Featured European Poet of the Month: Malta

Simone Inguanez

Photo: Thomas Langdon

ċakra: chakra

my body – a map for your soul
i will undress

dan ġismi mappa għal ruħek
– se ninża’

Listen to the Original Poem Read by the Poet

ritratt: sending a photo

a photo i had to send you
for you as i couldn’t get you the sea

the sea, behold
groaning with the pain of the setting sun
banging himself on the necks of the rocks
and struggling

ritratt li ma stajtx ma nibgħatlekx
għalik għax ma stajtx inġiblek il-baħar

il-baħar, arah
jokrob bl-uġigħ tax-xemx nieżla
jistabat ma’ l-ilsna tal-blat
u jitħabat

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Listen to the Original Poem Read by the Poet

the old man of the mountain
for miljenko

what shall I tell you, girl? he told me
the long rows of small white crosses crushed my brain
vukovar, dubrovnik, mostar, pristina

i thought the poetry died – all has died

come to sarajevo, i hold your hand
write on silence
and the wind blowing in your face
and the strange smells clutching
at your hair swinging

and take you in
and feed you manna and warm milk
by the fire cutting through the chill
and the photos on the wall, black and white, yellow tape
and see if the shadow on the wall tells you something
or the bare floor changing colour as logs crackle

i thought the poetry died – expected
big bags of words by the doors, torn verses
sweepers dragging

then, you came. what shall i tell you, girl?

once i had a daughter – with child
she left–
'since then, i don’t lock.
i can take you to her bed
i’ll read you the stories i used to tell her

and don’t leave with the currents of the river
for i’d have to open my window, this time
and to go on pacing, trying
to hear your voice and smell the perfume
of florets growing in distant lands

don’t look towards me
i don’t want to catch you in my eyes

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Listen to the Original Poem Read by the Poet

ix-xwejjaħ tal-muntanja
għal miljenko

x’naqbad ngħidlek fuq il-poeżija, binti? qalli
għasruli moħħi r-ringieli twal slaleb bojod żgħar
vukovar, dubrovnik, mostar, pristina

kont ħsibt li mietu l-poeżiji – kollox miet

ejja sarajevo,
inżommlok idek, ikteb dwar is-skiet
u r-riħ jonfoħ f’wiċċek
u l-irwejjaħ strambi
jiggranfaw ma’ xagħrek jitbandal

u ndaħħlek
nitimgħek il-manna u l-ħalib sħun,
mal-fuklar jaqta’ r-reżħa ta’ kamarti
u r-ritratti blekkendwajt mal-ħajt bit-tejp isfar.
u ara d-dell mal-ħajt jgħidlekx xiħaġa
jew l-art għarwiena tibdel ilwiena mat-tfaqqigħ taz-zkuk.

kont ħsibt li mietu l-poeżiji – stennejt ħa nilmaħ boroż kbar
xkejjer kliem mal-bibien, ta’ vrus imqatta’
u kenniesa jqandlu ’l hinn

u ġejt int. x’naqbad ngħidlek, binti?

darba kelli tifla kienet se ssir omm
u telqet–
minn dakinhar, qatt ma nsakkar
nista’ nraqqdek f’soddtha
naqralek l-istejjer li qrajt lilha

u titlaqx mal-kurrenti tax-xmara mgħaġġla
għax ikollok niftaħ tiqti wkoll
u nissokta npassi nipprova nisma’ leħnek
u nxomm ir-riħa ta’ fjuri żgħar li jikbru ’l bogħod

tħarisx lejja, li ma naħfnekx f’għajnejja

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I know

i know, when we get there, the zinc door trembling as we open
makes me shudder. it’s a long reel unwinding
creaking, the time i spend in those fields
each time i’m there.

once, you let me help you
i walked behind you on the soft soil
back home i brought smells of onions and fennel
each time i dream of you, they return
open doors wide, they won’t leave.

we went searching for beans hiding
in tiny branches and white florets
you taught me how to open pod by pod
really quickly. i still smell you
when beans are ready for me to rip, look inside.

we collected grapes. i recall
fine stems curling, my fingers purple
you showed me the square hole in the shade
where you turned grapes to wine, each year
i don’t know why, i was scared.

then, months later
picking dahlias and zinnias – armfuls, walking in
girdling bunch by bunch with brown string
to take them along to the cemetery.

then, one day we took you, with the flowers

on that day too the land was soft
– giving out smells of incence
and from the aisle grew olive trees–

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Listen to the Original Poem Read by the Poet

la naslu naf

la naslu, naf li l-bieb taż-żingu jirtogħod aħna u niftħu
se jqabbadni dehxa. nistħajlu tertuqa twila
għaddejja żżaqżaq, il-ħin li nqatta’ f’dawn l-għelieqi
kulmeta nsibni haw’.

darba, kont ħallejtni ngħinek
u mxejt warajk fuq l-art ratba
id-dar miegħi ħadt ir-riħa tal-basal u l-bużbież
niftaħ kemm niftaħ, m’hemmx li titlaq meta noħlom bik.

konna dorna għal ful jistaħba
qalb il-friegħi żgħar u l-fjuri bojod
u int għallimtni niftaħ fulu wara fulu
bl-ikbar ħeffa. u għadni nxommok
kuldarba li jibda l-ful tari u nittawwal ġewwa.

konna ġbarna l-għeneb u niftakar
iz-zkuk fini jduru nokkla nokkla taħt subgħajja vjola
inti kont urejtni l-ħofra kwadra fid-dell
fej’ tibdel l-għeneb f’inbid ta’ kull sena
u, ma nafx għalfejn, bżajt.

imbagħad, niftakar, ftit xhur wara
niġbru d-dalji u ż-żinnji ħodon u nidħlu ġewwa
nħażżmu qatta qatta bl-ispag kannella
biex niħduhom magħna ċ-ċimiterju.

imbagħad, darba ħadna lilek mal-fjuri

dakinhar l-art ukoll kienet ratba
u bdiet tarmi riħa ta’ balzmu taqsam
u mill-korsija nibtu s-siġar taż-żebbuġ–

(This poem has also been translated into Italian and Hungarian)

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Listen to the Original Poem Read by the Poet

writers’ residence

i.
i pull the edges – café au lait, smoothen
the blanket, white pillows
little carpet by the bath, and my breath.
open up – no light of day.
the sun sank in the river. it did.

returning, from the place
where poets let loose, yesterday,
he kept picking flowers on the roadside
when we got back, threw them in my lap
without words.

