tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-81747387334651809632024-03-13T01:10:45.264-07:00Other LivesOccasional blog on ME/CFS. May contain poetry.Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.comBlogger103125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-13150867809308960342017-09-26T05:00:00.000-07:002017-09-28T05:43:43.878-07:00Fighting ME/CFS and the MediaThese are particularly dark days for people living with <a href="https://www.actionforme.org.uk/what-is-me/introduction/">ME/CFS</a> in the UK. Sufferers are used to being misunderstood by non-sufferers and unsupported or ignored by health professionals, but they are currently facing their biggest challenge yet - the British Media.<br />
<br />
In reaction to last week's welcome news that NICE had caved into pressure and agreed to <a href="http://www.meassociation.org.uk/2017/09/breaking-news-nice-decides-to-fully-update-its-guideline-on-mecfs-20-september-2017/">review NHS treatment guidelines</a>, some sections of the media appear determined to misrepresent the illness by minimising its severity and continuing to present the lie that it can be successfully treated and even cured by Graded Exercise Therapy (GET) and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) - despite this being vehemently rejected by the overwhelming majority of sufferers as deleterious to their health or laughably inadequate; and what's more, not borne out by the research that close analysis has demonstrated to be <a href="http://www.virology.ws/2017/07/10/trial-by-error-the-cdc-drops-cbtget/">scientifically flawed</a>.<br />
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What could be driving such behaviour? Ignorance and resentment cannot be discounted. ("We're all tired, mate." Yes, we are, but normally you will feel better after a couple of hours extra sleep.) More likely, however, are the careers and reputations at stake of the medical professionals who initially rushed to explain the illness as all being 'in the mind', and who even now ignore strong evidence to the contrary coming from cutting-edge <a href="http://microbeminded.com/2017/09/15/new-stanford-university-data-clarifies-immune-dysfunctioninfection-in-cancer-mecfs-ms/">biomedical research</a>. There has also been speculation that resistance to change is politically-motivated. After all, what Conservative government would welcome an additional 250,000 people potentially being eligible for disability benefits? (My local Conservative MP, Peter Bottomley, recently refused to sign a petition requesting an <a href="http://www.meassociation.org.uk/2017/09/ask-your-mp-to-sign-the-early-day-motion-against-the-nice-guideline-for-mecfs-and-invite-them-to-watch-unrest-13-september-2017/">Early Day Motion</a> to discuss the inadequacy of NICE guidelines in Parliament.) Add to this the media's inherent desire to never let the truth get in the way of a good dust-up and you can get a sense of what people with ME/CFS are up against at the moment.<br />
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Whatever the reasons, people living with this debilitating illness that in many cases has devastated their lives, are now faced with the additional burden of dreading every unchallenged Today programme interviewee promoting pseudo-science; every You and Yours phone-in that inexplicably drops the term ME in favour of the more trivial-sounding CFS; every Guardian mention of miracle cures at expensive brain retraining workshops; every Telegraph profile of some semi-famous person who has rediscovered good health via pumpkin spice lattes and their 'creative process'.<br />
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What can you do? If you are a sufferer, and you are well enough, you can challenge the misrepresentation, and correct perception by letting people know what it is really like to live with a severe neuroimmune disease with virtually no support available. If you are a non-sufferer, you can perhaps suspend judgement, after consuming these biased media servings, until they've been confirmed or refuted by those who have an intimate and painful knowledge of the illness.<br />
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Eventually, like many stigmatised health conditions, ME/CFS will be accepted in the public consciousness, and more effective forms of (pharmacological) treatment will be available. Before then, media misperception and deliberate bias has to be called out wherever it is found. Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-76399463387907565462014-05-22T05:50:00.000-07:002014-05-22T05:50:59.798-07:00Where Have You Been?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAKFW4dqGfybxUi7rIuucN2UTGG9VgeAz-BBi-4vfor7bdzWorKw2MwmJtfxFzO_rmb1hsLhxyUbfodqQCFOOSQ9-vHR2COb5IJFidr4B2lPQgBGUx75SHN-ie5NL65OUfp6oeKQIshS7Z/s1600/hofmann.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAKFW4dqGfybxUi7rIuucN2UTGG9VgeAz-BBi-4vfor7bdzWorKw2MwmJtfxFzO_rmb1hsLhxyUbfodqQCFOOSQ9-vHR2COb5IJFidr4B2lPQgBGUx75SHN-ie5NL65OUfp6oeKQIshS7Z/s1600/hofmann.jpg" height="320" width="213" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0957326602/ref=s9_simh_gw_p14_d0_i3?pf_rd_m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&pf_rd_s=center-3&pf_rd_r=1N5KXXP1M7DJVSXAYX42&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=455333147&pf_rd_i=468294">Festschrifts</a> and translations of <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Gottfried-Benn-Impromptus-Michael-Hofmann/dp/0571289266/ref=pd_sim_sbs_b_3?ie=UTF8&refRID=0DTDA1RD2DZR0DZ4BFGB">Gottfried Benn </a>are all well and good, but I can't help thinking this absence in my life isn't going to be filled until Michael Hofmann publishes another collection of his own poetry. In the meantime, here's this appropriately titled book of essays to look forward to. Published by Norton later this year, it looks like being a reprint of his prose selection '<a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Behind-Lines-Michael-Hofmann/dp/0571195237/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1400589630&sr=1-1&keywords=michael+hofmann+behind+the+lines">Behind the Lines</a>' (Faber, 2001) for a U.S. readership. The original volume didn't go to a second edition, and with the spread of Hofmania in the U.K. in recent years, it's been difficult to get hold of a copy at a reasonable price. In a way its publication is reassuring since it means Hofmann hasn't yet completely 'done a Rimbaud', but his long poetic silence, if not a repudiation of poetry, still haunts and fascinates other poets in equal measure.<br />
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Readers of Hofmann's poetry naturally hope he will publish more again one day. Dig a bit further, especially among poets, and it's possible to detect that Hofmann's apparent estrangement from his muse has an unsettling effect; as though there is something frightening about contemplating the possibility of a life without writing poetry. Without poetry, some poets fear they will be overcome by 'a deluge of nothing'. Others simply cannot believe that writing poetry might not represent the be all and end all in a person's life; that someone might not be able to explore their full potential only by writing poetry. But what of the man? Unless you happen to be speaking to someone who knows him, rarely is any attempt made to empathize with Hofmann's circumstances. Again, it's as if it is impossible to imagine that he may have discovered other, necessary ways of being, or a more satisfying way of living than writing poetry.<br />
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Who knows? He may surprise us all some day by publishing a backlog of poems, or simply carry on what looks like a commitment to translate the entire oeuvre of Joseph Roth. Either way, I'm grateful for the poems we have. I'd feel excited at the prospect of new work, of course, but in no way could I begrudge someone for acceding to whatever changes it was necessary for them to make or adapt to in their life. On the contrary, just as his poetry has been influential to so many poets, his not-writing might also inspire if it encourages us to question our lives, to ask of ourselves - of the person we think we are: where have you been?<br />
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<br />Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-9437354475911584762014-05-19T04:00:00.002-07:002014-05-19T04:00:30.820-07:00Blog TourBlog Tour<br />
<br />
<a href="http://bibliophilicblogger.blogspot.co.uk/">Nick Murray</a> - poet, biographer, founding editor of <a href="http://rackpress.blogspot.co.uk/">Rack Press</a> and publisher of my last pamphlet 'Spring Journal' - kindly asked if I wanted to participate in a blog tour by answering these questions. My first thought was not really, but like most poets I couldn't resist a turn in the spotlight.<br />
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1. What are you working on?</div>
<div>
<br />
In Iron Age settlements, bards stayed up all night making merry and spent the daytime napping beside a fire while the rest of the tribe went off hunting and gathering. Thank goodness for Ocado, I think, as I pop an ibuprofen with my coffee and watch my family remount the treadmill each morning.<br />
