At the Fling I was impressed by Luke Kennard in the Wordsmith tent. Of course, the poems were stand-up, but they were not just facile and playing to the audience. His mini-lecture on the French poet, Francis Ponge, 1899-1988, was interesting, and inspired me to find out a bit more. A bit more about Ponge, (as well as Luke Kennard).
I came across an interesting blogger by Celia Eddy. Her blog re Ponge is at http://daybook-celeste.blogspot.com/2007/09/francis-ponge-1899-1988.html
if you are interested, click that link.
So I am now trying to compose a poem, a bastardised, uniformed, hommage a M. Ponge.
Monday, 19 July 2010
Sunday, 11 July 2010
Twice in one day
I have been rewriting my website intro.
It seems stupid and wordy (like me), but as I am talking to nobody but myself, does it matter?
Quite hard to get the right feeling for it. But I sincerely feel there should be something as definable and recognisable as Essex Poetry. I know we are not far enough away from London to be quaint and isolated in our writing. We need to have a philosophy and form a movement. We need a few like minds to join together, rather than work in isolation.
It seems stupid and wordy (like me), but as I am talking to nobody but myself, does it matter?
Quite hard to get the right feeling for it. But I sincerely feel there should be something as definable and recognisable as Essex Poetry. I know we are not far enough away from London to be quaint and isolated in our writing. We need to have a philosophy and form a movement. We need a few like minds to join together, rather than work in isolation.
The Fling
SO LONG SINCE I LAST BLOGGED - I really enjoyed The Fling at Chelmsford on Saturday 10 July. The Wordsmiths tent was of a high standard for stand-up poetry. I was the dummy who helped Nathan Penlington with his magic trick. Lucky I'm not the shy and retiring type.
Is it sad the poets have to churn out Pam Ayres/Hegley stuff to get laughs, just in order to get anyone ANYONE interested in poetry? Just to get any audience at all? Or is it just that we all like to have fun and write crazy stuff from time to time?
Just don't get pigeon-holed into cheap laughs. There's a lot of serious things to be attempted in poetry - in content, style and philosophy.
Also, it's so sad that I only have one follower, and she is worried about A level results and her uni future, so I don't suppose she now writes her own stuff still, or bothers to read my uninteresting musings. Boo hoo.
One of the reasons for not posting for a long time, is that I have such a full life. I love tekky things and computery stuff, but I've got a very full life outside poetry.
Is it sad the poets have to churn out Pam Ayres/Hegley stuff to get laughs, just in order to get anyone ANYONE interested in poetry? Just to get any audience at all? Or is it just that we all like to have fun and write crazy stuff from time to time?
Just don't get pigeon-holed into cheap laughs. There's a lot of serious things to be attempted in poetry - in content, style and philosophy.
Also, it's so sad that I only have one follower, and she is worried about A level results and her uni future, so I don't suppose she now writes her own stuff still, or bothers to read my uninteresting musings. Boo hoo.
One of the reasons for not posting for a long time, is that I have such a full life. I love tekky things and computery stuff, but I've got a very full life outside poetry.
Friday, 30 April 2010
Hissa Hilal - Her Latest Poem 7 April 2010
See my previous blog, also
(Translated from the Arabic)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8610237.stm
Mrs Hilal failed to win the top prize, see the link above.
(Translated from the Arabic)
My poems! When your critics seek flaws in you, they will be overwhelmed when they find none.
When you suffer from drought during a summer, I will pour meanings into you until your thirst is quenched.
Defeat fear and conquer every frightening cave.
Do not live life with one eye looking behind.
Any illusion that seeks to find a nest in you, make it fly.
Scare it away from your thoughts and ambitions.
Illuminate and realise your potential, and feel what God has given you.
The feeling of helplessness never helps the weak. If you step back, you will be gone.
For courage, there is a price. O, honest one.
When night and coward people renounce you,
When faint-hearted get scared even from the sound of the bullets,
When rumours increase around you, through genuine verses, you can kill any illusion.