– since his woman left him
Khaled spends days down
at the java house, always writing
nights in pubs, always drinking.

ii.
the rose behind my laptop, by morning
turned into green stars
– five stretched points
small hearts, dry, undone
i move them, trying to recall how they smelt
instead, i remember someone’s joke:
how many writers took their life
in this city? if you can guess, you win a night
with a poet–

i.
niġbed ix-xfar kafellatte, niddritta
l-gverta u l-imħaded bojod
it-tapit żgħir ħdejn il-banju, u nifsi.
niftaħ – ma jridx jisbaħ
għerqet fix-xmara x-xemx.

aħna u ġejjin lura
mill-post fejn jiskru l-poeti, ilbieraħ,
ma waqafx jaqta’ l-fjuri minn ġenb it-triq
x’ħin wasalna, tefagħhomli f’’ħoġri
u ma qalx kelma.

– mindu telqitu t-tfajla,
khaled sar iqatta’ l-ġranet
il-java house, dejjem jikteb,
l-iljieli jdur il-pabs, dejjem jixrob.

ii.
il-ward roża wara l-leptop sa dalgħodu
inbidel fi stilla ħadra
– ħames ponot twal
qalb żgħira niexfa msebbla
inressqu, nipprova niftakar x’riħa kien
minflok, niftakar il-kliem tal-bieraħ:
kemm kittieba neħħew ħaj’thom
f’diil-belt? jekk taqta’, tirbaħ lejla
ma’ poeta–

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salt

you’re salt,
the salt encrusted in the rips of this soul
that spoiled this morsel i’d count on
– this morsel i saved
to survive

Listen to the Original Poem Read by the Poet

melħ

melħ int,
il-melħ ingastat f’tiċrit dir-ruħ
li faqa’ dil-loqma, ħlift fuqha
– dil-loqma li fadal
biex ngħix

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Writer's Market UK 2009 Released

Writer’s Market UK (David & Charles, £14.99) is the single most comprehensive guide to writing and getting published today. Whether you are contemplating taking a writing course, dreaming of being published or have already been published, Writer's Market UK offers a book and a dedicated website full of fresh, up-to-date information.

This indispensable annual guide features articles written by some of the industry's most experienced writers and insiders, including Simon Brett, Simon Hoggart, Philip Gross, Elizabeth Kay and Sam Murphy. Topics cover the full writing spectrum from penning a radio play to crafting a newspaper article; from having your poetry published to successful online writing and networking; from preparing a synopsis to working with a publisher once your work has been accepted.

The classic resource for every writer, Writer’s Market UK details over 4000 UK and Irish book publishers, magazines, newspapers, literary agents, broadcasters, theatres and e-zines. The directory also lists useful writer's groups and societies, awards and festivals. There are handy tips on how to approach publishers, detailed submission guidelines and unlimited access to a unique website.

Editor Caroline Taggart has over 25 years experience in the publishing industry. During that time she has worked as a freelance editor with numerous high-profile authors and lesser-known writers. She has written a number of books herself including the successful I Used to Know That.

www.writersmarket.co.uk 

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Featured European Poet of the Month: Serbia

Vitomir Marjanović

Vitomir Marjanovic was born in Pozarevac in Serbia in 1987.

He has great great passion for writing and his loneliness and sorrows offer him the pulls to write.

He picked up the pen when his best friend Johan died.

Vitomir lives with his parents and works with them too as a florist.

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With every moment (with every corner of air)

The wind blows so strong
Like a beast in a forest looking for its prey
I sit up in infinity
I listen to those screams
The wind blows so strong
It takes me from reality to infinity
To infinity, while I dream of you
While I dream of you, while I need you
I’ll build a house from beautiful clouds
Only you and me
In clouds we dream, imagine
And live for each other

With every moment
With every corner of air
I look for you
I need you
I live you

At bright nights
In abundant mornings
Everything becomes cool with you
Each new day
In the future…..
And again
And again
With every moment
With every corner of air
I look for you
I need you
I love you

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Only like time

When the hands of a clock step into the midnight
Then I hear some bells in the distance
Like screams of a late night
Only like time
I move on

Without you I am like time
I am spinning
I am loosing myself
Only like time
I am changing
From joy to pain
From sorrow to disaster
Only like time
And its rerun

Nothing changes
I am a wandering cloud
No matter if it’s rainy or sunny
Only thunder gives me strength to move on

Where are you?
Where are you?

Hours are passing by by the speed of light
It has been raining for hours like a waterfall
It doesn’t stop

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I am walking through the forest

I am walking through the forest
I am leaving my footprints
I am hiding as if I weren’t alive
Loneliness becomes a part of me
In my thoughts sorrow prevails
In many shapes my thoughts
Are now losing their meaning

Step by step into the distance
Makes me disappear more and more
As if I were a shadow

I meet my memories like clouds
Which I can’t get back
From tha past into the future
Only distant screams around me,
Which only arouse fear deep in my soul

I am leaving, I am leaving, I am leaving
I am walking through this forest
I am looking for my right path
And my happiness
I am leaving, I am leaving
Even though a part of me is left behind
I am leaving, I am leaving

I am walking further and further
I am walking through the forest
I am not leaving my footprints
As if I were a shadow
I am leaving, I am leaving
 

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Copyrights remain with the authors

ILLYRIAN

Your body weight
Your air power
The speed slowdown
Are immeasurable
There are no limits to your light
Either
There is no measure of your radiance
Or
You are superlative that exceeds all dimensions
I swear to my word's soul
You're
A crumb of forgetfulness
Beyond the ear or the eye
For hundreds and thousands of years
You're
A bright thought
And never
Has anybody ever been able to appraise you
My god given homeland that conferred me my name
Albanian

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FOR ENCOURAGEMENT

One day
My day will come
If indeed it's true that
Every dog has it's day,
And I will know how to welcome it
Then the soil will be as bountiful in bread
And the spring in water
That it will fill all the gaps
But alas
What are we to do with you
Distrust in tomorrow,
Deplorable is that day

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MISS WORD AND MR THOUGHT

1.