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My work ethic was shaped by the Counter-Reformation and involves growing a beard, a demand for more consumer products, and whiling away afternoons at the theatre or cinema. When I lived in Rome, I used to see Nanni Moretti sheltering from the afternoon heat at the Nuovo Sacher cinema in Trastevere. He owns it now, so watching matinees was clearly a positive career move. Growing up in Surrey, I spent many afternoons holed up within the velvet sanctum of the Cranleigh Regal. On two occasions, I sat behind Eric Clapton who is the only person to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame three times.<br />
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At the moment I'm concentrating on building a private counselling practice. As a sometimes writer of poems, and a non-professional one at that, I feel unburdened by the need to always have a literary project on the go. I suppose you could say I'm working on assembling another collection, but only in the way people using Twitter can be said to be at work. As models of practice, W.C.W. and Jean Follain are close to my heart. Rimbaud's presence/absence is never entirely out of the picture.<br />
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I imagine novelists feel supported by the structure of the novel they're writing, however vaguely it's plotted. Though reassuring, such a way of working seems counter-productive to me. I prefer the freedom to sit in a near-empty cinema, eating popcorn and gazing at the screen until I'm the embodiment of awareness, attending to whatever passes across it. Outdoors, I look and look, collecting images, feeling uplifted despite the evidence. I won't know what I'm working on until the next poem breaks cover and surprises me. I last wrote a poem 26 days ago. I'll probably write another one.<br />
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2. How does your work differ from others of its genre?<br />
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The plagiarism goes undetected.<br />
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The serious answer: probably insufficiently.<br />
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3. Why do you write what you do?<br />
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Because I feel ground down, reduced, and in need of a release from whatever oppressive forces, personal and political, are at work in my life - including our enslavement to causality and explanation.<br />
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Be that as it may, here's the romantic explanation. The signal to write is compelling; poetry arrives like the emergency services with a defibrillator to revive the ailing heart.<br />
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But most of the time it doesn't. The imagination stews, a daube of undifferentiated thought. Or sits cross-legged on a stinky mat, half-convinced (hoping?) that 'The poem is already written, / but the page is blank.'<br />
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Also creative individuals are afforded a special status I haven't quite cured myself of the need for.<br />
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As for the language of my poems, their forms and preoccupations, these are simply the result of who I happen to be and the life I've lived. Most likely, all my poems are just the wringings-out of a sponge that has absorbed the work of other, superior poets.<br />
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4. How does your writing process work?<br />
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I am the world's most uncreative person. Left to its own devices, my mind atrophies. I point at flowers and make perfectly banal observations. Without others I have no language. However, if I'm reading someone else's poems, that's another thing all together. If I read, I write. Simple as that.<br />
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When I stopped smoking almost ten years ago I sacrificed a fairly disciplined writing habit. Or at least the habit of sitting still in one place with a pencil in my hand. Then my wife and I had a daughter which further affected the amount of time I have to write and the forms my poems end up taking. Now the moments I find most conducive to writing are in the gaps between other commitments; unexpected moments like waiting at the dentist's, being in a meeting, travelling on public transport. <br />
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I tend to write most when I'm on a train, homeward-bound, in the late afternoon. Then, I'll jot down a few lines or, if I'm lucky, a first draft on whatever's to hand - I gave up the encumbrance of carrying a notebook some time ago - and finish it off on my laptop the same evening. Once engaged, I love the intensity of writing a poem - the rhythms and images pulled together by some centrifugal force; a line scanning; the sense of play and element of puzzle-solving involved. Afterwards, I can see it was the self-forgetfulness that helped bring the poem into existence, and which felt so good. Other times, the poem accretes slowly, line by line, maturing in the darkness of an old folder.<br />
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It always comes to an end too soon. I write mostly short poems. I think of them as commemorating the creative impetus itself, and I dislike trying to extend it beyond its natural life. It might also be to do with the fact that I start losing control of my material after about 30 lines. If it was a respected enough form in the UK, I would happily write only haiku.<br />
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Poems will sit on my hard drive until it becomes important to me for someone else to think I'm still a poet. I know I'm at a low point when I discover motivation. Then, I'll send them off. If they're accepted, I make sure I let myself feel pleased. When a complimentary copy of a magazine arrives, I store it in an old banana box without reading my own contribution.<br />
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Next stop on the Blog Tour: <a href="http://carrieetter.blogspot.co.uk/">Carrie Etter</a> and <a href="http://www.madhatterreviews.co.uk/blog">Charley Barnes</a>.<br />
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<br /></div>
Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-20379374006876026202012-12-29T06:37:00.000-08:002012-12-29T06:37:13.176-08:00Reading List 2012<b><span style="font-size: small;">January</span></b><br />
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">The Haiku Anthology, ed. Cor Van Den Heuvel (contd; reread)</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">The Essential Haiku: Versions of Basho, Buson, & Issa, ed. Robert Hass</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">Not In These Shoes, Samantha Wynne-Rhydderch (reread)</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">The Dog in the Sky, Helen Ivory</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">A Halfway House, Neil Powell</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">Selected Poems, Christopher Reid</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">Katerina Brac, Christopher Reid (reread)</span>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
Black Cat Bone, John Burnside</div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>February<o:p></o:p></b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Stepping Stones: Interviews with Seamus Heaney, ed. Dennis O’Driscoll</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
View with A Grain of Sand: Selected Poems, Wislawa Szymborska (reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Zone Journals, Charles Wright (reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Water Table, Philip Gross</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For and After, Christopher Reid</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Death of a Naturalist, Seamus Heaney (reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Door into the Dark, Seamus Heaney (reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wintering Out, Seamus Heaney (reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
North, Seamus Heaney (reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Field Work, Seamus Heaney (reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Station Island, Seamus Heaney (reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Haw Lantern, Seamus Heaney (reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Seeing Things, Seamus Heaney (reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>March</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Seeing Things, Seamus Heaney (contd; reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Spirit Level, Seamus Heaney (reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Electric Light, Seamus Heaney (reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
