This year, I’ve spent more time than ever in fields, earning my crust as a stage manager at music festivals large and small. I’ve watched people of all colours and creeds come together in a shared love of music in all its different genres and flavours, and yes, I have my favourites, but you’d need to have a heart of stone not to find something beautiful in people coming together purely to see the bands they love, meet old friends, make new ones, and have a good time. And the sunshine has made it even better.
It’s an all-consuming job – I nip home between festivals to catch up on sleep, wash my work clothes, and head off again – and much of the rest of my life gets put on hold over these glorious months of summer, takes a back seat while I’m out working on shows. But I did – somehow – manage to squeeze in two poetry gigs and ensure I haven’t completely forgotten the joy that comes from getting up on a stage myself to share my own work. This also means there are now just four copies left of ‘snapshots from the fall of home’, so if you’ve been thinking of buying one, I’d recommend moving sharpish, because there may not be a second print run. You’ll find them on sale here.
A summer spent grafting at festivals also means it’s harder to keep track of what’s happening in the news (though I am aware our government is still deeply complicit in the ongoing genocide in Gaza, despite the performative hand-wringing of our one-time-human-rights-lawyer PM). Returning home from last weekend’s festival, though, I find that my hometown – like so many other rundown and deprived areas – now has red paint daubed on its mini-roundabouts and empty pubs, in a display of what claims to be ‘patriotism’ but is nothing of the kind. If ever you doubted that we’re living in an increasingly angry and polarised world, and that we urgently need to address it, for all our sakes, these crude and ugly ‘flags’ provide all the proof you could ever ask for.
So I’ll finish this article with links to two pieces looking at that. One is an article I wrote for Central Bylines and the other is a truly excellent poem by Louise Fazackerley, which I saw yesterday on Facebook and which I think needs to go viral. Here’s the YouTube link to it. Watch, listen, and share, folks. Watch. Listen. And share.