I've spoken rather
Differently
Too triumphantly
Miss
I hope
You take no offence
They are after all
Merely a poet's words
And you know that it's permissible
To strip the dressed thoughts
Stark naked
And the bare ones
To dress with suits I fancy
Or
Has it been just as well for you
That I simply tell you I love you
The words everybody tells
To anybody
As a husband to his own wife,
Miss
I beg to differ

2.

Well
Thought is no good without the word
Or the word
Means nothing if mind is not engaged
You are such a dear,
You are Miss word
And I Mr. thought
This is how I've always seen it
Myself with you and yourself with me
Even
This love formula
Anywhere
If at all it survived
Modernity

So Miss word, you are attractive
When Mr. thought
Lends you his charm

3.

Come on
Let's make up 'cause
Silence
Is anxiously watching
What's gonna happen with us

Anyway
Miss word
I feel like giving you a kiss
Only one
As I'm not sure how
A second or third may come
Let freedom live unfettered

Let the word
The mind
Speak whatever
They want

I now want
The first kiss

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UNDER MEMOY'S SHADE

I'd told you something forgotten
That which can't be recalled not even tomorrow
Forgetfulness grows ever older
When silence travels
I'm waiting for you
At the sun-dried oak
In que with the verse
Hung on the tip of my longing
Where one normally waits for his sweetheart
I sat down to rest
Till autumn runs out and light wears on
I attempted
To tell you but something.

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THE WORD SIDESTEPPED SILENCE

I used to keep silent
Yesterday
In order to speak a bit
I've inhaled sorrow's breath
I've always set off
To remote regions
Towards your eyes
To you
To quietly speak to you
To tell you
About you
And me
I've endeavoured
To tell you
That you're
The bread of lines
The water of the word
I for you
The most sung song
Ever
I wanted to keep silent
To scarcely speak
To become a shadow
To prevent the sun's light
I've wanted
To get over
All humanity's
Mishaps
And I've seen
How I could
Find myself
Closer to you
Soon or later
Yesterday
I've strived
To enjoy to the fullest
 

Copyrights remain with the authors

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Facebook Group: The National English Poetre: NEP
 

Description: This is an open group to create a platform to promote and connect all the poets writing and performing today in the UK who have not been 'branded' by the so called big publishers.

This group is open to not just poets but writers, poets, singers, photographers and artists who ought to be read, heard, seen or be experienced in their art form.

There are millions of Facebook users and this platform invites and encourages all of them to advertise the poets and writers and artists who are rising from the grassroots.

This platform offers some names and invites everyone to try and take these names to the people using Facebook.

This platform calls on everyone to use the technology to gather us together to stand up against 'the market-monster' and try to regain the landscape of our souls that can just sing as, when, how and however way they want to sing.

The National English Poetre or NEP for short does not sell or buy anything. Period. It is not promoting a brand or creating one.

It does not have a President, Chair or General Secretary nor does it have Fellows or Doctors or Gate Keepers.

NEP invites everyone to add new names who are producing great works and ought to be heard.

All the people involved in Poetry/writing/theatre/performances/arts, in short any form of human creativity are invited to put their activities, events, news, publication etc here so that everyone knows everything.

The NEP would like to celebrate the Poet of Beowulf whose name so far we do not know and would like to dedicate this group to the greatness of his/her work and proposed that we call the poet of Beowulf as Bewilliam English (without ascribing a gender to the name).

And thus here is The English National Poetre: NEP and these are names with which we launch this platform:



Alan Buckley
Girija Shettar
Luke Wright
Malgorzata Kitowski
Philip Ruthen
Briony Dennis
Inua Ellams
Juli Jeana
Tricia Peak
Tom Chivers
Helen Long
Claire Askew
Sarah Louise Perry
Kerry-Fleur Scleifer
Emma Robertson
Nnorom Azounye
Aeffe Mannix
Joshua Ehimwenma Idehen
Roi Kwabena
Molara Wood
Isabel Galleymore
Laura Bartholomew
Oliver Bryan
Anna Lindup
Emily Davis
Sharron Harriot
Carolyn Waudby
Abigail Zammit
Anjan Saha
Roshan Doug
Rebecca Atherton
Jayson King
Angela Cleland
Maggie Sullivan

Please read them wherever you can find their works. I guarantee you; you will fall in love with these voices.

Something seriously wonderful is happening in today's English poetry that the big publishers are missing to register. These are some of the voices that are writing poetry of the future today and wonderful it is to know, that the so called trainers are effectively failing to 'train' them as to what and how to write.

Please copy and paste these names onto your wall!

The NEP invites all the poets/writers/artists whose names are here to join this group and upload at least one piece of work for everyone to enjoy.

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=23276522904

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British Heart Foundation Event

BOURNEMOUTH PIER TO PIER AND WEYMOUTH BAY SWIMS RETURN!

It’s hard to imagine with our current weather, but summer is only a few months away and our British Heart Foundation (BHF) Event Organisers are busy preparing for this year’s off-shore charity swims in Dorset.

We are keen to urge people from across the UK to grab their swimming gear and take part in our Hearts First Bournemouth Pier to Pier and Weymouth Bay swims.

Every minute we spend over £100 on life-saving heart research because every two minutes someone has a heart attack and sadly only half survive. Heart disease is the UK’s biggest killer, and we are dedicated to saving lives through pioneering research, patient care and vital information. But we cannot do it without your help.

The Hearts First Bournemouth Pier to Pier Swim - thought to be the longest offshore charity swim in the UK - is now in its 18th year and will take place on Sunday 20 July. The Hearts First Weymouth Bay Swim, also off-shore, is taking place for a fourth year on Sunday 10 August.