District and Circle, Seamus Heaney (reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Human Chain, Seamus Heaney (reread)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Domestic Violence, Eavan Boland</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Second Space, Czeslaw Milosz</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Black Cat Bone, John Burnside (reread)</div>
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The Really Short Poems, A. R. Ammons</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This, Czeslaw Milosz</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Monster Loves His Labyrinth: Notebooks, Charles Simic</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Poetry Review (Spring 2012), ed. Fiona Sampson </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>April</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Monster Loves His Labyrinth: Notebooks, Charles Simic (re-read)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sidereal, Rachael Boast (x2)</div>
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The Dark Film, Paul Farley (x2)</div>
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Nights in the Iron Hotel, Michael Hofmann</div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>May</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Nothing Special: Living Zen, Charlotte Joko Beck</div>
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Small Hours, Lachlan Mackinnon</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Poems: Eugenio Montale, ed. Harry Thomas, trans. various (re-read)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Notebooks, Anton Chekhov</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Acrimony, Michael Hofmann (re-read)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Corona, Corona, Michael Hofmann (re-read)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Approximately Nowhere, Michael Hofmann (re-read)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Eternal Ones of the Dreams: Selected Poems 1990-2010, James Tate</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>June</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Modern European Poetry, ed. & trans. various (Bantam)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Second Life of Art: Selected Essays of Eugenio Montale, ed. & trans. J. Galassi</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Satires and Epistles, Horace and Persius, trans. Niall Rudd</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Faber Book of 20<sup>th</sup>-Century Italian Poems, ed. Jamie McKendrick, trans. various (re-read)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Selected Poems, Franco Fortini, trans. Paul Lawton</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
130 Poems, Jean Follain, trans. Christopher Middleton (x2)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Selected Poems, Attilio Bertolucci, trans. Charles Tomlinson</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Poetry Review (Summer 2012), ed. George Szirtes</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>July</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Songbook: The Selected Poems of Umberto Saba, trans. Leonard Nathan</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Twentieth Century Pleasures: Prose on Poetry, Robert Hass</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yet There Is Music: 1939-1948, Vladimir Holan, trans. Josef Tomas (unreadable)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
130 Poems, Jean Follain, trans. Christopher Middleton (re-read)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Haiku Anthology, ed. Cor Van Den Heuvel (re-read)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Shuttered Eye, Julia Copus</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>August</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The World’s Two Smallest Humans, Julia Copus</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Haiku Anthology, ed. Cor Van Den Heuvel (contd; re-read)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Grace, Esther Morgan</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In the Flesh, Adam O’Riordan</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Portrait of my Lover as a Horse, Selima Hill</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Collected Poems, R. F. Langley</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Farmers Cross, Bernard O’Donoghue</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Six Children, Mark Ford</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What the Water Gave Me, Pascale Petit</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Taller When Prone, Les Murray</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Maggot, Paul Muldoon</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>September</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Across the Land and the Water: Selected Poems, 1964-2001, W. G. Sebald</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Faber Book of 20<sup>th</sup> Century German Poems, ed. The Hofmeister</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Lucky Day, Richard Price</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Passing Through: The Later Poems: New and Selected, Stanley Kunitz</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Best American Poetry 1990, ed. Jorie Graham</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>October</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
New and Selected Poems, Michael Ryan</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
PLACE, Jorie Graham</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Poetry Review (Autumn 2012), ed. Charles Boyle</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Out There, Jamie McKendrick</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
November, Sean O’Brien</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
How Snow Falls, Craig Raine</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Best American Poetry 2009, ed. David Wagoner</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>November</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They Came to See a Poet: Selected Poems, Tadeusz Rozewicz, trans. A. Czerniaweski</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Straw for the Fire: from the Notebooks of Theodore Roethke, ed. David Wagoner</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Snow Watcher, Chase Twichell</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Experience: A Memoir, Martin Amis</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>December</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Collected Poems, Jane Kenyon (re-read)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Best American Poetry 1995, ed. Richard Howard</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Astonishment, Anne Stevenson</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Poetry Review (Winter 2012), ed. Bernardine Evaristo </div>
Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-83956159902410223452012-10-21T09:51:00.001-07:002012-10-21T12:25:30.917-07:00New Next Generation Poet<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3-JGlFI5LkasU6uinhUaMwbmoH5-4QWW5bDW4nqjb-BQDETQAS7pgljOSae87YgeS_6plgfE0xBkyVpJx79hSH8kkndHqcjMOedKHXaSENn9O1YPa9ZKXKuze3FDoL3qFNV0KP0oqfoLu/s1600/baby+dressed+as+poet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3-JGlFI5LkasU6uinhUaMwbmoH5-4QWW5bDW4nqjb-BQDETQAS7pgljOSae87YgeS_6plgfE0xBkyVpJx79hSH8kkndHqcjMOedKHXaSENn9O1YPa9ZKXKuze3FDoL3qFNV0KP0oqfoLu/s1600/baby+dressed+as+poet.jpg" /></a></div>
<br />
At the age of just five, Arlo Giovanni Butler (A.G., as his friends call him) is the youngest of the New Next Generation Poets. Butler won the National Poetry Competition while many of his contemporaries were still struggling with phonemes and secured a publisher for his first collection before finishing prep school.<br />
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After graduating from UEA at the age of eight, he relocated to East London where he established the capital's premier spoken word club night which attracts edgy outsiders, hip mainstreamers and not a few bebrogued hangers-on who, when their friends aren't looking, will passionately explain that poetry is cool because it is 'free from the logic of capital'. Comparisons with the New York School of poets aren't entirely undeserved since, in the words of another commentator, 'they sometimes seem only interested in each other.'<br />
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Once active online, Butler explains he stopped engaging with social networking systems after winning the T.S.Eliot prize for his second collection because his life was becoming 'info-saturated'. He hopes, however, that fans of his work will tolerate his recent excursus into musical composition, working in collaboration with the American minimalist maestro Steve Reich whose post-tonal style Butler says he fell in love with the first time he heard it inside his mother's womb.<br />
