Next month I will publish my sixth collection of poems, The Wind and the Rain, with Blue Diode Publishing. I … More
Tag: Life Lessons
James Schuyler: Centenary year celebrations
Open call for guest blog posts celebrating the life and work of James Schuyler This November, we celebrate the centenary … More
On having allies
I once heard a senior British poet warming to a riff during a reading on the topic of the acknowledgements … More
Advent meditation 3
This time last year, I had begun a third period waiting for a response to a new manuscript of poems. … More
Advent meditation 2
One of the things I have learned about myself in the last year or so is that I can sometimes … More
Advent meditation
I like to think of myself as a pretty consistent person. I look askance with a certain smugness at the … More
UCU Strike: reflections and resources
Thank you to everyone who stopped by and liked or commented on yesterday’s blog post about the UCU strike action … More
Not much
What’s been happening? Well, not much. Which is another, deflecting, way of saying quite a lot, actually. So much that … More
Lifesaving Lines: Pobble, by Heather Trickey
Heather Trickey was a social research scientist, charity worker, Quaker and poet. In 2020, during the first Covid lockdown, she … More
Lifesaving Lines: The Trees, by Philip Larkin
Early May. Sitting in the bay window upstairs at Cricklewood revising for finals. My pink vest and purple jeans phase. … More
More places of hope
I said here a couple of years ago that Natalie Jabbar’s blog of curated poems each April is like a … More
Lifesaving Lines: Spring, by Gerard Manley Hopkins
Our tiny minds blown by ‘The Wreck of the Deutschland’, ‘Spelt From Sibyl’s Leaves’ and ‘As Kingfisher’s Catch Fire’, we … More
Lifesaving Lines: The Bluet, by James Schuyler
On a spring day as far from ‘late in dour October’ it would be harder to imagine, James Schuyler’s The … More
Lifesaving Lines: The Death of Fred Clifton, by Lucille Clifton
So this is a bit spooky. All week I had in mind these marvellous final words from Lucille Clifton’s poem … More
Not exactly good riddance
Just a few hours left of 2021. Time to reflect on what this year has been. Until a week or … More
Lifesaving Lines: What the Living Do, by Marie Howe
Two great lines for the price of one (it is Christmas, after all) this week, from Marie Howe’s extraordinary poem … More
Lifesaving Lines
Thank you to everyone who has commented to me either publicly or in private about my new series of blog … More
Lifsaving Lines: Alone, by Tomas Tranströmer
I have been thinking a lot this week about a line from Tomas Tranströmer’s masterpiece, ‘Alone’. (I have also blogged … More