Filling January with poetry

I don't do that well in winter, being encumbered with Seasonal Affective Disorder, so I try to fill it with poetry to compensate for having to take the Christmas lights down. 

This year was my third year of doing Kim Moore and Clare Shaw's January Writing Hours, which offers the discipline of an hour a day responding to poems and prompts. Sadly, I can only ever attend four per week because of fixed work commitments, but even so, after a two-year break from writing poems following the completion of my most recent collection, 'Love the Albatross', I feel I might be getting ready to start writing again, and so it was good to smell the distant whiff of poetry on the air. And it's always wonderful to encounter poets and poems you might not have come across otherwise. 

I also volunteered to read at a few poetry events, largely to make myself do it despite the dark and the longing to hibernate. The first of these was the launch of Di Slaney's new pamphlet, 'January conversations, with dogs', published by Valley Press. Di was looking for poets with poems about dogs to read at the launch, so I sent her a copy of 'The Good Dogs of Chernobyl', which was published in my 2019 collection, 'The Shadow Factory', and was delighted when it, and I, were chosen to take part. And although they were mostly distant, Northern, god-like poets involved, whom I 'know' from social media but have never met, I instantly felt part of a warm poetry community - it was a beautiful launch of a thoughtful, dog-accompanied collection of poems that never tip into sentimentality, skilfully illustrated by poet and artist, Jane Burn. And yes, I bought two copies, one for us and one for dog-owning, poetry-publishing friends, and if you like dogs and poems, you should too. 

                         

Mid-month and I left Bristol for the first time this year to travel to Bradford-on-Avon for the second Poetry@Roots reading at Bradford Roots Music Festival. I read at the first one last year, on the grounds that not wanting to leave my settee to drive along the frankly scary Sally-in-the-Wood in winter's dark was exactly the reason why I should do it, and it was a such a shiny experience, I jumped at the chance to do it all again. 

Organiser and compere Dawn Gorman

This year there were guest readings by Kate Noakes and Christine McFarlane, who was launching her first collection, 'Irish Elk and other Extinctions'. Dawn, who organises every event she puts on so very competently, but without the least hint of bossiness, interviewed Kate and Christine for The Poetry Place on West Wilts Radio, and also Dominic Fisher and me about the forthcoming anthology from the IsamBards, 'Dancing on the Bridge'. You can hear us here, at about 6 minutes and 25 seconds in. 

Taking to the Golden Gudgeon stage

Then, right at the end of the month, two readings within 18 hours of each other, the first a Manchester Metropolitan University Alumni Showcase, at Manchester Poetry Library, which I joined online. 

Compere Kim Moore with a bottle of beer and fellow-reader, Rachel Carney, listening to a collaborative reading on the theme of dementia by Hilary Robinson and Rachel Davies

I always find Teams and Zoom readings slightly terrifying in case a) someone rings the doorbell and the dog goes ape, or b) I suffer a technical disaster and find I can't join the reading, or the internet goes down - none of which has happened yet, though that doesn't stop me worrying. This time, there was even more jeopardy, as we're between kitchens right now, and out of camera shot, I was surrounded by tottering piles of crockery, rusting pots and pans, jars of condiments bought with the most exciting of intentions in 2018 that somehow got pushed to the back of the cupboard and never used, etc, etc. In the end, I took the precaution of shutting poor Cwtch the Collie upstairs, from where she tried to dig her way back down through the ceiling, though this wasn't audible in Manchester. As for the notification which kept popping up, telling me I had a poor network connection, I just ignored it and it was OK. 

Rachel Carney's view from the audience

Since this might have been my last contact with MMU, I'm pleased it went well. I loved studying for my MA, and having the space to write about the difficult subject of estrangement was important to me as I negotiated my experience of it. It was also exhilarating hearing the poetry some of my peers - Rachel Carney, Betty Doyle, Simon Costello, Hilary Robinson and Rachel Davis - have written.

The final reading of the month wasn't at all scary because it was on my home ground, at Silver Street Poetry and Open Mic, of which I'm one of the co-organisers. Knowing everyone there makes for a safe space in which I can be a little more frank about the circumstances behind the 'Love the Albatross' poems than I might be otherwise. And of course, people know me in return, which means I know I won't be judged. 

Action MC moment from Dominic Fisher

It means a lot to me when people who, it turns out, have experience of estrangement come up to me after a reading and tell me how much these poems have touched them. 

Finally, the last poem from 'Love the Albatross' to come home to roost did so in the pages of Indigo Dreams' The Dawntreader. A fine place for it to land. Thanks to Ronnie and Dawn for everything. 

Filling the Honey Pots of the Mind

It was a beautiful, sunny day and I had nowhere I had to be apart from at home doing the sort of everyday stuff that doesn't get tackled from one month's end to another because there are always more interesting things to do. So I wrassled the dog into the car and set off for Dartmoor.

My destination, and the starting point for our walk, was Buckfast Abbey on the south-eastern edge of the moor. 

Buckfast Abbey has an interesting story of its own, but as soon as I'd parked, I was up off the lane past Fritz's Grave, heading towards Hembury Woods.