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Ladbrokes has given the young wordsmith odds of 10/1 to win the Nobel prize for literature before his twenty-first birthday. His third collection is due out from Faber on Monday.Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-51724112459030688052012-10-08T04:28:00.003-07:002012-10-08T04:28:44.618-07:00Reviews of 'Spring Journal'Two more reviews: David Morley in the current issue of <a href="http://rackpress.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/poetry-review-on-rack-poets.html">Poetry Review</a> (ed. Charles Boyle) and Matthew Stewart at <a href="http://roguestrands.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/review-spring-journal-by-dan-wyke.html">Rogue Strands.</a>Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-1749976612607297572012-09-18T08:05:00.000-07:002012-09-18T08:05:09.335-07:00'Waiting for the Sky to Fall' Reviewed<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyfbE24ZgjVj-H63o-4COYpyf_h7ZxTHAVLIvQHlKt7-u1c2lT_J7XC9TtOkVN-6hbjgZiDZD8xTmj-c6J3xslC-6RDgjH5urxVUSQMnnp4gBZdB1q-b67Gn9izlsAqcrZr9ujPfZTp91g/s1600/3+Musketeers.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="204" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyfbE24ZgjVj-H63o-4COYpyf_h7ZxTHAVLIvQHlKt7-u1c2lT_J7XC9TtOkVN-6hbjgZiDZD8xTmj-c6J3xslC-6RDgjH5urxVUSQMnnp4gBZdB1q-b67Gn9izlsAqcrZr9ujPfZTp91g/s320/3+Musketeers.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
Really pleased to discover my first collection with Waterloo Press 'Waiting for the Sky to Fall' has received another enthusiastic review, this time by Steve Spence in <a href="http://www.stridemagazine.co.uk/Stride%20mag%202012/august2012/Flight%20and%20Smoke.htm">Stride Magazine</a> (click to link). Copies are still available from the <a href="http://www.waterloopresshove.co.uk/#/dan-wyke-2010/4548332046">Waterloo Press </a>website.Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-36078657728796357672012-07-11T03:57:00.000-07:002012-07-11T03:57:15.229-07:00Quote for the Day: Seidel'I will say that learning how to write has to do in part with learning how to accede to yourself and your object, instead of writing what you think you ought to write, or what at that point in time the world thinks poetry is about. Or what you think you ought to be about. The moment comes, if it ever comes, when you have enough strength to give way, to give in to being who you are, to give in to your themes. Giving in to your obsessions, giving in to the things that you will be writing about over and over. And sometimes the things you’ll be writing about over and over are things that some people don’t find very nice.'<br />
<br />
Frederick Seidel, Paris Review Interview No. 95<br />
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<br />Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-56046601307011040392012-07-09T04:46:00.002-07:002012-07-09T05:22:04.022-07:00Thanks to <a href="http://www.peterdaniels.org.uk/">Peter Daniels</a> for the second review of my pamphlet 'Spring Journal' in the latest issue of <a href="http://www.bowwowshop.org.uk/page32.htm">'The Bow-Wow Shop'</a>.<br />
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Before reading that, though, you should head over to <a href="http://christianwritespoetry.blogspot.co.uk/">Christian Ward's</a> blog to read some really enjoyable poems.Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-36459739186521500262012-06-18T04:49:00.002-07:002012-06-18T04:49:39.721-07:00Thanks to <a href="http://www.clairetrevien.co.uk/home/">Claire Trevien</a> for drawing my attention to <a href="http://angelatopping.wordpress.com/">Angela Topping's</a> review of my <a href="http://rackpress.blogspot.co.uk/">Rack Press</a> pamphlet 'Spring Journal' which has now been published online in <a href="http://sabotagereviews.com/2012/06/18/four-rack-press-pamphlets-2012/">Sabotage Reviews</a>.Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-52490787443339594582012-06-16T11:48:00.001-07:002012-06-16T13:45:35.830-07:00Bloomsday Poem<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJ3i8louTPRMdCnqw-JGjyW_l1Ilt39kAgqSMdGmG_0ZfeRB9uTDggAYNDzhIdGQuvZ84RTBYG8qV6d8I78yEAjDgW4FcLbdUR4Uu2uLPlyRw3YPog7o5TSwq0o0zWprFyZ1U1ju-ugFKo/s1600/joyce.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" pca="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJ3i8louTPRMdCnqw-JGjyW_l1Ilt39kAgqSMdGmG_0ZfeRB9uTDggAYNDzhIdGQuvZ84RTBYG8qV6d8I78yEAjDgW4FcLbdUR4Uu2uLPlyRw3YPog7o5TSwq0o0zWprFyZ1U1ju-ugFKo/s1600/joyce.jpg" /></a></div>
<br />
Ok, so you're all Joyced out but I've just remembered this I wrote after I last read 'Ulysses' in 2001 when I was living in the North Laines in Brighton. It's absolute rubbish, I know, and deservedly unpublished, but I like it for the fact that it shows I was willing to experiment a little with the style of poetry I was writing back then, and I share it in the spirit of celebrating all things - high and low - Joycean.<br />
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<strong>Just Nipping Out</strong><br />
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<br />
Rain in the air. Face. Cobbles wet.<br />
Who’s that? Hannah? No.<br />
Girl at school, left bike in her garage.<br />
Brother friends with her brother,<br />
listened to ska music together.<br />
<br />
Three saffron rice for price of two.<br />
Poor quality olive oil.<br />
Wouldn’t sell their best, would they.<br />
Perugina. Perugia. Bought selected<br />
William Blake there. Simple in Italian.<br />
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Closed. That aloof young guy<br />
unpacking boxes, putting books out.<br />
O well. Bit cloudy for sunglasses.<br />
Great rack. Tight T-shirt.<br />
Wonder about her boyfriend.<br />
<br />
Could buy body lotion for Jane.<br />
What was it: camomile or aloe vera?<br />
Home soon. Bread shop closing.<br />
Always nervous entering this one.<br />
Unwelcoming. Overprice their poetry.<br />
<br />
Belonged to dead people mostly.<br />
Stand here till rain passes.<br />
Thought Rutger Kopland was Danish.<br />
Big feet. Should’ve brought coat.<br />
Eased up. Doesn’t matter anyway.<br />
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Watch out! One-way street. Twat.<br />
Nothing much up here. Probably is.<br />
Walking faster now. Blue door.<br />
Currant buns under grill.<br />
Smell of toasted cinnamon. Umber.<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">16 June, 2001</span><br />
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©2012 Dan Wyke<br />
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<br />Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-44807124527975283582012-06-02T09:17:00.001-07:002012-06-02T09:17:15.658-07:00Jubilee Poem<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzPAZEsuosknSNNfn5bY_kTf3bD-o6OAiYE1Enhiug2tYcsiPGFrdajvtxxrmtUfY-bIZOlhXA50foj983MwQvxxbDQsuNrQV1kDEHbpEG1_jjDPL5LYVw7Hvx2jDWnXwjCxw1OnmaOa9J/s1600/Street-party-for-the-Quee-007.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="192" rba="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzPAZEsuosknSNNfn5bY_kTf3bD-o6OAiYE1Enhiug2tYcsiPGFrdajvtxxrmtUfY-bIZOlhXA50foj983MwQvxxbDQsuNrQV1kDEHbpEG1_jjDPL5LYVw7Hvx2jDWnXwjCxw1OnmaOa9J/s320/Street-party-for-the-Quee-007.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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The First Taste of Freedom</div>
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For background there’s unbroken blue sky<br />
draped with red, white and blue bunting.<br />
A trestle table stretches the length<br />
of the cul-de-sac, which is unusual,<br />
<br />
but somehow fits in with the adults<br />
hobbling, legs tied, on the playing field.<br />
We’re all suntanned and freckled,<br />
except Jeffrey, who’s darker,<br />
<br />
and whose parents have stayed at home.<br />
We haven’t even heard of heavy traffic,<br />
but we know the rest of the world<br />
is celebrating the Jubilee.<br />
<br />
He takes a piece of cake out of the flag,<br />
chews it, and pretends to be sick.<br />
Someone’s mum shouts, <em>Don’t do that!</em><br />
He splurts, <em>It tastes of shit, the Union Jack</em>.<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">From 'Waiting for the Sky to Fall', Waterloo Press, 2010.</span><br />
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©2012 Dan WykeDan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-55512152764810194782012-04-28T01:49:00.003-07:002012-04-28T01:49:48.546-07:001973<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDk4ko6cXfOSipA494qZH6hhEUUS5_LId3VHkYvzZGfINsWdxl3xCypHBleW2hdsNQoLtxcAmETSO1u9t1_LHYTAJiTaZfeP9KSjtw9MO40jrAOcyH8oedEn0vLOeZpkhPKVoMrsosJ4Iw/s1600/frank+spencer.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" oda="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDk4ko6cXfOSipA494qZH6hhEUUS5_LId3VHkYvzZGfINsWdxl3xCypHBleW2hdsNQoLtxcAmETSO1u9t1_LHYTAJiTaZfeP9KSjtw9MO40jrAOcyH8oedEn0vLOeZpkhPKVoMrsosJ4Iw/s1600/frank+spencer.jpg" /></a></div>
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The Carol Ann Duffy-led project <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/apr/27/sixty-years-in-poems">'Sixty Years in Poems'</a> in which poets recall a year in verse, published in yesterday's online Guardian (always with 'the leading poets'), reminded me of this piece of juvenilia written years ago obviously with the help of a history book to commemorate my birth-year.<br />
