I started wrapping up the Melanchrini manuscript around December 2011), I've written nearly 70 or so (maybe more, hard to tell in a way) poems and come to the conclusion that only around 25 of those are acceptable. That seems low in a way, but I'm getting very fussy. Some poems will need redrafting, some are just sketches and some are not worth reviving. There is a poem cemetery in my hard drive, many poetic corpses are lying around in unmarked graves. I think most poets like to think about new pieces, but I've wondered about those other 'abandoned'  poems and what their value was and still might be. Maybe their value was to write other poems alongside them where the original intent was actually realised. I've sent out a lot of 'not ready' poems as well as 'ready' ones and it's only time that makes your realise that. The moral is perhaps to hold on or to get decent feedback.

Anyhow, I have a reading coming up in Beeston! Here's a fabulous poster designed by Pippa Hennessy:

I am reading with John Gallas and Roy Marshall. Readers of this blog will know my high opinion of Roy's work and I'm also looking forward forward to hearing more of John's work. Roy Marshall has an EXCELLENT new collection out now with Shoestring, The Sun Bathers. I hope to write more on this very soon and include a poem from the book. It's wonderful that Roy's work is being so well-received in the press at the moment. His Crystal pamphlet Gopagilla has just been reviewed in The TLS alongside other great pamphlets by Kim Moore, Suzannah Evans, Ian Parks, David Clarke and others.

Come and join us in Beeston!

I will try and keep-up-to-date with this blog promise.

'I Don't Call Myself a Poet'

This fascinating site was brought to my attention by Wayne Burrows the other day. A project run by Sophie Mayer. It's a simple idea, students are assigned a contemporary poet, they have to familiarise themselves with that person's work and then interview them. The interviews are fascinating and many of the poets interviewed are refreshingly frank and honest about the way they view themselves as a writer of poetry. This includes an impressive list of 68 writers with more to come. It's the honesty which really appealed to me, especially on the subject of publication, rejection and how writers keep writing. Jane Holland made me laugh out loud when she put it down to 'stupidity and egotism,' however, what becomes clear is that poets become poets because they can't actually stop themselves, not simply because of the kudos of awards and publication. They lap up other poets' work, they see value in a variety of different voices; poets writing at different times, in different languages, different styles and concerns. It becomes a labour of love, I once read Rilke's 'Advice to a Young Poet,' which I think would be relevant to an older poet, a middle-aged poet, someone starting out and someone carrying on. You might be getting my hint. Thanks to the wonders of the Internet I am at liberty to copy and paste this:

You ask whether your verses are good. You ask me. You have already asked others. You send them to journals. You compare them with other poems, and are upset when certain editorial offices reject your efforts. Now (since you’ve permitted me to give you advice) I ask you to abandon all this. You look outside yourself, and that above all else is something you should not do just now. Nobody can advise you and help you, nobody. There’s only one way to proceed. Go inside yourself. Explore the reason that compels you to write; test whether it stretches its roots into the deepest part of your heart, admit to yourself whether you would have to die if the opportunity to write were withheld from you. Above all else, ask yourself at your most silent hour of night: must I write? Dig inside yourself for a deep answer. And if the answer is yes, if it is possible for you to respond to this serious question with a strong and simple I must, then build your life on the basis of this necessity; your life, even at its most indifferent and attenuated, must become a sign and a witness for this compulsion.

On being asked 'What made you become a poet?' Carrie Etter replies in her interview:  'I never felt as though there were a decision or a choice.' Which sums up what Rilke says above. You do it because you have to. I regret having my 'nearly decade off' writing poetry in my 20s, because I decided to let other people get on with, I was going to get on with other things. It didn't work forever, I went back to it because I couldn't stop myself.

Many of the poets discuss the issue of 'truth' in poetry and I liked Maitreyabandhu's response. Incidentally, Maitreyabandhu is the writer of one of my favourite poetry essays, 'The Provenance of Pleasure,' which appeared in the Spring 2011 edition of Poetry Review. We forget that writing itself is a pleasure when we are bogged down with rejections, there is a higher pleasure, perhaps even a spiritual pleasure in the act of writing, but that's another blog post. Anyway, here's the quote:

The way to avoid sentimentality in poetry is to work hard at telling the truth. At the same time, we shouldn’t be so afraid of sentimentality that it stops us expressing any emotion in poetry at all!

My friend Roy Marshall, whom as you know is an exceptional poet, is very good at this. I sometimes wonder that there is an danger in being too clinical with a poem, as well as over-sentimental. Is good poetry more like a paper-cut? In terms of getting 'jolted' into understanding, even if you will never, ever go through the same experience as the person who wrote the poem you are reading.

I could go on, I really could. But I will stop here for the morning as my twins are doing half-days at school and I have not hung out any washing yet. At least I will have something to think about when I am pegging things on the line.

The site of course is here.

Peony Moon

Here's some good news! There is a feature on Melanchrini on Michelle McGrane's excellent blog 'Peony Moon.' As I don't post my own work very often on this blog click here if you'd like to read a selection of my poetry from the blog. Whilst I'm here I'll also include reviews by Matthew Stewart and Roy Marshall. When I started the blog I intended to use it as a 'scrapbook' of sorts, so I'll try and put some links to the book up as a way of keeping things in one place!

Poems from Roy Marshall and Jess Mayhew

Alice contemplates the flowers...