(No one seem to know who Fritz was, by the way.)

Once in the woods, I started to make my way up to the hill fort. 

It was a slow, steep way, with much puffing on my part and patient waiting on Ted's.

Entry through the ramparts

Looking along the ditch

Hembury Castle aka Danes Camp was built during the Iron Age. 

Inside there is an 11th or 12th century motte with a surrounding inner bailey, which might have been used for a short time following the Norman Conquest. 

The legend  - NB there is always a legend - is that at one time the fort was held by the Danes, until some local women allowed themselves to be taken. At night when their captors were asleep, they got up, killed them and let in their countrymen. 

There isn't much of a strategic viewpoint these days on account of all the trees. 

Quite a steep drop down

The next part of our route would take us on a meander back down the hillside to the River Dart at its foot.

It was autumnal and lovely.

The remains of a Viking shield (probably)

Forest fire

A glimpse of the Dart

Local wildlife: Ted ...

... and a crocodile

We wound our way along the right bank of the Dart.

Miss Tick's shambles

The creative team of autumn and sunshine was trying out nifty lighting effects ...

... while the wardrobe department was dressing up in silk-embroidered brocades.

Eventually we had to leave the river and climb back up to the road.

I think Ted misses holidays in Devon as much as I do, as he sat very close to me on a log and we had a bit of a cuddle. 

This day of remembered light, carefully stored in the mind's honey-pots, will have to get us through months of darkness. 

Back at the Abbey there was just time to pick up a modest bottle of tonic wine, much beloved of Glaswegians, I understand, and ex-pat grockles. 

And then it was home. 

Ye Grete Derknesse

Every autumn equinox, I run through a quick refresher course on how my trusty Lumie Bodyclock works and tell myself it's going to be fine this year - I'm not going to be such a big baby about winter and Ye Grete Derknesse, I'm going to light candles and wrap myself up in colourful handknitted blankets and get out somewhere beautiful and sustaining on every single bright and sunny day that is granted to us. 

But some days there seems to be no daylight at all, just continuous dusk and it's exhausting. And the bright days always seem to fall when I'm due in work, or I've agreed to drive my mother half way across town to buy a packet of Cathedral City mature Cheddar cheese because it's 30p per 350g cheaper in a supermarket there than it is locally. ('That's six shillings!')

So has it been this November. Instead of a bit of easy living post poetry festival, there's been the torment and tedium of funding bids. Two days out arranged - to Dartmoor and South Somerset - didn't happen through no fault of anybody's. And though these last two weeks there has been much chauffeuring of Son the Actor to be done - about 450 miles altogether, to a beautiful location the other side of the city with stunning autumnal walks - it's all been done under cover of darkness, the first round trip through the evening rush hour and the second last thing at night. We've seen a total of four foxes and something that looked smaller and somewhat malevolent in the headlights as it pushed its way through a hedge. Gollum, or a svart maybe. 

I did manage to fit in Simon Armitage's reading at the Bristol Poetry Institute. He read mostly from his new collection, The Unaccompanied, plus some older poems, including an extract from his translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, which I love. If you haven't ever been to hear him read, you are missing a treat. Armitage is the Jack Dee of poetry. His poetry-reading persona during his introductions is downbeat and self-deprecating. Then come the poems which are engaging and often very funny. I think I must have heard him read half a dozen times over the last - I don't know, 15, 20 years? - and I enjoy it as much as I ever did.

Between chauffeuring stints I also fitted in the launch of Anna Bianchi's book Becoming an Ally to the Gender-Expansive Child. The evening consisted of readings, conversation and questions, and I gained fresh insights, not just about questions of gender and identity, but privilege too. I was expecting an intimate evening, but I've never seen the upstairs room at the Greenbank in Easton so packed, which was fantastic and a great tribute to Anna, the quality of her writing and her indefatigable heart. Oh and there was a big urn for the making of tea too. Inspired. 

Winter Is Coming

You know it's on its way but this was the first time I felt spring this year, back at the beginning of March in Corn Street, Bristol.

Eight months later in Leeds shadows lengthen at four in the afternoon and the devil starts to dance the way into darkness.

Light book-ended by the music of a fiddle.  Now it's the turn of the long dark but in four months' time the days will come dancing back.  

Barrington Court in October

January's so dark it saps the soul. This winter I've surrounded myself with SAD lamps, which do help but even so it's a slog to get through each day.  I think I must be have been a hedgehog in a past life. To make matters worse, apart from a hobble around New Passage and Clevedon, I haven't been anywhere outside of the city in ages, having sprained my ankle just before Christmas.  I was told to bind it up and walk on it as much as possible and left A&E clutching a catering pack of Ibuprofen.  Then it turned out that I had an ulcer and the rest is agony ...

So, I've decided to brighten things up by posting some photos of my 50th birthday trip to lovely Barrington Court in Somerset, back in October, courtesy of my friends, Julie and Alison.  Quirkiness and colour.  Just the job for the dreary time of year.