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<strong>1973</strong><br />
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Vietnam; Cambodia;<br />
Paris Peace – premature;<br />
Picasso dies; Auden after;<br />
Greek Coup; Yom Kippur.<br />
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Oil Crisis; Cod War;<br />
Gary Glitter; The Exorcist;<br />
Jimmy Osmond; Roger Moore;<br />
Princess Anne weds Cpt. Phillips.<br />
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Joe Bugner; Watergate;<br />
Gulag Archipelago; I.R.A.;<br />
Edward Heath; V.A.T.;<br />
Allende shot by Pinochet.<br />
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Ulster Strike; Mainland Bomb;<br />
Internment; Dad’s sperm;<br />
Daniel – Elton John;<br />
Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em.<br />
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©2012 Dan WykeDan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-39547189660847890842012-03-27T05:58:00.024-07:002014-05-20T06:55:53.405-07:00List of UK Poetry Magazines Accepting Email SubmissionsWell, it's a start. I'll add others as and when I hear about them. Check back from time to time and please send me the names of any literary/poetry magazines and journals that accept email submissions that you know about.<br />
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Many magazines still prefer postal submissions and will get pretty pissed off if you email them so check before.<br />
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Some magazines on the list that accept email contributions also operate submission windows.<br />
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<a href="http://www.ambitmagazine.co.uk/">Ambit</a><br />
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<a href="http://http//www.cinnamonpress.com/online-shop/envoi-poetry/">Envoi</a><br />
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<a href="http://magmapoetry.com/contributions/">Magma</a><br />
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<a href="http://newwalkmagazine.wordpress.com/purchase-submit/">New Walk Magazine</a><br />
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<a href="http://www.newwelshreview.com/submissions.php">New Welsh Review</a><br />
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<a href="http://www.otherpoetry.com/submissions.html">Other Poetry</a><br />
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<a href="http://www.shearsman.com/pages/magazine/submissions.html">Shearsman</a><br />
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<a href="http://www.wolfmagazine.co.uk/submissions.php">The Wolf</a><br />
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<a href="http://www.agendapoetry.co.uk/">Agenda</a> (trial period)<br />
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<a href="http://www.weyfarers.com/index.html">Weyfarers</a><br />
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<a href="http://www.thecadaverine.com/">The Cadaverine </a>(under 30)<br />
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If you're submitting to U.S. journals, <a href="http://dianelockward.blogspot.co.uk/2011/10/print-journals-that-accept-online.html">Blogalicious </a>has an extensive list that accepts online submissions.Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-7350439190107330932012-02-28T04:06:00.009-08:002012-02-28T04:31:42.185-08:00Dungeness<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuHTMAA6a0_xquxGxUaH5heAq8G5ynsBeQnbAbpoQkxcGsQnnkyFNaHSu5eSjFNetToHyiEfgXLTNgYMb0I94M1sR7wTcD3s0bKNljs-l1BM8rqi0BpJICecGe2CsKvehOkG7tGF6q2Oqm/s1600/dungeness2.jpg"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 314px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 226px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5714159410705570258" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuHTMAA6a0_xquxGxUaH5heAq8G5ynsBeQnbAbpoQkxcGsQnnkyFNaHSu5eSjFNetToHyiEfgXLTNgYMb0I94M1sR7wTcD3s0bKNljs-l1BM8rqi0BpJICecGe2CsKvehOkG7tGF6q2Oqm/s400/dungeness2.jpg" /></a><br /><br />Here's something I wrote after visiting Dungeness on 8th February last year to mark the Centenary of Elizabeth Bishop's birth.<br /><br /><strong>Dungeness<br /></strong><br />I think the people live here because the stone has managed to flower, and the way the land and sea and sky form a continuum vaster than the eye can encompass, must allow them to see themselves and each other more clearly. If one were Elizabeth Bishop, one would probably think of the line ‘awful but cheerful’.<br /><br />Scattered over the treeless pebbly flat are dozens of hammered-together temporary-looking bungalows, shell-coloured, hugging the ground, with washing-lines flapping bright loads, and the odd stoved-in, upturned hull.<br /><br />Perhaps as a gesture of solidarity, there are no walls or fences or boundary marks of any sort: only patches of strange, tenacious flora growing against the odds in shingle stretching from door to door: sea kale and sea cabbage, dwarf broom and dwarf hawthorn, twisted and stunted by the unrelenting wind.<br /><br />Above the steep shore ridge, bony fishing-boats blister, waiting for the waves below to cease white-cresting in every direction. Around them, the litter from previous expeditions: smacked- off fish heads, crab legs, scraped-empty crustaceans, broken winches, frayed rope, yards of tar-sticky net, punctured buoys, unpaired shoes, a disemboweled mattress, a gaping fridge digesting cartons printed in another language.<br /><br />Under the stern of the Emma Jayne, a charred hollow of black and red pebbles shows how the earliest rising fisherman thought to warm himself and his crew. Further along, yellow toy diggers attempt to redistribute ever-accumulating deposits of long shore-drift in a Sisyphean cycle of toil. Sometimes a matchstick couple can be seen bending their will against the sky-line, oversize gulls wheeling hungrily overhead in the bruised light.<br /><br />On the hazy horizon the ominously mute power station, the size of a small city, steams in its warm emissions. From there, long, drooping cables radiate like the lines of a railway junction, throbbing above the reedy, disused gravel pits.<br /><br />Silence has descended on everyone here like radioactive fallout: a contagious reticence. After a short stay you feel it enter and explode softly like a depth charge, its disturbance travelling outward with you when you go: alive and sometimes flourishing, like the beautiful outbursts of lichen rooted in the scarred rocks.<br /><br /><br /><p>©2012 Dan Wyke</p>Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-63755175127778387212012-01-16T10:58:00.000-08:002012-01-17T05:14:06.501-08:00Haiku: Unopened Letters<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4zc0tTWpLsc8VsjxfiJuLnkN1xOEqPYncfV5g2zPSQgxCrk5RzLdz39ghKWzHKtGpCIyoYZzwvMPzV3TgyTGkrbpZk5zevZWU1krMBs8ae7__uiFSBZFBSvGsRoF6Tz8GY0XYtixeSnzF/s1600/graveyard.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 259px; height: 194px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4zc0tTWpLsc8VsjxfiJuLnkN1xOEqPYncfV5g2zPSQgxCrk5RzLdz39ghKWzHKtGpCIyoYZzwvMPzV3TgyTGkrbpZk5zevZWU1krMBs8ae7__uiFSBZFBSvGsRoF6Tz8GY0XYtixeSnzF/s400/graveyard.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5698315507228196658" /></a><br /><br />Unopened letters<br />on the floor in the hallway<br />all afternoon.<br /><br />.<br /><br />A cold wind is scattering<br />the cherry blossom –<br />young newlyweds.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Black knickers<br />flat in the dirt<br />in the middle of the road.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Fly<br />running all over<br />a pile of dogshit.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Originally:<br /><br />Fly<br />feasting<br />on a pile of dogshit.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Ladybird<br />on our bedroom ceiling<br />all summer.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Unable to remember<br />the word for squid<br />in Italian.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Cold night –<br />the warmth of my wife’s<br />sleeping body.<br /><br />.<br /><br />rain<br />bare branch<br />two crows<br /><br />.<br /><br />Lonely night –<br />enjoying the sound<br />of my own farts.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Glimpsed from a train,<br />an old woman<br />in a blue dressing gown.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Winter sunlight,<br />long shadows<br />in the graveyard.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Keeping me awake<br />at night –<br />haiku.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Low-tide,<br />gulls gather<br />on the shoreline.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Even on my sickbed<br />I am full of gratitude<br />for the way.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Forgetting about the haiku<br />I can’t remember,<br />two more occur.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Old-looking homeless guy<br />having a smoke<br />on a sunny bench.<br /><br />.<br /><br />A young woman<br />looks down at her breasts<br />while talking on the phone.<br /><br />.<br /><br />The <em>puttanesca</em> sauce burns<br />to the bottom of the pan –<br />reading haiku.