These events are growing in popularity each year with over 1600 swimmers likely to take part in 2008. Everyone is welcome to join in, from individuals to families and groups of friends or work colleagues.

The Bournemouth Pier to Pier Swim starts at 12 noon from the Bournemouth Pier end of the beach and is a 1.4 mile swim between Bournemouth and Boscombe piers. Last year the event raised a record £64,000, which we hope to better this year. Taking part costs £10 for adults and £5 for accompanied under 16’s. Entry is by advance registration only.

Weymouth Bay Swim is a challenging one mile swim along the edge of Weymouth Bay, beginning at 9.30am from the Pavilion end of the beach. Taking part costs £10 for adults and £5 for accompanied under 16’s. Registration is possible on the day but for the full price of £15 for adults and £5 for accompanied under 16’s.

For further details, or to enter either of these events please visit www.bhf.org.uk/events or call the events team on 0800 652 5818.

Please contact Andrew Coles, BHF Regional Events Organiser on 01225 481601 or colesa@bhf.org.uk  for further information.

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Blurb launches international online photography book competition

Calling all photographers, flickr obsessives, bloggers, artists and authors:
You could win $25,000 and a trip to San Francisco!

London, UK 25th March, 2008 – Blurb, the creative publishing service, is launching the Photography.Book.Now (PBN) International Salon and Symposium to help photographers create their own coffee table books and achieve international recognition for their work. Entries are invited from now and the closing date is 14th July 2008. The winner will take $25,000 and a trip to San Francisco as the grand prize. Presented by Blurb, the competition sponsors also include: Livebooks, Flickr, SmugMug, American Photo, Photo District News (PDN), and JPG Magazine.

Entries will be accepted in two categories, General and Themed.
1 The General category celebrates the diversity of the photographic medium and gives entrants the creative freedom to produce the book of their choice.
2 The Themed category invites any topic, concept or collection of work that demonstrates how photography can create a narrative in book form.

Don’t have a pre-made book? Make one for free at www.blurb.com and then submit your entry either in hardback or online!

World-renowned photographer and photography book expert Darius Himes will lead a panel of editors, publishers, curators and photographers who will jury the PBN competition.

An important part of PBN is bringing the photographic community together. There will be an awards ceremony in San Francisco where the grand prize and top category winners will be honoured on 12th September 2008. There will also be meet-ups in San Francisco, New York, London and Cologne, where attendees can hang out with industry peers, judges and friends.

PBN includes a travelling salon showcasing the competition’s winning books, and a half-day symposium featuring panels and presentations exploring the modern photography book movement.

“Most photographers, whether photography is their day job or they wish that it could be, want to see their work published,” said Eileen Gittins, Blurb’s founder and CEO.

“To affordably make a book of one’s own photography, with complete creative control, is a liberating, exciting, highly personal and satisfying experience. That’s what Photography.Book.Now should inspire: Photographers can now make the coffee table books they’ve always wanted, with a real chance to gain worldwide recognition and win a tremendous prize.”

Entry details and other important dates:
Click here for complete entry guidelines, rules and submission details are available online.
Deadline: 14th July 2008
Winner and honorary mentions publicly announced on or around 18th September 2008
San Francisco Awards Ceremony: Friday 12th September
London meet up date: Friday 10th October

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PIONEERING PHOTOGRAPHIC RESEARCH WINS PRESTIGIOUS BOOK AWARD

A photography book by a Leicester professor, which accompanies an internationally acclaimed exhibition currently touring the world, has won the prestigious Kraszna-Krausz Book Award.

Over the past 14 years Roger Taylor, Professor of Photographic History at De Montfort University, has gathered a unique collection of British calotypes - works of exceptional beauty and rarity made from paper negatives - from the beginnings of photographic art.

His ground-breaking book about the collection and the photographers behind them, Impressed By Light: British Photographs from Paper Negatives, 1840-1860 (Yale University Press), was one of six books across the world short-listed for the awards.

They are the UK's leading prize for books published in the fields of the moving image and photography, with a total prize fund of £10,000 split between the winners of the two categories in the awards; moving image titles and the photography category.

The winners were announced at the London Book Fair on Monday (14 April).
Prof Taylor's ground-breaking exhibition of some of the calotypes was launched at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art last year and is currently at The National Gallery of Art in Washington DC and will go to the Musee D'Orsay in Paris next month.

The exhibition presents 118 works by 40 artists, including masters like William Henry Fox Talbot, David Octavius Hill and Robert Adamson, Roger Fenton, Benjamin Brecknell Turner, and Linnaeus Tripe, as well as unrecognised artists.

Most of the works to be featured have never been exhibited before and are loaned from 27 public and private collections in the UK, France, Canada, and the US.

Dr Gerard Moran, Dean of Art & Design at DMU, said: "The Kraszna-Krausz Photography Book Award is the most prestigious in the field and it's very fitting that it should go to De Montfort University's Professor Roger Taylor.

He is a major figure in the development of Photographic History both here in the UK and internationally - as the recent exhibitions he has curated in New York and Washington demonstrate. Roger has been at the centre of exciting research in the surprisingly under-documented area of British photographic history - and this personal recognition for his excellent book is a most appropriate tribute."

Prof Paul Hill, course leader for the University's renowned Photography Masters degree, said: "This is like the Booker Prize for Photography and it's a wonderful accolade for a brilliant piece of internationally-praised work."

Prof Taylor's book will now join the Kraszna-Krausz collection of photography and moving-image books held in the National Media Museum in Bradford.

The awards recognise and celebrate excellence in photography and moving image publishing and were founded in 1985 by the prolific and dedicated Hungarian-born Andor Kraszna-Krausz, who was also founder of Focal Press.

 

Los Angeles Art Weekend 2008: April 10-13

This year's Art Weekend is scheduled to take place next April 10-13th. If you would like additional information about the festival or would like to attend, please contact me at the number below.
 

Souri Kim
Los Angeles Art Weekend
(917) 379-4899

www.laartweekend.com
www.framenoir.com

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Music/Technology

Goodness! What is Sideloading!

