We are in Richard and Andi’s kitchen in their minuscule flat on the Wandsworth Road in the early nineties. Richard…
Archive
The Year of of Living Deeply
S …
Saying goodbye
It’s a funny feeling, almost new each time I experience it, an anticipation of loss that is somehow fresh and…
Lifesaving Poems: Stuart Pickford’s ‘The Curtain Falls’
The Curtain Falls Suddenly a life is over – Ends with such serious charades The Dean makes lame quips…
Towards a model of poetry writing development
As promised last week, here is my presentation of the paper I co-wrote with Sue Dymoke in which we argue on…
Letter to a younger poet
Listening to the wonderful array of speakers at the Foyle Young Poets symposium on Monday, I tried to think back…
Poetry writing as a socially mediated process
‘Even the poetic world is social’ (Bakhtin, 1981, 300). This time next week, Saturday 23 June, I will be presenting…
Lifesaving Poems: Carrie Fountain’s ‘Poem Without Sleep’
Poem Without Sleep All the things that could happen to the baby came to me last night as I…
Nowhere Poet
It is odd to speak of missing someone you never met, but this is how I feel about the American…
A Fergus
My first reader was a man called Fergus. A friend of a flatmate at university, I never got to…
Lifesaving Poems: Tom Andrews’s ‘Reading Frank O’Hara in the Hospital’
Reading Frank O’Hara in the Hospital 1 The IV drips its slow news. So long, lean and turbulent morning!…
Lifesaving Poems: Kathryn Simmonds’s ‘In a Church’
In a Church No, no time for this the outside clamours to be heard, the books, you see,…
On a failure
Here is a story about a recent failure of mine. It all started with an idea, which I knew, just…
Sleep, mostly
‘What else are you guilty about?’ ‘Most things,’ I say. ‘It doesn’t stop with poetry, you know. Or those unread…
Escape to the Chateau
’Anything else?’ the book says. ’What do you mean?’ ’That you want to tell me?’ There is a long silence,…
The world expert on John Ashbery
‘What else are you not telling me?’ says the book. ‘Nothing,’ I say. The book rolls its eyes, gives a…
Kind of ashamed
‘What you reading?’ says the book. ‘Nothing.’ ‘No need to be shy,’ says the book. ‘Go on, what is it?’…
The New York Times bestseller list
‘What’s wrong?’ says the book. ‘Nothing,’ I say. ‘Liar.’ ‘Am not.’ ‘Are.’ ‘Aren’t.’ ‘Pants on fire. You’re hopeless. You should…
Lifesaving Poems 