<br /><br />.<br /><br />A crow shuffles along<br />the branch to make room<br />for another crow.<br /><br />.<br /><br />The anniversary<br />of my mother’s death –<br />first whiff of spring.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Brushing my teeth<br />hard and fast –<br />regretting something I said.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Pissing in the night,<br />sea-air<br />through the open window.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Cheep-cheep,<br />cheep-cheep.<br />Go back to sleep, little bird!<br /><br />.<br /><br />Staring<br />out of a window –<br />ho-hum.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Pink dawn –<br />who doesn’t<br />feel torn?<br /><br />.<br /><br />Overheard on a train:<br /><br />Blue sky,<br />white fields –<br />the cold!<br /><br />.<br /><br />Moonlight slanting through<br />slatted blinds,<br />cat moon-bathing on the bed.<br /><br /><br /><p>©2012 Dan Wyke</p>Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-54945017648130113522012-01-05T04:27:00.001-08:002012-01-11T02:43:17.744-08:00Haiku: Christmas Presents<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBLd1alZq0WFG9nvl9SWkBRlEUBd2oYAzmTaOPzZ-CiObF6-GI-xhJaD4jR1Qm6K4cHWybuivHMPLx3lYeji7VdeQZ11752N7C0cuBzJCO25NfOGfjth4D7t75E0HJnBn8bbFqMm9DxvE8/s1600/santa.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 268px; height: 188px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBLd1alZq0WFG9nvl9SWkBRlEUBd2oYAzmTaOPzZ-CiObF6-GI-xhJaD4jR1Qm6K4cHWybuivHMPLx3lYeji7VdeQZ11752N7C0cuBzJCO25NfOGfjth4D7t75E0HJnBn8bbFqMm9DxvE8/s400/santa.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5694124215081809282" /></a><br /><br />Here is a selection of haiku written over the holiday period, including the ground-breaking 'dogging haiku' that was deemed too risque for publication by the British Haiku Society.<br /><br /><strong>Christmas Presents</strong><br /><br />Cold dawn…<br />a car engine starting<br />sends gulls screeching.<br /><br />.<br /><br />fox<br />with the same face as me<br />seconds before we hit it <br /><br />.<br /><br />How lonely<br />outside the furniture shop<br />our old sofa.<br /><br />.<br /><br />late home<br />the moon<br />the evening star<br /><br />.<br /><br />Dawn stillness…<br />a heron practicing yoga<br />by the river<br /><br />.<br /><br />Finishing the address,<br />my father tears a page<br />out of his notebook.<br /><br />.<br /><br />December cremation:<br />my grandmother’s ashes<br />settle on the windscreen.<br /><br />.<br /><br />My daughter<br />plucks a pink rose<br />from the wreath. <br /><br />.<br /><br />My wife walks<br />across our bedroom,<br />unties her nightgown.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Up before everyone – <br />catching the first haiku<br />of the day <br /><br />.<br /><br />Winter dawn…<br />the postman’s red fingers<br />squeezing envelopes.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Christmas Eve:<br />Mrs Claus on all fours<br />in the Asda car park.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Christmas presents:<br />stripy socks;<br />a different outlook.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Boxing Day walk –<br />a strip of light<br />along the horizon.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Saying goodbye<br />to my brother –<br />his straight back.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Visiting relations;<br />the Christmas tree unlit<br />in our front room.<br /><br />.<br /><br />New Year’s Day –<br />same face<br />in the mirror.<br /><br />.<br /><br />January –<br />how dark the front room<br />without a Christmas tree. <br /><br />.<br /><br />Rain at the windows…<br />sharing the room<br />with silence.<br /><br />.<br /><br />I drill another hole<br />for the smell<br />of burnt wood.<br /><br />.<br /><br />Lawnmowers<br />cutting out one by one –<br />July evening.<br /><br />.<br /><br />As the sun goes in<br />swimmers appear<br />in the water.<br /><br />.<br /><br />hire car<br />beach-towels on the window shelf<br />the heat<br /><br /><br /><p>©2012 Dan Wyke</p>Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-74736207156010873272011-12-29T11:28:00.001-08:002011-12-30T07:47:04.043-08:00Spring Journal<img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 300px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5691635030567194850" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg66tPFeGqpv31wjm925TwImWYj4TQ_umYRuh48ail5fciptUrbxCJANYhke7VHJuBYnspMa2lfSnvwV9oqu4_0LCbbiQj3TTdWGh6z7m4txbj6epeYE1IbH_r8tT5Lvmp1Wi7kw9nH6yYH/s400/dec+2011+029.jpg" /><br />My new pamphlet 'Spring Journal' has just been published by Rack Press and will be available to order on 9th January from the <a href="http://http//www.rackpress.blogspot.com/">Rack Press Poetry </a>website or to buy directly (at a later date) at the London Review Bookshop, Bury Place, London WC1.<br /><br />Other poets published in Rack's latest series of pamphlets are <a href="http://http//denisesaul.co.uk/">Denise Saul</a>, <a href="http://http//www.martinaevans.com/">Martina Evans</a>, and <a href="http://http//www.micheleroberts.co.uk/">Michele Roberts</a>.<br /><br /><br />The launch is on Thursday 26th January, 18.30 - 21.00 (readings from 19.00), at The Marchmont Centre, 62 Marchmont Street, Bloomsbury, London WC1N 1AB. Admission is free and refreshments will be provided.Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-91913873475453155082011-12-29T11:12:00.000-08:002011-12-29T11:21:41.059-08:00Haiku: Issa's Untidy Hut<a href="http://lilliputreview.blogspot.com/2011/12/carolyne-rohrig-dan-wyke-wednesday.html"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 275px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 183px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5691631131739364962" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYLJqKoQBP38Q9CutWu-QrvnoaOsEvHXj2zf24BhW7eTdoTY7096p03cugxB9XZ3XDakqHkAWQG1zDkuLvxTULQvojrdqRZWTwugaFOcvqaai1Y_PvBhm4yD-F9NlOgBz_s8QCMLqIhISg/s400/heron.jpg" /></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><div></div>Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-86248769561590834782011-12-19T04:40:00.000-08:002011-12-29T10:45:01.772-08:00Poetry Reading List 2011<strong>January<br /></strong><br />Tony Hoagland, Unincorporated Persons in the Late Honda Dynasty<br />Gillian Clarke, A Recipe for Water (reread)<br />Sinead Morrisey, The State of the Prisons (reread)<br />Tony Hoagland, What Narcissism Means To Me<br /><br /><strong></strong><strong>February<br /></strong><br />Ian Hamilton, Collected Poems<br />Jo Shapcott, Of Mutability<br />Stevie Smith, Selected Poems (reread)<br />Jo Shapcott, Electroplating the Baby (reread)<br />Robert Hass, The Apple Trees at Olema: New & Selected Poems<br />Adam Zagajewski, Mysticism for Beginners (reread)<br />Adam Zagajewski, Canvas (reread)<br />Robert Creeley, Collected Poems 1945-75<br /><strong></strong><br /><strong>March</strong><br /><br />Robert Hass, The Apple Trees at Olema: New & Selected Poems (contd.)<br />Robert Creeley, Collected Poems 1945-75 (contd.)<br />Robert Wells, Lusus<br />Geoffrey Hill, Without Title (reread)<br />Adam Zagajewski, Eternal Enemies<br />Adam Zagajewski, Without End: New & Selected Poems<br />David Harsent, Night<br />Charles Simic, A Wedding in Hell<br /><br /><strong>April<br /><br /></strong><strong></strong>Christopher Reid, A Scattering (reread)<br />The Best American Poetry 1998, ed. John Hollander<br />Charles Boyle, House of Cards<br />Charles Simic, Selected Poems 1963-83<br />Elaine Feinstein, The Magic Apple Tree<br />Alison Brackenbury, Breaking Ground<br />Cavafy, Collected Poems (reread)<br />Elaine Feinstein, Collected Poems and Translations (reread)<br /><strong></strong><br /><strong>May</strong><br /><br />Oktay Rifat, Collected Poems<br />Charles Wright, Bye and Bye: Late Selected<br />Michael Longley, One Hundred Doors<br /><strong></strong><br /><strong>June</strong><br /><br />Matthew Stewart, Inventing Truth<br />Leontia Flynn, Drives<br />Jean Sprackland, Tilt<br />Oktay Rifat, Collected Poems (contd.)