Beatles fans frustrated with the ongoing iTunes download saga are turning to pre- played CDs to "side-load" tracks onto their Mp3 players.

www.musicmagpie.co.uk   the online store that buys and sells pre-played CDs is reporting record sales of Beatles CDs since the Beatles download story resurfaced.

Craig Dawson, operations director of www.musicmagpie.co.uk  said:

"Side-loading is the popular alternative to downloading and is where you copy your CDs onto your Mp3 player.

"The refusal to allow Beatles tracks to be downloaded from places like iTunes means Beatles CDs are probably the most sought after CDs on our site at the moment. People are desperate for the tracks to be put on their Mp3 players."

Back in November 2007, Sir Paul McCartney announced to journalists that The Beatles back catalogue would go digital in 2008.

The rumour last month that Apple had done a $400 million deal to put the entire Beatles back catalogue on iTunes caused quite a stir but was quickly denied by Apple and the companies who own the rights to the songs.

Dawson continues:

"Fans just aren't prepared to wait for all of these multi-million pound deals to be done and have found their own way of getting hold of Beatles Mp3s."

Top five selling Beatles albums on www.musicmagpie.co.uk

1. The While Album
2. Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club
3. Abbey Road
4. Please, Please Me
5. Ain't She Sweet

Further info:

Gemma Wieczorek
RMS PR Ltd
Tel: 0161 927 3131
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Editorial

Welcome to the 4th anniversary issue of Poet's Letter opening the journey of the 5th year of publication. Let's Love of Crows speak as the Editorial for April. See you all (whoever could make it) at Poet's Letter's May Reading on May 12, Monday at 7:30 pm.

Anniversary Special Poetry

Utopia: Philip Ruthen

 

Pt 1

Utopia
is a prefab
a short walk
from a W-sign
by the rail lines at
St. Pancras.
It has its own banner
pasted
above the entrance
the notice with opening times
is smeared by
searching fingerprints
the padlock on the door
is levered off
the exit sign
smashed.
It has been well used.
It is in need of
refurbishment.

Pt 2

A palace
beyond
Granada
the tarpaulin
sheets
glisten
on the roof -
the dilapidated wash
cover lit from high -
they wouldn’t move them,
not even for fame.
The Alhambra
tries maintaining
expectations.

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BLACK ELK: Bryan Oliver


 

BLACK ELK STARES BACK AT ME

THERE'S A SMILE ON HIS FACE

A FEATHER IN HIS BLACK HAIR

A SPEAR IN HIS HAND

HE STARES BACK AT ME

GHOST FROM THE PAST.



FREEDOM FLUTTERS

THE FEATHER IN HIS HAIR

BEFORE THE GREED CAME

BEFORE THE WAGONS OF HATE

BEFORE THE CONQUISTADOR'S CERTAINTY

BEFORE THE BULLETS

LEARNING HOW TO SCALP

TO DRINK BAD LIQUOR

TO LOSE

DESPAIR

AND DIE.



SO WISE

SO CALM

SO BALANCED

I ENVY YOU

WHAT WAS

WHAT CANNOT BE AGAIN

ARROWHEADS IN THE GROUND

BROKEN

FEATHER MATTED

FORLORN.
WE SEEK THE SURVIVORS

THROUGH DIMINISHING FORESTS

CUTTING DOWN THE OXYGEN

SWOPPING POTS AND PANS

FOR ANCIENT BURIAL GROUNDS.



BLACK ELK SMILES

WEARILY

HE'S SEEN IT ALL

HEARD IT ALL

BROKEN PROMISES

WORDS OF SLIME.



CLIME INTO A CANOE

PADDLE US BACK

TO THE WOLF AND THE COUGAR

BEAR AND BUFFALO TIME.



BLACK ELK TURNS AWAY

BACK TO THE GREAT SPIRIT

LEAVING US NAKED

HOLDING A HANDFUL OF YELLOW METAL.

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Copyrights remain with the authors

The Second Fall of the Eagle Stone:

Angela Cleland

“Coinneach Odhar foretold...that Loch Ussie would ooze up through the well and flood the valley below to such an extent that ships could sail up to Strathpeffer and be fastened to the (Eagle Stone); and this would happen after the stone had fallen three times.

“The Eagle Stone has already fallen twice, and on the second occasion the Cromarty Firth flooded up to the old County Buildings in Dingwall.”
(The Propechies of the Brahan Seer, Alexander Mackenzie)

Right enough, the stone lay flat,
Pictish eagle recalling the sky,
luck drained from its sculpted horseshoe –
yes, they should have let it lie.

But the council members' socks were wet,
so how could they sniff at the seer’s sign?
They’d fix the Eagle Stone upright
to make sure it stayed cursed this time.

Two held it up, two dug, two ran
to the builders, mixed, and filled the trench,
planned and built a small field round it,
eight foot square with a barbed wire fence.

They drank tea, two by two, in shifts,
each helped to hold the stone up (squint);
when the concrete set, they wiped their hands,
and went home. They've not been back since.

Now every night, as they sleep deep,
the concrete cracks a little more
the Brahan Seer turns in his barrel of tar
and the waters swell at the Cromarty's shore.

Yet they believe they've fixed it
and will not wake till they bash their heads,
on their low ceilings one dreich night
when the swollen firth floats up their beds.
 

Copyrights remain with the authors

Black Hole: Laura Bartholomew

 

Steer me away
From that black, black hole
Which uninvited has befriended me
As in the past.

Unwillingly I succumb
To the fall
The desperate fall
Swallowed up
By the black, bleak hole.

I stand away from it now
And yet, and yet
I see the opening
The shaft of black light
Beckoning
The sudden seamless drop.

I shall not, will not
Be seduced by the black hole
The terribly frightening
Black, black hole.

It took substantial strength before
To scramble out of the hole
Some years it took
Inch by bloody inch
Climbing, pushing, shoving myself out
Like some broken breech birth.

Eventually exhausted
I broke free
From that dark venomous place.

