Christmas Lights in Bristol

 Early morning in Clifton

 Lunchtime on Wine Street

Three in the afternoon on Narrow Quay

Bristol, there've been times I've tried to leave you ...

... but somehow I forget to unhook the elastic strap from the back of my belt ...

... and I'm left doing a sort of horizontal bungee jump over and over again. 

I'm getting tired now ...

... and it's no real hardship to abandon resistance ...

... not on days like these.

Cranes on Princes Wharf

The Wills Memorial Building and Cathedral from M Shed

Looking south to Totterdown

Arnolfini on Narrow Quay

St Augustine's Reach

Over to Cabot Tower on Brandon Hill

Cathedral Steps

The Triangle

Bitter Drinking Poets

Ooh look, bitter drinking poets - I mean Inking Bittern poets - at Halo Cafe Bar Monday last, courtesy Acoustic Night Bristol.  

John Terry

                                           Alana Farrell

Alan Summers

                                           Cathy Wilson

Colin Brown

                                                                me

and Dru Marland, who made it all happen












Come along to Can Openers at Foyles later today (Friday, 12pm) for a reprise!


'Inking Bitterns' - a book of poems and pictures for wild places, illustrated by Dru Marland - is published in association with Poetry Can and available from Gert Macky books and good independent bookshops - in Bristol, this means Durdham Down Bookshop, Standfords, and Foyles, price £5. 

Bitterning in Devizes

Bitterns are secretive birds.  If they sense they've been seen, they will point their bills directly upwards and blend in with the surrounding reeds.  This is called 'bitterning' and it's all well and good if you actually are a bittern, not so if you're a book about them.  These must be ushered into the well-deserved limelight, so whilst on a visit to Holt in Wiltshire to see our potter friend, Jan Lane, Dru Marland and I popped into Corsham and Devizes to visit a couple of bookshops. (Yes, really, they still have bookshops on the Chalk.)  

Corsham is crooked and quaint in an almost-the-Cotswolds sort of way; Devizes is a proper place.  I really like Devizes.

Couch Lane: former hospital for animals

my clever and talented friends

Is this a genuine Victorian pillar box?

Either way, Ted wasn't impressed.

Monday Market Street

Pigeons

Mission darn well accomplished

Ted says "'Inking Bitterns' - a book of poems and pictures for wild places, illustrated by Dru Marland - is published in association with Poetry Can and available from Gert Macky books and good independent bookshops - in Bristol, this means Durdham Down Bookshop, Standfords, and Foyles, price £5.  So please buy one so that I'm not reduced to foot warming duty in that draughty old bone-rattler they insist on bumping around in. Please.' 

Celebrating British Sign Language Poetry

Now the furore about who was and who wasn't invited to the celebration of contemporary poetry at Buckingham Palace last week has died down, I'd just like to say how delighted I was to learn that my work colleague, Richard Carter, an eloquent and inspirational poet in British Sign Language, was included in the reception and his contribution to our shared art recognised.    I'm delighted that he was there to represent not just his strand of poetry, but all of us who would like to be considered poets.  

Here's Richard with a poem called Peach.  

Inking Bitterns on the North Bristol Art Trail

Here are the Isambards - David Johnson, Pameli Benham, Stewart Carswell and me, reading poetry on the North Bristol Art Trail this Sunday just gone, and yes, we did trot out a few Brunel-themed pieces, but Stewart and I also read our contributions to this brand new and fantastic poetry bookette, Inking Bitterns, lusciously illustrated by Dru Marland and costing a mere £5.

'Inking Bitterns' - a book of poems and pictures for wild places, illustrated by Dru Marland - is published in association with Poetry Can and available from Gert Macky books and good independent bookshops - in Bristol, this means Durdham Down Bookshop, Standfords, and Foyles, price £5. 

  

For more peeks inside this gorgeous book, take a look here!

Late November at Arnos Vale

Arnos Vale Cemetery was laid out as an Arcadian landscape in 1837.  Now the landscape has taken over.  

My grandparents' and infant uncle's grave, now beginning to sink (and yes, I really should go back and do some weeding ... )

Even the leaves are condemned; they all have the Black Spot.

Looking across to the Chhatri of Raja Rammohun Roy, who died of meningitis on a visit to Bristol.

But it's not poetry, is it?

'Happy are those who see beauty in hidden places where others see none ... '