Lifesaving Poems: Dorothy Nimmo’s ‘Rondeau Redouble’

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

Lifesaving Poems: Wisława Szymborska’s ‘Psalm’

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

Earlier this year I ran a Poetry School course about poetry and health called Written on the Body. It was … More

Swineherd When all this is over, said the swineherd, I mean to retire, where Nobody will have heard about … More

I heard Michael Symmons Roberts give a magisterial reading from his book Drysalter recently. It was exemplary on so many levels, not … More

In 1991 I made the decision to teach part-time so that I could put poetry more at the centre of … More

A Poem for Someone Who is Juggling Her Life This is a poem for someonewho is juggling her life.Be still … More

Occasionally the entrance of a poem into your life is a combination of a series of tiny events, each of … More

As I said the other day, Geoffrey Summerfield’s Worlds is one of the most important books in my life. As I … More

Sometime in 1997 I went to hear Kevin Crossley-Holland give a reading at Exeter Central Library. I’d heard he was … More

I once heard Stephen Knight say ‘If I am reading well then I am writing well.’ It was a Q … More

One CigaretteNo smoke without you, my fire.After you left,your cigarette glowed on in my ashtrayand sent up a long thread … More

I became interested in Robert Lowell’s poetry because of the criticism of Seamus Heaney. I had tried reading him before, … More