Influences: my first reader

My first reader was a man called Fergus. A friend of a flatmate at university, I never got to … More

Lifesaving Poems: Chrissy Williams’s ‘The Burning of the Houses’

The Burning Of The Houses Tottenham is on fire and I work in an arts centre where the sky is … More

Cut through to what happens when you listen. Cut through to making it happen, listening for it, failing, then doing … More

Dear Ant Looking forward to 2015 it’s tempting to think it will never reach the heights of 2014. Big mistake. Huge. … More

I have so much to be grateful for in 2014. The year began in one of my temporary fits … More

Here are the most read Lifesaving Poems of 2014. For the first time I have been able to compare last … More

I am sad because the great American poet Mark Strand has died. Among the tributes to him in the last … More

I am at a thing. Not a famous thing, but an important one nevertheless. People are there, people you and … More

The poem and I are best friends. For ever. We hold hands in public and spend every spare minute with … More

Everyone who enters the stage begins by saying thank you * That silence * Mostly nearly all the time * … More

By the time you read this I will be far away from here. It has not happened yet, but I … More

The Burning Of The Houses Tottenham is on fire and I work in an arts centre where the sky is … More

I am at a thing. A historic thing. (An historic thing? I will never know). Poets are there. Household names. … More

Medicine The black hair of my Chinese doctor gleams like combed ink as he leans over his desk, with quick … More

A year ago I had a relapse of my cancer. Except I didn’t. For a week or so I knew … More

Reading Thomas Lux’s magnificent new Selected Poems reminded me recently that I first heard his poems before I read them. One of … More

Well, it’s happening. Happened, I mean. Stuff I thought would last forever -film titles, the actors in them, scenes of … More

She started as a name. There I was, following my nose, minding my own business, trying to ignore all instincts … More