You have come with thought exposing fodder-seekers.
You would think friends will praise you.
Your honesty is itself a slap in the face of all falsehood.
Those who are used to only compliments will be annoyed.
He will get jealous who wags his tail when he sees the bread.
When you prefer to stay hungry out of pride.
He who has no conscience hates you.
In his darkness he is immersed, he does not see your light.
What benefits the scum when standing in your way?
When every free voice remains supportive of you do not fear his snake hiss.
You have a waving wing; you will not be betrayed by your open skies.
Bring the good news to he who wants to be your ally.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8610237.stm
Mrs Hilal failed to win the top prize, see the link above.
Thursday, 29 April 2010
Hissa Hilal - our Islamic Sister
Have you heard of this poet - Hissa Hilal? If not, look at the following weblinks. Her latest poem is worth reading for its content, although it's not possible to appreciate the poetic rhythm and form.
http://suqalmal.blogspot.com/2010/04/hissa-hilal-last-poem-7-april-2010.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8587185.stm
She has been very successful in national poetry competitions in Saudi Arabia. She is the voice of ordinary men and women who are sick of living under the burden of conservativism and she writes critically about the country's hard-line Muslim clerics, calling them: "vicious in voice, barbaric, angry and blind". She has to conform for the sake of her husband and family, wearing the head to toe abaya black cloak. But she longs for the day when this misguided religiosity is a thing of the past for her daughters, if not for herself.
Like most people in the world, she is an ordinary level-headed, well-meaning individual, regardless of race or religion. How sad that ordinary people have live under rulers who are like petty warlords, and who may, in various parts of the world, be corrupt, or misguided, or fundamentalist, or evangelical or plain ignorant.
If we could do something about this, we think it would be great. But interference from outside is never welcome. And I am very skeptical about web campaigns, trying to influence a foreign country.
http://suqalmal.blogspot.com/2010/04/hissa-hilal-last-poem-7-april-2010.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8587185.stm
She has been very successful in national poetry competitions in Saudi Arabia. She is the voice of ordinary men and women who are sick of living under the burden of conservativism and she writes critically about the country's hard-line Muslim clerics, calling them: "vicious in voice, barbaric, angry and blind". She has to conform for the sake of her husband and family, wearing the head to toe abaya black cloak. But she longs for the day when this misguided religiosity is a thing of the past for her daughters, if not for herself.
Like most people in the world, she is an ordinary level-headed, well-meaning individual, regardless of race or religion. How sad that ordinary people have live under rulers who are like petty warlords, and who may, in various parts of the world, be corrupt, or misguided, or fundamentalist, or evangelical or plain ignorant.
If we could do something about this, we think it would be great. But interference from outside is never welcome. And I am very skeptical about web campaigns, trying to influence a foreign country.
Tuesday, 27 April 2010
Blair Peach - Police and Poetry
Today we heard that the police investigation into the death of Blair Peach, in 1979 in Southall, has been made public. And nobody is to be held responsible even though 31,000 police man hours were spent investigating it.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8646829.stm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blair_Peach
This is disgraceful. The murderer or murderers have successfully covered this up, and are probably now retired after 30+ years. They have got away with it.
I believe that 90% of police officers are decent people doing a difficult job. But in any profession or walk of life there is a small minority of rotten apples. They dirty things for everyone else. All police officers have been left with the stinking taint, even if individuals are honest and blameworthy. Rotten apples must be destroyed, because they will inevitably destroy all the rest.
We sometimes see that a tenacious police officer will track down a civilian murderer, often after many years, because he or she feels that justice must be done. The Met SPG police, from the highest to the lowest, have not ensured that justice is done.
My personal experience of the police has always been good. When I had a summer job in the local Crown Prosecution Service, a young DI sat next to me during a trial I was attending. He was a poet, and passed one of his poems to me during the proceedings. I often wonder if he continued to write.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8646829.stm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blair_Peach
This is disgraceful. The murderer or murderers have successfully covered this up, and are probably now retired after 30+ years. They have got away with it.