So, steer me away
From that black, black hole
Yes, steer me away.

Copyrights remain with the authors

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Featured Poet: Noel Canin

Noel Canin was born in South Africa in 1949 and grew up during the Apartheid era. She began writing poetry during her last year in South Africa before moving to Israel in 1968. She writes: This conflicted country, like many others, is essentially one of refugees, a container of alien reflections that inevitably change in the new climate so that one neither completely belongs in the old country nor in the new. As lonely as this may be, it is also essentially a space of freedom, a room to write in.''

In this space she has two beloved children and four grandchildren.

 

Immigrant daughter

For Anael

Whose daughter am I
in this clamorous land
this bewildered nation of alien hope
of barriers and walls
and seditious intention

I am a daughter of the warm African earth
I am a daughter of the wind in the grasses

Whose daughter am I
in this promised land
this self-absorbed nation of chosen people
of grieving and guns
and ancient superstition

I am a daughter of the Indian Ocean
I am a daughter of the traveling sand

I am a daughter
an absent daughter
I am a daughter
Of Mandela’s land

Whose daughter am I
under moon and sun
whose daughter am I on this ancient road
I am a daughter
I am a daughter
I am a daughter of this stern old globe

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Crossing the road

For Edna

Sometimes I stand at the side of the road
and wait to cross. And then I wait some more.
As the cars stream by, I wonder
whether to do my Queen Victoria thing,
you know, the bit where I stalk into the road,
one hand held up, palm open,
and the long line of cars
from the main road into the suburb
startle to a halt as I, palm up,
march majestically before them.
Today, as I stood pensively waiting
at the side of the road -
I hadn’t yet got to the cardinal question
of my Queen Victoria thing -
a drop-dead gorgeous young creature
with the gentlest curve of belly –
very short blouse, you see -
(an image of my step father saying – not enough material eh?) -
Well, up she came and stood beside me and
instantly, as naturally as the fashions change,
that long line of cars
from the main road into the suburb
swept cheerfully to a halt.

Which just goes to show
that women with generous,
passion comfortable bodies
and fifty seven years of being
are simply invisible.

- Although, if you ask me,
the sight of a flowing haired
fifty seven year old woman
in a pink cotton Indian dress and a straw hat
doing her Queen Victoria thing
is also worth a little something -

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The Jacaranda Trees

For Myrtle and her daughters

I push him in his wheelchair
down past the 48 bus,
through the gas station
and up beneath the Jacarandas
to the park. He murmurs, this sweet boy,
and I stroke the top of his head.

In the capital of my
childhood country,
Jacarandas still stain the streets purple.
Today’s blooms untainted by the old terror
conceived and legislated within the golden brick
embrace of the Union Buildings. Remember?

The man in the suit and polished shoes,
running,
the policemen in their uniforms
and black boots,
grinning?

They chased him because he was black
because he was a black man wearing a suit,
they fired at him
because he was a black man
on his way.

The grey faced man asleep on the divan
in our dining room?
Who wasn’t there the next day
and whom my mother never mentioned again
and years later said she didn’t remember
when I asked.


My aunt and uncle, when they came
looking for explosives at two or four
or five in the morning,
and my uncle who let them in
stark naked
and said yes
he always kept explosives under
his four year-old daughter’s bed
and God help them if they woke her
and they could fetch their own bloody ladder
if they wanted to climb up into the roof.

The young black Jazz musician who leaped
from the guest room window
when they came to make sure nothing
subversive
was going on in the middle of the
sleepdead night, goddamn left wing Jews,
and who came back to practice on the piano
as if nothing had happened
that would not happen again and again
and again.

I push him in his wheelchair
down past the 48 bus,
through the gas station
and up beneath the Jacarandas
to the park.

And the blooms still redolent with
dread and dreams
night after night
shapeless hordes
running gaining grasping
terror slashed away
with a shriek
at first light.

Through the sweat of childhood
the gracious purple of the
swaying Jacaranda trees.

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The Accordian


Two veined brown hands
under two chafed black straps,
hands drawing out and pressing in,
parchment stretching to the
sounds of an alien childhood,
in his eyes the smile of his grandfather
watching his grandmother dance,
her black dress billowing in the
dry veld wind and her laugh
snatched to the grasses sighing,
If the hands did not choose
to slip beneath those straps,
open wide the muscular old arms,
no power on earth could
roll out that sound.

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Bon Appétit

When this little room is tucked away into the evening
the window closed behind long
yellow-cotton curtains
I look through the door to the living room
- it's a small apartment -
where a deserted concrete building fills the window.
From that room I can see
the grey sky in the evening or
the blue sky in the morning.
But, right now,
grey light spreads its livery across IsraelPalestine
where the bombs fall
and the rockets rise
and a baby is killed in the crossfire.

So tell me, my hearties,
after the signal
after the rocket
after the bomb -
It isn't about Jews and Palestinians anymore, is it,
- not so long ago it wasn't about Bosnia and Sarajevo -
but hey,
who gives a shit, I am just
one of the people
who wait beneath the bomb or the rocket
who take the bus that will explode
who ride the taxi with a man marked by the IDF - that most moral army -
someone going home to a newborn
when the soldier fires,
when the café blows up.

Listen to me, look at me,
you who will never recognize me at the polls,
I see you
taking that call
giving that signal
making that plan
- before going home to dinner -
Why, you won't even know I'm gone
because you don't even know I'm here. Whatever.
And if I am unfair, well,
I guess you can always do something about it,
about the ineffable notion of peace.
In the meantime,
Bon Appétit.

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Copyrights remain with the authors

Poetre/Theatre

Glyn Maxwell’s The Only Girl in the World Opens on April 29 at Arcola Theatre

Read the interview of the Playwright

Glyn Maxwell

Arcola Theatre: 29 April – 24 May 2008


The Only Girl in the World – a verse play about the final victim of Jack the Ripper by award-winning British poet and playwright Glyn Maxwell – will be performed at the Arcola Theatre for four weeks only from 29th April. Maxwell’s next play Liberty! opens at Shakespeare’s Globe this summer, and his latest novel The Girl Who Was Going To Die has just been published to great acclaim.

