I’m writing from my throne on the sofa, in the throes of a Poetry Wivenhoe hangover. On Thursday, I drove down to Wivenhoe, which was a six hour drive and arrived at my friend Chris Tanner’s house at about six. I met Chris on a fabulous writing course at Ty Newydd (www.tynewydd.org)
Ty Newydd is kind of like the welsh version of the Arvon writing courses – I think I’ve been on four courses now, and I’ve always enjoyed them – the first one was life changing in fact!
However, I met Chris on the third one-our tutors were Alan Jenkins and Fiona Sampson. A group of us went swimming in the sea – I nearly drowned because I was trying to swim in knee deep water because of my phobia of sea weed – didn’t want to put my foot down…anyway, that is beside the point!
So I turned up to Chris’s house – and his lovely wife Emma made an amazing beef stew – I had second helpings for perhaps the first time in my life, and then we made our way down to the Royal British Legion in Wivenhoe for the reading.
I read in Wivenhoe maybe a year and a half ago – before I won an Eric Gregory or had a pamphlet published, so it was lovely to come back and read there again.
The organisers were friendly, the local poet Tom Vaine was superb, and the standard of the open mic very high. I would definately recommend going along to a Poetry Wivenhoe event if you are ever down that way. They have a website which is http://poetrywivenhoe.org/
The reason I have a Wivenhoe hangover is because it was a bit of a marathon – a lovely, thought provoking reading after a six hour drive, then I decided to drive two hours to Leicester so I would have a head start when I set off for work the next day, and then getting up at 6a.m to get back to Barrow for my afternoon teaching – so it really felt like I was hungover, even though I obviously hadn’t drank.
I still feel pretty wiped out but I also had a lovely ‘poetry day’ yesterday – a poetry day is when nice poetry things happen to you – and they usually take place in threes. So here are my three –
1. I’ve had a review accepted in Acumen. The review is of Myra Schneider’s book ‘What Women Want’ and you can find one of her poems on an early Sunday poem on this blog. Having a review accepted feels just as good as having a poem accepted – and I find reviews much more ‘personal’ than my poems. I see the poem as a piece of art, which though it can be related to my life is still seperate to me. A review however, is my opinion – much more personal
2. My certificate arrived for my MA. It feels great to have the certificate – this signals the close of one part of my life, which I enjoyed immensely. I can believe that its real now – I have an MA with Distinction.
3. This is a cheat because this is two nice things rolled into one. There is a lovely review of my pamphlet on a very interesting poetry blog by Clarissa Aykroyd: http://thestoneandthestar.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/kim-moores-rabbit-and-moon-revisiting.html
Other news – I sold ten pamphlets at Wivenhoe bringing the grand total up to 188.
Tomorrow there will be a poem by Carola Luther, Grasmere’s Poet in Residence. Tomorrow I will also be planning my workshop for National Poetry Day (not done it yet)
We now have only one place left on the workshop – and I’m really hoping that some local folk from Grange Over Sands come and support our evening reading and open mic.
Really enjoyed your poetry at Wivenhoe. I particularly like your poems about your family. I find that i seem to write about events from the past and then see more clearly how my thinking has been influenced. I expect this retrospective thinking is due to my mature years. Both Peter(my husband) and I read at Open Mic. His thoughtful poem was about throwing away his rugby boots and the memories that were evoked. Mine was the short one at the end of Open Mic about the scar on my palm that was proof that I was pretending to swim at four when really my hand was on the river bed and a shard of glass. Love your chatty Sunday summaries …a bit like a log book
Margie North