What you read in 2019

Anthony Wilson, , ,

Here are my most popular blog posts of 2019.

As you will have seen, I am taking a brief sabbatical from blogging in the early part of 2020. I have prepped some posts for early January, but after that I shall be away.

With deep thanks to all of you for reading, commenting on and sharing this blog. I look forward to seeing you in the spring.

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Why I left Facebook -Probably the most widely-read and commented on post I have ever written. I don’t miss it for a second. Twitter and Instagram quickly followed. Best thing I ever did.

Philip Larkin’s Going – It’s not even my favourite of his poems. But after a long layoff, this was the poem that got me interested in him once again.

In memory of Mary Oliver – A found poem from a book of prose Oliver wrote accompanying photographs by the love of her life, Molly Malone Cook. It is still hard to imagine she has left us.

Waiting for the Barbarians, by CP Cavafy – ‘Because the barbarians are coming today./ What’s the point of senators making laws now?/ Once the barbarians are here, they’ll do the legislating.’ As chilling and prescient now as when it was first published.

Annunciation, by Gillian Allnutt – A great poem by one of our great poets. The first in a series of Advent poems.

My climate change conversion – Please watch the video embedded in this blog post. Then share it with everyone you love and care about. This is happening. Now.

Dancing with me in my kitchen – In which two of my favourite people Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise discuss one of my poems as part of the Turning Towards Life project.

Why I can’t vote Labour at the next election – I am not sure who I am more angry with, Boris Johnson or the contemptuous shower of a campaign led by Jeremy Corbyn and his acolytes. Against my better judgement, I did vote Labour in the end. I wish I had stuck to my guns and gone Green.

Some writing prompts – Blog post ending with a line by my all-time favourite blogger, Shawna Lemay.

from Midnight, by Mourid Barghouti – A tour de force by the leading Palestinian poet Mourid Barghouti: ‘Enemies,/ victory has become your daily routine/ like your morning toast./ Why, then, this hysteria?/ Why do I not see you dancing?/ How much victory do you need to be victorious?’

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You can read my conversations with the Book blog posts here

You can read my Year of Living Deeply blog posts here

You can read my Lifesaving Poems blog posts here

Published by Anthony Wilson

I am a lecturer, poet and writing tutor. I work in teacher and medical education at the University of Exeter. My anthology Lifesaving Poems was published by Bloodaxe Books in 2015. In 2012 I published Riddance (Worple Press), a collection of poems, and Love for Now (Impress Books), a memoir, about my experience of cancer. The Wind and the Rain, my sixth collection of poems, is available now from Blue Diode Publishing. My current research project, funded by the Foyle Foundation, is Young Poets' Stories: https://youngpoetsstories.com/. This blog is archived by the British Library.

5 Comments

  2. Hi Anthony. Just to say thanks for ALL your posts and sorry for not commenting more often, except in my head, which is not a lot of use to you. Your posts always leave me with something valuable and enriching: a thought, a feeling, a poet or poem I haven’t come across before, an experience or argument perfectly articulated and thought- or feeling-provoking. I wish you happy, restful, satisfying time off and look forward to your return whenever.

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  3. Thanks, Anthony. Good chilling. I am deep into Still Life by Ciaran Carson. Best possible 2020, politically – is worth a wish, if unlikely. Jeremy

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