The Only Girl in the World re-examines the last few days in the life of 25-year-old Irish immigrant Mary Jane Kelly, who was the final and youngest victim of Jack the Ripper. It focuses on her relationship with Joseph Barnett, her former lover who gave evidence at her inquest in 1888 and has been suspected of being Jack the Ripper.


Mary Kelly will be portrayed by rising young actress Jennifer Kidd, who was recently seen as Nerissa in The Merchant of Venice and as Mary Lovett in Holding Fire! for Shakespeare’s Globe and in The Changeling for Cheek by Jowl. She said today: “The beauty of Maxwell's play is to allow Mary Kelly to shine through as a real woman, with enormous charisma and strength but whose circumstances changed sufficiently to lead to her earning a living through prostitution around Miller's Court in Spitalfields by 1888.”

“Coming just after the conviction of Steve Wright for murdering five prostitutes in Ipswich and the controversy surrounding the London Dungeon’s plans to use former prostitutes to show visitors around its ‘Jack the Ripper’ exhibition, it seems particularly important to tell this story – and to remember that no woman is ever ‘just’ a prostitute.”

Joseph Barnett will be played by John Wark, whose credits include roles for the Almeida Theatre, Royal Shakespeare Company, Bristol Old Vic, and his recent critically acclaimed performance in the title role of Jamie the Saxt (Finborough Theatre).

The Only Girl in the World is directed by Alex Clifton, who has directed as an associate of the John Caird Company, worked as an assistant at the Royal National Theatre, as resident director at The English National Opera, ran The Jerwood Director's Forum and was Artistic Director of Pursued by a Bear Theatre Company, resident company of The Farnham Maltings Arts Centre.

It is produced by award-winning young Producer Chantelle Staynings, who was recently awarded the Stage One New Producer’s Bursary for the sell-out production of Nicholas de Jongh’s Plague over England at the Finborough Theatre. Her credits also include the current Jingo: A Farce of War at the Finborough Theatre (starring Susannah Harker) and the Scottish premiere of Sondheim’s Passion.

Arcola Theatre, 27 Arcola St, London, E8 2DJ
Box Office: 020 7503 1646 / www.arcolatheatre.com
Performances: Tuesday 29 April to Saturday 24 May 2008
Monday to Saturday evenings at 8.15pm
Running time: 1 hour 20 mins

Mary Kelly Jennifer Kidd
Joseph Barnett John Wark
Musician Andrew Mathys

Director Alex Clifton
Designer Paul Burgess
Lighting Designer Katharine Williams
Producer Chantelle Staynings

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Interview with Glyn Maxwell

Glyn Maxwell is one of our most exciting and acclaimed contemporary playwrights.  His plays include The Black Remote (Cottesloe, National Theatre Connections season); The Lifeblood (Riverside Studios, Edinburgh Festival 2004: British Theatre Guide ‘Best Play on the Fringe’); The Last Valentine (Almeida Theatre); Anyroad (Bridewell); Broken Journey (RSC Summer Festival, Young Vic Studio); and The Heart in Hiding (BAC).  His opera libretti include Ariadne (Almeida Opera/Aldeburgh Festivals) and The Birds (City of London Festival and UK Tour).  His awards include the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize, E. M. Forster Prize, Somerset Maugham Prize, and shortlisting for the T. S. Eliot Prize, Whitbread Poetry Prize (1992, 1995) and Whitbread First Novel Prize (1994).

On the eve of the opening of his verse play THE ONLY GIRL IN THE WORLD

A Play of Jack the Ripper at Arcola Theatre, 29 April – 24 May 2008 we talked to him in an e-interview.

The Only Girl in the World – a verse play about the final victim of Jack the Ripper by award-winning British poet and playwright Glyn Maxwell – will be performed at the Arcola Theatre for four weeks only from 29th April.  Maxwell’s next play Liberty! opens at Shakespeare’s Globe this summer, and his latest novel The Girl Who Was Going To Die has just been published to great acclaim.

The Only Girl in the World re-examines the last few days in the life of 25-year-old Irish immigrant Mary Jane Kelly, who was the final and youngest victim of Jack the Ripper. It focuses on her relationship with Joseph Barnett, her former lover who gave evidence at her inquest in 1888 and has been suspected of being Jack the Ripper. Mary Kelly will be portrayed by rising young actress Jennifer Kidd and Joseph Barnett will be played by John Wark. The play is directed by Alex Clifton and produced by Chantelle Staynings.

Arcola Theatre, 27 Arcola St, London, E8 2DJ
Box Office: 020 7503 1646 / www.arcolatheatre.com

Performances: Tuesday 29 April to Saturday 24 May 2008.

Monday to Saturday evenings at 8.15pm

Running time: 1 hour 20 mins    

Here is the interview of Glyn Maxwell. Good luck to The Only Girl in the World and its cast.

Poet’s Letter: These are exciting times for you as a writer since so many things are happening for you this year. Would you say this is what success is about a writer or playwright or a poet?

Glyn Maxwell: I think life is at its finest for any writer at solitary moments of revelation or achievement, that is, when the work is going well. The happiness of publication, or a show being well staged, or signing books for people - these are all pleasant enough but they're not exactly nourishing. If a writer's in it for that, s/he's in the wrong business really.

Poet’s Letter: What prompted you to decide to write a play about the girl at the knife’s end? The whole world was fascinated by the serial killer yet you took off the fascination-spotlight from the murderer and focused it on the girl? Why?

When we stop thinking, we let history glamourise events. The First World War is scarred with atrocities. The Titanic disaster is horrible. To me, 'Jack the Ripper' (whoever he was) is disgusting. His psyche is of course something we should examine, as we should be interested in anything at the extremes of behaviour, but I don't care who he was. It doesn't seem much of a mystery that he got away with it, either. It was dark; they were prostitutes; the police were inept. That savage in Ipswich would have got away with it in 1888, and we're not having him in the London Dungeon. But I'm interested in ordinary good people cast into extraordinary bad situations. I care about Joseph Barnett and Mary Kelly (or my versions of them grown from the historical record) because they loved each other, lived together, fought and made up, then finally broke up - and Joe is left with a lifetime of guilt that he could have saved her if he'd stayed with her. I'm interested in why he didn't, and in why she stayed where the danger was.