<br />Jack Robinson, Days and Nights in W12<br />Michael Donaghy, Collected Poems<br />John Burnside, The Good Neighbour<br />Billy Collins, Horoscopes for the Dead<br />Louise Gluck, Averno<br /><strong></strong><br /><strong>July</strong><br /><br />Ten: New Poets Spread the Word, ed. Evaristo & Nagra<br />Tomas Transtromer, Collected Poems (reread)<br />Lavinia Greenlaw, Minsk (reread)<br />Louise Gluck, Village Life<br />Hilary Menos, Berg<br />Paul Henry, The Brittle Sea: New & Selected Poems<br />Charles Simic, Master of Disguises<br />Charles Simic, The World Doesn't End<br />Charles Wright, Bye and Bye: Late Selected (contd)<br />Charles Wright, Sestets (reread)<br /><strong></strong><br /><strong>August</strong><br /><br />Basho, On Love and Barley (reread)<br />The Haiku Anthology, ed. Cor Van Den Heuvel<br />The Classic Tradition of Haiku: An Anthology (reread)<br />Stephen Dunn, New & Selected Poems 1974-1994<br />Stephen Dunn, Loosestrife<br />Anvil 3<br /><strong></strong><br /><strong>September</strong><br /><br />The Haiku Anthology, ed. Cor Van Den Heuvel (contd;reread)<br />The Penguin Book of Japanese Poetry (reread)<br />Anvil 3 (contd)<br />Mary Oliver, Swan<br />Charles Simic, Night Picnic (reread)<br />Stephen Dunn, What Goes On Selected & New Poems 1995-2009<br />Deryn Rees-Jones, The Memory Tray (reread)<br />Seamus Heaney, District and Circle (reread)<br /><strong></strong><br /><strong>October</strong><br /><br />The Best American Poetry 2006, ed. Billy Collins<br />John McCullough, The Frost Fairs<br />Mick Imlah, Selected Poems<br />The Best American Poetry 2007, ed. Heather McHugh<br />C.K.Williams, Collected Poems<br /><strong></strong><br /><strong>November</strong><br /><br />C.K.Williams, Collected Poems (contd)<br />The Best American Poetry 2008, ed. Charles Wright<br />Leontia Flynn, Profit and Loss<br />Tomas Transtromer, New Collected Poems<br />The Best American Poetry 2003, ed. Yusef Komunyakaa<br /><strong></strong><br /><strong>December</strong><br /><br />A.R. Ammons, Collected Poems 1951-71<br />Basil Bunting, Briggflatts (reread)<br />Sam Willetts, New Light for the Old Dark<br />Lavinia Greenlaw, The Casual Perfect<br />Carol Ann Duffy, The Bees<br />The Haiku Anthology, ed. Cor Van Den Heuvel (reread)Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-26774832629557613032011-11-02T03:47:00.001-07:002011-11-02T04:06:34.496-07:00Short Bee Poem<div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlnaXnZl_PfhhN-7V07kBFclzxc2k8fZ4OyG_bSk7qlKQvnU7BnPUZg2ADJWX2N27H1tpK39ZdSJModI4eVa0Yofuxz24_IgvFxLsh9oDJsiySrBjDSpPGNjm3SIvP8-s3ZS7rJ3wjULkr/s1600/bee+poem.bmp"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 259px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 194px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5670348418295521074" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlnaXnZl_PfhhN-7V07kBFclzxc2k8fZ4OyG_bSk7qlKQvnU7BnPUZg2ADJWX2N27H1tpK39ZdSJModI4eVa0Yofuxz24_IgvFxLsh9oDJsiySrBjDSpPGNjm3SIvP8-s3ZS7rJ3wjULkr/s400/bee+poem.bmp" /></a><br /><br /><strong>September</strong><br /><br />I sit in the kitchen,<br />under a thinning calendar.<br />At this time of year<br />I’m always too tired to write.<br />Outside, the weak, midafternoon sunlight<br />balances on shadow-stilts.<br />A bee – perhaps the last – passes slowly<br />over the dried out honeysuckle; lands.<br />Stumbling from stamen to stamen, it adds,<br />even now, bullion to the panniers<br />strapped to its sides.<br /><br /><br /><p><font size="2">©2011 Dan Wyke</font></p></div>Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-21233433650978600432011-10-17T02:39:00.000-07:002011-10-19T03:12:21.079-07:00Featured Poet: Alan Morrison<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgauheOeemGpOp5kClECjV2EAoUH1wnlbL0zlCmrpDey8nDl9Nny_2dGE9jF9QljImEPy3vzpRHKh1arJLXovQ0sJcho0130TkmVTryku3eytRqTENUyY5tNuPYfA68PXx4EHaXwCa60QMf/s1600/alan+morrison.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 352px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5664395454892051442" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgauheOeemGpOp5kClECjV2EAoUH1wnlbL0zlCmrpDey8nDl9Nny_2dGE9jF9QljImEPy3vzpRHKh1arJLXovQ0sJcho0130TkmVTryku3eytRqTENUyY5tNuPYfA68PXx4EHaXwCa60QMf/s400/alan+morrison.JPG" /></a><br /><br />I am delighted to be able to post two poems from Alan Morrison's latest book, <em>Captive Dragons/ The Shadow Thorns - Poems from the Mill View Residency 2008-11</em> by Alan Morrison. This book incorporates an epic poem on the subject of mental illness and its perception throughout the ages, tackling thorny issues such as psychosis and suicide through a series of 35 Cantos exploring different periods, persons and approaches to the psychiatric and social treatment of mental illness. A Laingian sensibility drives towards some uncomfortable speculations as to 'mental illness' as, in part, a socio-political construct. <em>The Shadow Thorns (</em>from which these poems are taken) is a sequence of smaller poems, each a study of composites of various inpatients encountered by the author during his three year voluntary poetry workshop residency at Mill View psychiatric hospital in Hove.<br /><strong></strong><br /><strong></strong><br /><strong>Flo of the solitudes<br /></strong><br />Flo’s patron of the moment’s immersion,<br />Timelessly lit in a pool of her own<br />Out-pouring, her melting-clock comfort zone<br />From the scotched tick-tock of Cronos; thrown<br />Onto absorption’s potters-wheel so<br />Fast-spun she changes shape without motion,<br />Her forehead pressed by thumb and forefinger<br />Imperceptibly sculpting each curvature<br />And groove of her temples’ wet-clay gesture —<br />She’s lost to her process, the epicentre<br />Of her head’s magic lantern waxing a-flicker<br />With lit silhouettes, phantasmagoria<br />Cavorting around her rapt cerebrum,<br />Shivering her tapped oblongata stem,<br />Her eyes synchronised hypno-pendulums<br />Chasing empty pages with mesmeric pen,<br />No chore in the pull of inspiration,<br />Her whole body clutched in concentration,<br />A twitching statue that has to be inched<br />Out of its trance with a soft verbal pinch:<br />Flo, our hour’s up now, thus lowers the winch<br />That hoists up the spell prior to its clinch<br />Of gathering magic; with slow-motion flinch<br />She comes round again, then slips from her plinth.<br /><br /><br /><strong>Robert of the clocks<br /><br /></strong>Robert’s scared of cats, apples and clocks,<br />Occasionally jerks in his seat to shoo off<br />Cobwebs or shadows from his shoulders’ rock —<br />If spoken to, Robert jolts as if shocked<br />By voice, as if you were an animal who talked;<br />His itching eyes can rub away the crock<br />Of our badly dyed bodies: limpid skins<br />Reveal astral colours exclusively to him,<br />While our heads leak tulpa illustrating<br />Our morphing thoughts, embarrassing<br />For him, as if each person is flashing<br />Their private parts: his clairvoyant chagrin;<br />He appears inhibited by some obscure<br />Obsessive-compulsive nomenclature<br />That impels him to avoid things that aren’t there,<br />Or optically scour their ghosting structure<br />To anticipate particular threats in their nature —<br />His mouth retches mutely as if the pressure<br />Of a transparent hand smothers its words —<br />But he howls in his sleep, so some have heard,<br />During the grip of his night-horrors’ gird,<br />He howls like a dog torn by wolves, the curd<br />Of his strangled tone prowls the gloomy ward,<br />Owls on their night shifts dimly disturbed.<br />Robert can only compose words with Os —<br />Cosmos, osmosis, Osama, morose<br />Might form his typical spasm of prose,<br />Orotund aphorisms, round symbol rows<br />Of circles, omicrons, open mouths, pose<br />Compelling emptiness through hollow crows.<br /><br />from <em>The Shadow Thorns</em> sequence<br /><br />The author adds: 'The poem portraits in <em>The Shadow Thorns</em> sequence are each loosely based on a combination of individuals encountered by the author during his time as poet-in-residence/voluntary workshop facilitator at Mill View; none of these are intended to focus solely on any one individual, therefore if any reader feels a particular poem may be specifically and solely describing themselves, the author maintains this can only be coincidental.'<br /><br />Alan Morrison is author of critically acclaimed volumes <em>The Mansion Gardens</em> (Paula Brown 2006), <em>A Tapestry of Absent Sitters</em> (Waterloo 2009), <em>Keir Hardie Street</em> (Smokestack 2010), and of the much-praised verse play <em>Picaresque</em>. His new volume, <em>Captive Dragons</em>/ <em>The Shadow</em> <em>Thorns – Poems from the Mill View Residency 2008-2011</em>, is now available from <a href="http://www.waterloopresshove.co.uk/#/alan-morrison-2011/4555945463">Waterloo Press www.waterloopresshove.co.uk</a>. He is editor of the widely respected literary and political webzine <a href="http://www.therecusant.org.uk/">the Recusant</a>, and of the Caparison imprint which produced the polemical anti-cuts anthology <a href="http://www.therecusant.org.uk/#/emergency-verse/4543558626"><em>Emergency Verse </em></a><em>- Poetry in Defence of the Welfare State</em> (2010/11). His fifth volume, <em>Blaze a Vanishing</em>, is due for 2012.Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-27744806376909249092011-10-10T02:08:00.000-07:002011-10-17T02:37:49.268-07:00Featured Poet: Martin Mooney<div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizVyDtlhO4u5_uVBCQPjJ3vPCtcAtTXdypc8lKImFjb4L_If7HiUNG23wlFZcrk4uhO1rLaueGc_hwlLKmmHlyKMWYkbzZJJZoT8_YBCWc4saWIJFv6mTRUeekFSYUg4sfatiiA-MW_MS1/s1600/martin+mooney.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 200px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 300px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5661788394473221586" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizVyDtlhO4u5_uVBCQPjJ3vPCtcAtTXdypc8lKImFjb4L_If7HiUNG23wlFZcrk4uhO1rLaueGc_hwlLKmmHlyKMWYkbzZJJZoT8_YBCWc4saWIJFv6mTRUeekFSYUg4sfatiiA-MW_MS1/s400/martin+mooney.JPG" /></a><br /><br /><strong>A Question About Fog</strong><br /><br />Did it drive the cattle down from the hill in search of a visible world,<br />or did they use it for camouflage, for this infiltration<br /><br />of our human terrain, these gardens and metalled roads on which they’ve appeared<br />by surprise this morning, sudden, unblinking, innocent, burly,<br /><br />a sign of what’s kept on the outskirts, what’s never discussed,<br />silent apart from the hoof-falls, the muffled flop of their dung?