rollercoaster
October 1st was National Poetry Day, and that evening I was part of an online event where poets whose pieces had been shortlisted for Canterbury Festival Poet of the Year shared their work. I shared mine from the upstairs lounge…
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grooming for men
you’re down the gym doing reps
when this guy...
Some days, they’re the wrong notes
and I seem to be playing them on a bassoon...
turning of the seasons
This weekend saw my final music festival of the season done and dusted. Although – after a summer of hot, dry, and dusty festivals all across the UK – it would be more accurate to describe this last event as done…
How We Made It Through The Dark Days
For that was the winter we listened to Enya
complaining that the porridge was too hot,
or too cold, complaining that she would...
he has, he says, three rules
three rules he lives by. We
are unloading trucks in the arena
in the heart of the city, moving
peace de resistance
Friday night completely changed the focus of the piece I’d been intending to write, and reminded me – yet again – of the transformative power of art. You see, on Friday night I went along to Wolverhampton Arts Centre and…
and no, you cannot rewind time
Here is a thing. It is open.
You need the thing to be open, but
you do not like the people who keep
no bloody whimsy
Many years ago, when I was at Uni, a mate gave me a book he no longer wanted. It was the collected poems of Adrian Mitchell, and it had a profound effect on my understanding of what poetry could be…
musings on the national
Not for the first time the announcement of the winners in the National Poetry Competition – and congratulations to Partridge Boswell, the other winning poets, and every single person who had a poem which made it onto the longlist, because…
celebrating small spaces
Last night I was down in Luton with my fellow pandemonialists for what turned out to be an absolutely amazing gig in Luton’s Hat Factory arts centre. We’d been invited down by Lee Nelson, who runs a superb night in…
catching my breath…
Last week’s gigs involved a lot of weather – there was the snowstorm as we headed back from Bishop’s Castle on Wednesday evening, then Saturday’s monsoon rains as we drove to Kendal – as well as appreciative audiences, excellent open…