Poet’s Letter: What is it that you would like people to see in the girl?

In 2008 I shouldn't have to say that people forced by poverty to leave their homelands and sell sex in a filthy city remain beautiful and dignified human beings, but one look at the tabloids and I think I'll keep saying it. Mary Kelly came from Ireland, grew up in Wales, lost her husband in a mining accident, wandered to London, tried to make a go of it as a sort of West End escort, but drifted towards Whitechapel - of course a sinkhole for poverty and failure - and eventually shacked up with the naive and decent Joe Barnett, who can hardly believe his luck. In the play, Joe's relative prosperity (he has a steady job at Billingsgate) represents a chance of rescue for Mary, but it's fleeting. Joe tries to repress her spirit, own her, and we feel she's been running away from that sort of thing all her life. The harder he tries to love her, the further she slips away. She is haunted by a sense of a beautiful home in the past - a misty childhood memory of Ireland over the sea - there's a spiritual core to her which Joe can never understand. I think of all my plays this is the purest evocation of a male spirit and a female spirit - or even an English spirit and a Celtic spirit - reaching forlornly for each other. 

Poet’s Letter: Why do you think people ought to come and experience this play?

It's beautifully acted and directed. Clarity and mystery where they should be, balanced. It's going to be funny as well as frightening. It creates a coherent world. Both characters are likeable - even lovable - but they do stupid and selfish things like we all do. And it fits marvellously into the Arcola Studio, which is intimate but also has a darkness to it, you walk a path downwards to reach it. I love venues like that.  Why come and see it? It's a play about two lovers on the edge in London, and that's never historical.

Poet’s Letter: Why do you use this form of theatre as opposed to other conventional theatre?

It's simple - I write plays in verse because I'm a poet. I find the verse line I use in plays (which is a loose 5-beat line, quite conversational, you won't even know it's there!) answers to a rhythm in the heart, in the breath. I think it can play the sound of a moment passing better than prose can. I don't think it's any accident that plays in pentameter (to say the least, Shakespeare) usually manage to sound timeless, ahistorical, local. They are playing the sound of the human creature experiencing light or thought or pain. Also something about using a line, a somewhat regular line, allows the playwright's voice to disappear into other creatures with distinctive voices, and without this you don't have theatre. 

Poet’s Letter: What would you say to people with money as in funding bodies in terms of Verse plays and giving them enough support?

I don't really believe in verse drama as a separate genre. There are great, good, and bad plays. I try not to use the phrase in any promotional material - it's a killer, to be honest. And funding bodies should employ people who can hear whether what's written is true, that is, readers with a great ear. It shouldn't matter what it is, what its style is, what the numbers add up to.

Poet’s Letter: Why verse play is essential to reinvigorate the souls of the theatre going public?

What's essential is that people can afford to stage - and attend - plays that are strange or challenging or obscure or offensive - it doesn't matter in what form they're written. 

Poet’s Letter: What in your opinion are the most powerful elements of a verse play?

Well poetry is concentrated language, language escalated. If you bring those elements to theatre you can achieve a thrilling kind of richness. But a play still needs to function as drama, to have a structure that resembles life, or if not life, dream or music. Without a heartbeat stuff dies, in art as well as life.

Poet’s Letter: As a poet how do you see poetry’s status in today’s world?

Poetry is pretty indestructible really. But the world has lurched violently (and I mean violently) towards a consensus in favour of market value: that everything has its price. Our actual lives so utterly and unerringly disprove this proposition that it's shocking to see how totally it thinks it's won the game. Love, kindness, charity, music, jokes, good sex, great art all disprove it again and again in their manifold ways, and poetry is simply the quietest and most tenacious of these things that say 'Your value system is a lie'. Or, as Dostoevsky put it: 'the beauty will save the world'.

Poet’s Letter: How do you measure success as a poet?

In the end I don't, time does. But for now, I cast a critical eye and feel the poetry is getting stronger - which is nice, because I give a hundred times more attention to my theatre work!

Poet’s Letter: You are a multi-talented creative person, a playwright, a poet, a novelist and made great marks in the cultural landscape with your work. What drives you to be involved in so many different art forms?

I don't really know. I'm pretty restless, and I happen upon stories I want to tell, and sometimes I think a play would be right, or a long poem, or a novel - the story tells me how it thinks it should be told. But I'm in as a playwright for the long haul.

Poet’s Letter: As an artist how do you respond to society and where do you think your loyalty lie? Loyalty in terms of the market and your art?

I think an artist's loyalty is to his/her art alone, and if s/he says otherwise s/he's faking or not an artist. This isn't the same as saying 'art for art's sake' - which has led us up so many grim cul-de-sacs in the last hundred years - it's saying that whatever your art is - is what you cleave to. My art happens to be a relatively public art (in that my poetry is fairly accessible, and my plays tell stories) but that's my temperament and my choice - I don't think all art should be like that.

Poet’s Letter: This year is essentially a great year where does it lead you? Any other projects being hatched inside as you get to see your works reaching out to people.

There's always more. I'm adapting a Russian novel for the stage, working on two opera libretti (one on creation myths; one on dementia), adapting a play of mine to a screenplay, putting the finishing touches to my new poetry book - Hide Now, comes out in October from Picador!

Poet’s Letter: Do you think it is important that all forms of arts including theatre and poetry are taken into the soul of community and cultural regeneration as opposed looking at regeneration as a figure hunting economics or debate producing dry politics?

Art is in trouble when committees start thinking 'here's what we're looking for...now let's find what fits it!' There's been too much of this in British arts funding for too long. Our theatre - our little theatre, pub theatre, community theatre, fringe theatre - is an absolute jewel in what's left of the crown, and what are we doing? - pushing to come fourth at this bankrupting Olympics. 

Poet’s Letter:</sp