In the few months which have elapsed between their publication and now, there’s been some very lively interest in the Crystal pamphlets. People from across the UK and worldwide have been purchasing pamphlets; writing reviews and expressing good wishes. Last Friday, another launch was held in Nottingham, and readings have been going on up and down the country, including a reading at Ledbury in July. I’d like to share two poems by Roy Marshall and Jess Mayhew which have received lots of positive attention. It’s interesting to see which poems audiences seem to enjoy:


Rose

For no good reason
we expected his Latin genes to colour him,

for a slick of black to crown him
as he emerged from between her legs;

for olive skin that would darken
at the touch of sun.

Tonight, feverish, oink cheeked,
mousy hair plastered on a milky brow,

he sleeps with her,
a small doppelganger

arms flung above his head,
a mirror of his mother.

Their murmurs and breath
float from open lips

his a perfect miniature
of her own sleep-slackened rose.


As Tim Love said in one of his reviews, this is the ‘kind of poetry which is easy to read but hard to write,’ it’s certainly never laboured.

Here’s Jess’ poem:

Pub Lunch

At the end of your tether
I hunch over Queen’s Head scampi,
bench wood warm under my palms.

On the river, a swam lumbers to air,
black webs tucked and curses
at a man chugging his boat around,

pale under his mildewed lifejacket.
A bee trickles on the lip
of your glass. You swat and miss,
Sending it into shivering flight,
unseaming chubby joined legs, coarse
yellow hairs. Unhook the sting,

until all that is left are the quarks
which tumble and fizz like pollen grains.
You’re not listening, you say.


Mayhew’s sharp observation; the lumbering ‘swan’; the ‘shivering flight’ of the bee, creates a sense of unease, which finally reveals itself in the last line. I like poems which have an almost physical effect on my reading, I can sense the discomfort. It’s this eye for detail that makes her poems memorable.

'Someone Else's Photograph' by Jess and 'Gopagilla' by Roy, are available here at Crystal Clear Creators.

At some point -sooner, rather than later fingers crossed - I hope to write up a blog post about the process of putting together my own poetry collection. To quote Tom Elliot, 'There will be time...'

The Pamphlets are Here!

I couldn't resist putting these up for your delectation. Here are the covers of the six lucky winners of the Crystal Clear Creators pamphlet competition. They are stunning and thanks to Helen Walsh for her beautiful designs, hope to write more about these. The launch for the pamplets is on Friday 2nd March at De Montfort University Leicester, at the Cultural Exchanges Festival see here. The lucky pamphleteers are Roy Marshall, Aly Stoneman, Charles G. Lauder, Hannah Stevens, Andrew 'Mulletproofpoet' Graves and Jess Mayhew, who I mentored for this project. I should also mention Jonathan Taylor, a wonderful editor and of course I knew first-hand how hard he worked on these.

Shindiggery - Monday 22nd August.

The Leicester shindigs jointly held by Nine Arches Press and Crystal Clear Creators have a real sense of buzz about them and last Monday's was exactly in that vein. The headline readers were Matt Meritt, Roy Marshall, Alex Plasatis and Deborah Tyler Bennett, whose new pamphlet 'Mytton, Dyer, Sweet Billy Gibson' is out now. All of them were wonderful. Alex's reading was a real surprise, of a very lascivious nature you'd say, very funny though. I'd go into details but there might be children reading. Matt's work is always a pleasure and was, as always, evocative and well-written. His writing is at full strength, and we were lucky to hear some brand new pieces. Deborah's work is always a treat and some of the poems from the pamphlet were based on her own great-grandfather and very strongly-voiced, making use of her Nottinghamshire roots and dialect. I was born in Worksop, you know, I'm very fond. Roy's work is imaginative and sonorous, my left ear was right next to the speaker, I savoured every word.

         The open mic, was very strong indeed, performances came from Mark Goodwin, Jayne Stanton, Gary Longden, Jane Commane, Jonathan Taylor and others. All wonderful. I left with rather a glowing feeling, happy that such things were occurring in my own city. Put that in your pipe, London town. If you would like to read other accounts of this event then are two I know of, one by Gary Longden: http://behindthearras.com/wordsandvoices.html#Shindig
and Matt Merritt: http://polyolbion.blogspot.com/

Frog!





[N.B. There's no reason for why I called this blog post 'Frog' I couldn't think of a better title and Roy's blog features a frog and what a lot of assonant rhyme there is here.]

Roy Marshall has put up one of my poems on his excellent blog, it's called 'Fable' and you can find this here:
http://roymarshall.wordpress.com/favourite-poem-of-the-week/
I should also mention that back copies of 'The Rialto' have gone up on the South Bank poetry magazines website, here you can find one of Roy's poems, 'Hayride' on this great resource: http://www.poetrymagazines.org.uk/magazine/record.asp?id=26988
It was a very good edition which also included poetry from Katy-Evans Bush, David Morley, Sarah Jackson and some frozen peas from Simon Armitage.

Pingggk! with Roy Marshall

How many years must a mountain exist, before it is washed to sea? How many Gs are in Pingggk, the name of Leicester's newest spoken word night, not sure, but hoping it's three. On May 31st, next Tuesday, Roy Marshall is the main act at Pingggk! and it should kick off at around 7:30 with slots for open mic, whoops, nearly spelt that 'open mice.' Roy is something of a local phenomenon in Leicester, he's been published in lots of top notch magazines including The Rialto and Smiths Knoll. He's also won a comp to have a pamphlet published with Crystal Clear. So then, 7:30, 15 Wellington Street, Leicester next Tuesday it is.

Oh, by the way checked my stats page, never knew it existed before. I would just like to thank the people who actually read this blog! Especially those from the Ukraine, Brazil and the Netherlands - you are all splendiferous.