Poetry Reading

On Friday night I read some poems at Alliance Francais in aid of Women's Day. Since we don't have a printer I just brought some poems that had been printed inside magazines. I didn't know that the poems were supposed to be on the theme of 'The Strength of Women', so mine were slightly off topic. There were some cool poets doing different things. This guy did spoken word in Swahili:

 This woman showed her paintings behind her and then read the poems that had inspired her:

Sitawa Wafula, who's releasing her spoken word album soon, read poems on the theme of violence against women:

All the other poets did a great job. I think I was pretty terrible because I was so nervous! The spotlights shone in my eyes and I couldn't see the audience.

I hope everyone had a happy Women's Day and celebrated being women/ knowing women!

South Africa published my poem!

I send out poems to magazines every now and then and sometimes they print them in magazines. But they always email me before the print them to ask if the poem is still available, if I want to change anything, etc. But not this time. A printed magazine, 'New Contrast', just turned up in the post with my poem in it.  I was pretty excited. Well, VERY excited if I'm being honest. Below are the pages with my poem on and my writer bio.

And check out these cool stamps! I've never been to South Africa or received mail from there before, so it was really awesome of them to publish my poem and send me a copy. Thanks, SA!

Silence and Snow

A silence greater still
Than this minus twenty silence; desire
Heavier than the snow stacked up
On roofs of schools
Which have to close because of it

You come over with sleds, blue and red
And say nothing, refuse tea.
3 pairs of trousers and 4 sweaters and
I’m squeezing into the buttons of my coat,
Pushing your car when it gets stuck in the snow.

We slide across the ice hockey pitch,
Pull ourselves up the hill
The wind throwing itself
Through the gloves and socks
I’ve stacked up on my hands.

Sitting in our sleds, looking over the city
I think we’ll never make it down alive,
And I’m glad we’re here regardless
But you pull my sled-string from the snow
Wrap it around your hand, and take off

The speed and weight and thin plastic
Pushes the snow out and away before I feel it
Instead I feel the ice beneath, speeding us on
I feel the scrape and dip of every curve
We are caught in the whoosh against the wind

The snow pushes its way between my layers,
Our sleds hit against each another,
Urging us steeper, faster, steeper, faster,
We scream into the rush, rush, rush-
I’m alive, and in conditions such as this.

sustenance

I tell you, imagine my love as a fish-food pellet
The kind that people keep fish alive with in their absence
A sturdy grey lump you can store in your heart
For these winter days, every day dispensing a thin layer
Into your bloodstream, aiding your survival
Until these thousand miles get smaller and less cold.

Poem by Suzanne Catlin

Here is a fresh poem by my friend and coursemate from Kingston's Creative Writing programme, Suzanne Catlin. I think the poem is good, the language at times lovely. Thanks, Suzanne.


Atheist Ashes

We are gathered through unwavering resolve
To walk through these heavy iron-wrought doors together
Strengthened by the people we’ve known,
Weakened by the people who’ve left us.

And as I sit I realise something akin to gravity,
The maw of realization becoming a chasm
So wide I cannot see the teeth only the deep void;
Only the nothingness behind my own eyelids.

Hymns echo in awe around the rafters but I can’t breathe.
So I sit there lips tight with eyes dry and burning
Leaning against the cut lilies already wilting;
And I’m scared but not enough to be fooled.

There is no God, no metaphor, only silence;
A thrilling crescendo of imagined noise,
A puff of cold air along a prickled nape,
A play of coloured light on pews and stone.

I stay long after the people are gone,
Down by the crumpled bibles and prayer cushions,
The chill settling into the sinew and bone,
And beyond the doors the sky tears itself open,
Becoming a thunderstorm.

Make your own Nun- a poem

Felt, 20cm by 10cm light pink

20cm by 15cm grey

15cm by 14cm white

Lightweight yarn, beige

2 black beads

Silver chain

Silver cross

Cardboard

Batting

Rouge.

