Life Begins With Cancer

This is the recording of my reading ‘Life Begins With Cancer’, recorded at the Greenbelt Festival on Sunday 25th August, … More

Waiting to be picked

If you’re not enough without the gold medal, you’ll never be enough with it. – John Candy, Cool Runnings I did not … More

I’m grateful to you, you see. I wanted to tell you. –Raymond Carver (‘For Tess’) A kind, wise man once … More

Morning on Earth Morning on earth, light snow, and just when it was so warm, practically spring. But the thermometer … More

Things I Learned at University How to bike on cobblestones and where to signal right. How to walk through doors … More

Hysteria As she laughed I was aware of becoming involved in her laughter and being part of it, until her … More

Phil Bowen gave me this poem, written by a ten-year-old girl, in 1998 to illustrate a writing game he submitted … More

A year ago I published Riddance, a book of poems, with Worple Press. It concerns my diagnosis and experience of cancer … More

A comment Mark Robinson made in the days following Seamus Heaney’s death in August resonated with me. He said he … More

The Only Son at the Fish ‘n’ Chip Shop He lived with his mother till he was forty-five … More

How It All Started Do you know this dream? An exam room full of neat, serious girls, your lucky gonk … More

Rondeau Redouble There is so little left. The room is bare. She’ll strip his sheets and blankets by and … More

Psalm How leaky are the borders of man-made states! How many clouds float over them scot-free, how much … More

A year ago I went to hear Clare Best read from her extraordinary book Excisions (Waterloo Press, 2011). Clare … More

Timetable We all remember school, of course: the lino warming, shoe bag smell, expanse of polished floor. It’s where we … More

I met Evangeline Paterson once, in the early Nineties, at a workshop in London. Rupert Loydell suggested I went as … More

Laura Apol’s ‘The Switch’ is a witty poem which explores the tension between primal, and sometimes unforeseen, forces and the … More

Emily Riall will be a new name to many readers of this blog. She was a fine young poet … More