<br /><br /><br />Martin Mooney was born in Belfast and has worked as a civil servant, creative writing teacher, arts administrator and publican. As well as poetry, he has published short fiction, reviews, critical articles and cultural commentary in Irish and British periodicals.<br /><br />Mooney has collaborated with visual artists on a number of site-specific projects, and with composer Ian Wilson on Near the Western Necropolis for mezzo soprano and chamber orchestra. He has also adapted texts by Shakespeare, Sheridan and Ionescu for physical theatre companies in the north of Ireland.<br /><br />Mooney is the author of four collections of poetry - Grub (1993), Rasputin and his Children (2000), Blue Lamp Disco (2003) and most recently <a href="http://killysuggen.wordpress.com/author/mmooney64/">The Resurrection of the Body at Killysuggen</a> (2011), poems from which can be found on the blog of the same name.<br /><br /><br /></div>Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-28926644510543672072011-10-06T14:20:00.000-07:002011-10-10T04:39:57.795-07:00Featured Poet: Claire Trevien<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBDIM9z54RDZmnRxp8cx34X3PGjoYwNkyQo6QLPSUcu4UteBmXbpgTpVDCoQJoBNrjEKu8zWku4ADJHNV3hZMa3cjfElymoFT8tpguFemLpR1Vpcx05UKmfcW4qVshLLnDFo-ZIv08lDuS/s1600/claire.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 342px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5660677948603705762" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBDIM9z54RDZmnRxp8cx34X3PGjoYwNkyQo6QLPSUcu4UteBmXbpgTpVDCoQJoBNrjEKu8zWku4ADJHNV3hZMa3cjfElymoFT8tpguFemLpR1Vpcx05UKmfcW4qVshLLnDFo-ZIv08lDuS/s400/claire.JPG" /></a><br /><br />To help cope with the post-NPD comedown, I'm delighted to be able to post two poems by Claire Trevien.<br /><br /><br /><strong>Love from,</strong><br /><br />On my wall I pinned<br />the postcards you sent me from<br />Malta, Ibiza, Gomera, Greece . . . My fingers<br />jumped from pools of fluorescent water<br />to cats haunting<br /><br />crusty archways. I used to pine<br />at your absence — an idea — as I fingered<br />those battered papers haunting<br />my wall. Each picture was your face watered<br />down by time, even the stamps smiling from<br /><br />their contained box. My fingers<br />would trace the images from<br />the cards until they unpinned.<br />Once, you gave me Madrid, a water<br />fountain, but your words failed. My haunt<br /><br />would always be wrong: you’d pinpoint<br />a boulevard rather than the street it was (or water<br />it down to a lane) and your signature varied from<br />“your father” to “Joel”. I sent its crumbs to haunt<br />the wind, but eventually my fingers<br /><br />chased those scattered scraps pinned<br />inside bins, imprinted, or sailing watery<br />grass. I rescued my wronged address from<br />the pond and the litter man’s fingers,<br />though your signature is still out there, haunting.<br /><br />My fingers stopped trying to pin you down,<br />you sent no more hauntings from over the water.<br /><br /><br /><strong>Ties</strong><br /><em><span style="font-size:85%;">for Paul C.<br /></span><br /></em>My coat wipes against unripe<br />blackberries, his fingers ride<br />the brambles for berries fried<br />by too much sun; my stick bites<br /><br />through the grass a path, stinging<br />nettles rub his thighs; flies sing<br />and the skies are caught licking<br />corners and bony treetops . . .<br /><br />*<br /><br />He finds the conkers too damp,<br />or thieved by squirrels; he finds<br />them too small to use, I find<br />their shape can fit in my palm<br /><br />wholly - they captivate me<br />as if the key to all is<br />in their shape, their solid brown<br />arabesques, tied forever.<br /><br /><br />Claire Trévien is a Franco-British poet. She has published an e-chapbook of poetry with <a href="http://www.silkwormsink.com/">Silkworms Ink </a>called 'Patterns of Decay' and a pamphlet with Salt Publishing called <a href="http://http//www.saltpublishing.com/pamphlets/smv/9781844718665.htm">'Low-Tide Lottery' </a>from which these poems come. She is the editor of <a href="http://sabotagereviews.com/">Sabotage Reviews</a>.Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8174738733465180963.post-41358430987970575622011-10-06T11:49:00.001-07:002011-10-07T11:42:29.369-07:00Beholding Fanny<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglO82acVZ9XNqKhjlJYgSH3RrGB_E1XQ2Xl7k1V8D9gO47jVX_A0Qk55xM06dEfwf17sN8MRUI5eCi2WDfTB6xcmR575HX_kPHjHpB6_PNxuuh3TEiBxYqFQsWGWjdEFFgSiSQeET6sK1r/s1600/shepherd+2.bmp"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 268px; height: 188px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglO82acVZ9XNqKhjlJYgSH3RrGB_E1XQ2Xl7k1V8D9gO47jVX_A0Qk55xM06dEfwf17sN8MRUI5eCi2WDfTB6xcmR575HX_kPHjHpB6_PNxuuh3TEiBxYqFQsWGWjdEFFgSiSQeET6sK1r/s400/shepherd+2.bmp" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5660453294676330434" /></a><br /><br />I don't often have enough time to update my blog, and today is no different, but I can hardly claim to write a poetry blog and not post an update on National Poetry Day.<br /><br />For some poets NPD is no more about poetry than any other day. I woke up in the early hours with an image on my mind but didn't want to lose any more sleep by getting up to write it down, and so it slipped back into the realm of dreams. It was a good one - they always are! - and I still feel satisfied by the way it had enough energy to carry on into a second line.<br /><br />In the morning I deliberately avoided Radio 4 since I generally dislike listening to actors reading poetry. Even if a poem is being read by the poet, I'm usually not in the mood to stop what I'm doing and give it my full attention in the way I would if I had chosen a book and set aside time to read it. Actors can get in the way of a poem - they perform, and fail to realise the poem, if it's doing its job, will speak for itself. In the worst cases, the poem is completely eclipsed by the thesping actor.<br /><br />I was looking after my daughter all day so I didn't have the time to find out what other poets were up to on Facebook. Neither was I able to attend any of the many NPD events being held around the country, but not, alas, in Worthing. <br /><br />Actually, I'm not sure I would have wanted to participate or attend even if there was something happening closer to home. I'm aware that many fine poets were participating in events that no doubt many people found interesting and innovative, but I don't often feel the same way about off-page poetry activity. I prefer to read and write - that's all, and there wasn't even time for that, today. <br /><br />Aesthetic interest was engaged, however, by a visit to an antiques shop selling lamp stands and pieces of furniture painted in the style one sees in every room at the Bloomsbury Group's country home Charleston. Nearby, I bought some bacon from a hostile butcher who clearly had me down, correctly, as a supermarket customer, then drove back over the Downs on what fifty years ago would still have been a chalk track used by farmers.<br /><br />A trip to the library to renew First 1000 Italian Words brought about the unexpected pleasure of finding Mick Imlah's Selected Poems. I am the first person to take it out. Although I haven't read any of it yet - I'm trying to get this done first - I have given it a long, loving sniff. Heavenly.<br /><br />To eek things out a bit longer we stopped off at the museum. Isabella likes sharpening pencils and I like to see the Stone Age skeleton and a medieval green glass goblet with a hare running round the side. <br /><br />Waiting while she magnified a selection of echinoids and trilobites, I noticed the display on sheep farming. Of particular interest was a poem, written in 1883 by the shepherd Michael Blann. Its first lines read: <br /><br />'It was on the green where they all danced <br />There I beheld my fanny'. <br /><br />On the way home I nipped into Lidl for some milk and noticed a Christmas advert for gingerbread. The text claims that 'the great playwright William Shakespeare once exclaimed, <em>Had I but one penny in the world, thou should'st have it to buy gingerbread</em>.' I wonder if anyone can verify that or are the marketing people indulging in a bit of brazen bullshitting.<br /><br />So, another NPD has been and gone. John Burnside has finally won the Forward. One of my favourite poets Tomas Transtromer has been awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. My daughter sleeps contentedly, leaving her father too knackered to do much more than finish this and call it a day. And the ghost of fanny-loving Michael Blann walks on Downland tracks white in the moonlight as the Stollen on display in the supermarket window.Dan Wykehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02248307538795534761noreply@blogger.com0