Boxing Day

The paper, the absence, the necessary ornament:

No. Today, you in new Nike, white and Alaska,

Drive me to the trailers, your Marine friends-

Their holiday selves are weaker, unprepared,

Wrapped in two pairs of sweatpants.

At the ice rink, you promise to help me forget.

I’m cautious against the white cleanliness.

You push me forwards ‘til I’m flying, safety-swung,

Your thumbs pressed to my shoulder blades:

My skates skim and our cheeks form blushed rounds.

Your house, our cheeks not yet calm:

Your mother asks if we feel better now. Our brother

Is still dead. The boxer dogs wag their tails regardless.

Come evening, my house is like I never left:

The eight I live with lie atop made beds, as earlier.

tao lin has made a cool poem-video for people with short attention spans.

I really like it a lot. Maybe you will too.


poetry reading for manchester from tao lin on Vimeo.

I just find it so weird that MTV would have a poet laureate.

So. Ashbery is the MTV poet laureate. I can't decide whether I like it or not. I guess I ought to. The more people that read poetry the better. But its so weird having poetry interspersed with TV commercials. I find it strangely offensive.

I don't really know much about Ashbery, aside from that he is famous. I have read some of his poems. And now, thanks to mtv, I have read some more. I think I'd be more likely to read them all if they animated the whole poems. It's nice to watch, even though the animation has an in-class presentation feel about it.

Things I'm grateful for.

When the cutlery is clean and in the drawer.
My 4-page CV. Hats. Sunscreen.
The rise in the price of petrol.
Tulips. Jews. The Chapman Brothers.
Graffitti. Buttons. My 65L rucksack.
The Irish. The Brazilians. Shadows.
When my Nan tap dances.
The continued existance of the Queen,
Jay Z, and my brother. Carbohydrates.
Certificates. Les Miserables. Zoey 101.
Not having to be a prostitute.
Orange. Yellow. You.

You Should Be Sleeping

As a child I was scared of cover-girls.
I thought they'd leave the magazines
To stab me while I slept.

To minimise the chance of being stabbed
I turned them over.
If there was one on the back as well,
I was truly doomed.

My mother was a cover-girl.
I didn't know it at the time.
I am still a bit scared
Of their sharp arched eyebrows.

i miss john

i posted a poem of his earlier this year.

here's a picture of he and i on the beach in chicago, where he now lives with his beautiful girlfriend, Puff.

here's a poem.

John
I miss the way you never vacuumed your hair
From my floor after I cut it. The way you'd always
Bring me 9p bagels and slice them in two,
Then tell me I had to put them in the toaster myself.
The way you'd share your frozen blueberries
And your Digestives, but not your potato croquettes.
The way you woke me early on Sundays
Because you wanted to go to car boot sales and laugh,
And the way I woke you in the night
Because I wanted to walk and photograph the moon.
Most of all I miss your room with you in,
When everyone was sleeping but us.
I'd paint the pictures in your comic books all wrong,
Wear your socks, and tell you things which felt enormous.
You'd listen, really listen, then tell me
You really weren't the best person to talk to
Because you didn't know the answers.

The Giant Squid- a poem, after Bishop's 'The Fish'.

The Giant Squid

Meant to capture the monster,
haul it in; got instead a twenty-foot
tentacle, red and white and alive.
It curls narrowly at the closer end,
sticks a single white sucker
to my finger. The whale watchers
are excited in a Japanese way.
The sucker is rubbery and would slip
I watch the ring of teeth not close
against my flesh. Shivers, shivers rise
as waves to the gum-like warmth.
Twenty feet below sea level
my camera captures 550 stills
Of the monster- it loses a limb
freeing itself from my trap.
The tentacle moves like an ‘S’
And flays against the deck:
I cannot tell if it is attacking
and don't know why it's living still.
The Squid Expert from New Zealand
would like to jar a giant squid,
this tentacle; he says stills
are not significant, even history's first.
He must rear one from infancy,
that it may not know the rugged sea.
But I'll take these stills
and analyze until they make sense;
May the voiceovers call me science,
say I penetrate the deep.