What's in the Bones
This selection of poems called 'What's in the Bones' was commended in the 2006 New Writer competition. The title reflects the amalgam of craft, insight, intuition - and that inexplicable spirit which melds those elements into poetry. Our relationship to landscape is a central theme, along with a plethora of colourful characters who possibly reflect my love of drama.
Click on the poem's title and you may read or listen to the poem.
Home to the May King
I heard the repeated call “I watch you” in a dream and on waking set it down, from which point the poem seemed to write itself. I could not say from where it came, though I now realise I was writing about the Green Man. I have always admired Robert Graves, and perhaps derived inspiration from his White Goddess.
Still Life
I combined a real incident in an art exam (long ago and far away) with Thomas Lynch’s poem “A Note on the Rapture to His True Love.” The exam has become a class: the stillness of the interior is nudged by inattention; the mind wanders to an exterior view. We are in the here and now and, simultaneously, quite elsewhere.
Stick
Though he bought a former farm and rented out stables, my grandfather was no farmer. He is nonetheless the model for this cussed, die-hard traditionalist. I took the title for this selection of poetry from a line in this poem.
The Dark Side
The voice is that of a moon goddess (Snow Moon) commenting on brutal aspects of contemporary life. This poem is part of a sequence in which I explore female archetypes inspired by the thirteen moons of the pagan year.
Why There Are Tunnels
I wrote this poem after the murder of Jamie Bulger. It considers the growing malaise of random violence. The imagery relates both to the scene of the crime and to Blands Farm in North Yorkshire, where there are underground tunnels for which there is no clear rationale.
Inanna to the Babylonians
The goddess is robbed of her daughter under the moon of the long night. Inanna is a Sumerian goddess of love, fertility and warfare who is also associated with rain and storms. Her mythic journey has similarities with that of Persephone and Demeter in that she visits the underworld, consequently having a bearing on the cycle of the seasons.
Searching for Signs
I’ve kept to a straightforward narrative style - the events speak for themselves. I mean this poem as a tribute to the indomitable human spirit that survives, as well as to those who attempt to help and heal the oppressed.
In the Walled Garden
I wrote this on the island of Islay as a kind of psalm, an isolated ruin near the cliffs of the Atlantic coast being the spur. Bleak yet intimate, the chapel recalls a former way of life. The sibilance of the vocabulary echoes the surge of the waves, the wind, the drip of the rain - and the determination of the islanders to celebrate through worship. The alliterative outbursts recall their defiance in the face of hardship.
Embarking from Port Ellen
This poem was also written on Islay. I was struck by the comparison between tourism and the former life where there was insufficient work and food, and from which there was an eventual exodus. Boats link these contrasting lifestyles, carrying mundane necessities as well as being vessels of hope, desperation and imagination. It gave me great pleasure that this poem was chosen by a young couple, not known to me, to be read at their engagement party and, indeed, at their wedding. They were as brave, surely, as any emigrants.
Putting Back the Clock
A dear friend died suddenly at the beginning of a new era in his life which had promised contented retirement on the shore of one of the lesser-known Norfolk Broads. Rhythm is important here - to do with lapping water, the swing of the weeping willow - but the breaks in it echo the unpredictability of our existence.
This selection of poems called 'What's in the Bones' was commended in the 2006 New Writer competition. The title reflects the amalgam of craft, insight, intuition - and that inexplicable spirit which melds those elements into poetry. Our relationship to landscape is a central theme, along with a plethora of colourful characters who possibly reflect my love of drama.
Click on the poem's title and you may read or listen to the poem.
Home to the May King
I heard the repeated call “I watch you” in a dream and on waking set it down, from which point the poem seemed to write itself. I could not say from where it came, though I now realise I was writing about the Green Man. I have always admired Robert Graves, and perhaps derived inspiration from his White Goddess.
Still Life
I combined a real incident in an art exam (long ago and far away) with Thomas Lynch’s poem “A Note on the Rapture to His True Love.” The exam has become a class: the stillness of the interior is nudged by inattention; the mind wanders to an exterior view. We are in the here and now and, simultaneously, quite elsewhere.
Stick
Though he bought a former farm and rented out stables, my grandfather was no farmer. He is nonetheless the model for this cussed, die-hard traditionalist. I took the title for this selection of poetry from a line in this poem.
The Dark Side
The voice is that of a moon goddess (Snow Moon) commenting on brutal aspects of contemporary life. This poem is part of a sequence in which I explore female archetypes inspired by the thirteen moons of the pagan year.
Why There Are Tunnels
I wrote this poem after the murder of Jamie Bulger. It considers the growing malaise of random violence. The imagery relates both to the scene of the crime and to Blands Farm in North Yorkshire, where there are underground tunnels for which there is no clear rationale.
Inanna to the Babylonians
The goddess is robbed of her daughter under the moon of the long night. Inanna is a Sumerian goddess of love, fertility and warfare who is also associated with rain and storms. Her mythic journey has similarities with that of Persephone and Demeter in that she visits the underworld, consequently having a bearing on the cycle of the seasons.
Searching for Signs
I’ve kept to a straightforward narrative style - the events speak for themselves. I mean this poem as a tribute to the indomitable human spirit that survives, as well as to those who attempt to help and heal the oppressed.
In the Walled Garden
I wrote this on the island of Islay as a kind of psalm, an isolated ruin near the cliffs of the Atlantic coast being the spur. Bleak yet intimate, the chapel recalls a former way of life. The sibilance of the vocabulary echoes the surge of the waves, the wind, the drip of the rain - and the determination of the islanders to celebrate through worship. The alliterative outbursts recall their defiance in the face of hardship.
Embarking from Port Ellen
This poem was also written on Islay. I was struck by the comparison between tourism and the former life where there was insufficient work and food, and from which there was an eventual exodus. Boats link these contrasting lifestyles, carrying mundane necessities as well as being vessels of hope, desperation and imagination. It gave me great pleasure that this poem was chosen by a young couple, not known to me, to be read at their engagement party and, indeed, at their wedding. They were as brave, surely, as any emigrants.
Putting Back the Clock
A dear friend died suddenly at the beginning of a new era in his life which had promised contented retirement on the shore of one of the lesser-known Norfolk Broads. Rhythm is important here - to do with lapping water, the swing of the weeping willow - but the breaks in it echo the unpredictability of our existence.
