Lifesaving Poems: Jo Shapcott’s ‘Era’

As I say in my full length review of Jo Shapcott’s Of Mutability, really good books about cancer are rare. Really … More

Lifesaving Poems: Connie Bensley’s ‘Sunday Lunchtime’

I first came across ‘Sunday Lunchtime’ in a copy of Sunk Island Review, edited by Michael Blackburn. You can find … More

Seven years ago today, the date in the photograph above was the day I knew had cancer. By this … More

I have written before that there are a wide range of reasons for including the poems I have in my … More

I began writing the Lifesaving Poems series of blog posts in May 2010. The idea was to celebrate the poems … More

The Next Big Thing I have been been tagged by poet and blogger Abegail Morley to answer set questions relating to my memoir … More

I was thinking recently about John Ashbery. As I say in my post about my poetry highlights of 2012 one of … More

I have just been asked by Abegail Morley to send her a list of my poetry books of 2012 for … More

I fell in love with the poetry of Mark Strand via the enthusiasm of Rupert Loydell sometime in the late … More

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog. Here’s an excerpt: 4,329 films were submitted … More

Mary At first a fluttering then a kick, his fist pummelling my ribcage when I knelt to pray. They … More

In the spring of 1999 I got the best education in poetry I have ever had. I was in Suffolk, … More

Yesterday was a good day and a sad say. A good day because Smiths Knoll, the poetry magazine edited by … More

Isn’t Twitter a marvellous thing? Following a link on a tweet of Jeanne Duperreault last week I came across the Canadian Poetry Online … More

I began writing the Lifesaving Poems posts in June 2011, back when I was using Posterous for this blog. … More

Everything is Going to be All Right How should I not be glad to contemplatethe clouds clearing beyond the dormer … More

The first thing I do when a new copy of The North, Rialto or Smiths Knoll lands on the doormat … More

I met Peter Carpenter in the summer of 2001 at the Arvon Foundation’s Totleigh Barton writing centre. I was at … More