I believe that 90% of police officers are decent people doing a difficult job. But in any profession or walk of life there is a small minority of rotten apples. They dirty things for everyone else. All police officers have been left with the stinking taint, even if individuals are honest and blameworthy. Rotten apples must be destroyed, because they will inevitably destroy all the rest.
We sometimes see that a tenacious police officer will track down a civilian murderer, often after many years, because he or she feels that justice must be done. The Met SPG police, from the highest to the lowest, have not ensured that justice is done.
My personal experience of the police has always been good. When I had a summer job in the local Crown Prosecution Service, a young DI sat next to me during a trial I was attending. He was a poet, and passed one of his poems to me during the proceedings. I often wonder if he continued to write.
Sunday, 25 April 2010
Poetry - a Political Exercise?
Politics and poetry - in the past these concepts were regularly paired. But we hear much less of it today in the mainstream of known, published and widely recognised work, although there is a continuing tradition if you read poetry published in the Morning Star.
http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/index.php/news/content/view/full/72702
Of course, that verse is of a left-wing persuasion. One wonders if the right-wing has any poetic advocates who get published. I would be interested to hear from any reader of this where I can find such British Tory efforts.
I write political non-partisan poetry, as well as other genre. I like to register my opinion on current events, government decisions, and world problems. Some of these appear on my website, if you care to check.
Recently, I was given a book called "Well Versed", poems from the Morning Star, and I thoroughly enjoyed SOME of the items (well, we all have differing tastes). I was pleased to see a poem by Adrian Green, an Essex poet of my acquaintance, and I rather took to the work of Bernard Kops, which I found extremely accessible, nay charming also.
As a member of the Poetry Society, I was very recently emailed by a group who referred me to a blog on the subject of the upcoming British general election, plus a lot of other topics re war, human rights, global problems et al. I, (plus all the other Stanza organisers of the Poetry Society it seems), was asked to forward on the email to my contacts. Having read the blog, I decided not to pass it on, for the following reasons.
The blog was extremely confused and confusing. It turns out that it is a forum for discussion, with many people putting in their two-penn'orth. So that the result is rather like a shouting match at a political rally, with many hecklers.
I am always willing to listen to another point of view, but there were so many that this blog was, in my opinion, worthless. And my main objection was that someone with an opinion did not follow the rules of logic - rules which allow a case to be made out coherently. You know - the sort of thing they teach you at school when writing an essay, or doing an assignment at university - quite basic stuff, really. Heated ranting never won an argument, as anyone can testify.
Perhaps one memorable verse written by a poetic genius could do more to change world opinion, than an infinite number of blogs. "The Charge of the Light Brigade" was an attempt to put an heroic gloss on a gross military blunder - but it, and the work of World War II poets, such as Siegfried Sassoon, changed public opinion significantly. You can read war poetry still being written today - but it is too introspective and does not touch the real meat of the topic sufficiently.
http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/index.php/news/content/view/full/72702
Of course, that verse is of a left-wing persuasion. One wonders if the right-wing has any poetic advocates who get published. I would be interested to hear from any reader of this where I can find such British Tory efforts.
I write political non-partisan poetry, as well as other genre. I like to register my opinion on current events, government decisions, and world problems. Some of these appear on my website, if you care to check.
Recently, I was given a book called "Well Versed", poems from the Morning Star, and I thoroughly enjoyed SOME of the items (well, we all have differing tastes). I was pleased to see a poem by Adrian Green, an Essex poet of my acquaintance, and I rather took to the work of Bernard Kops, which I found extremely accessible, nay charming also.
As a member of the Poetry Society, I was very recently emailed by a group who referred me to a blog on the subject of the upcoming British general election, plus a lot of other topics re war, human rights, global problems et al. I, (plus all the other Stanza organisers of the Poetry Society it seems), was asked to forward on the email to my contacts. Having read the blog, I decided not to pass it on, for the following reasons.
The blog was extremely confused and confusing. It turns out that it is a forum for discussion, with many people putting in their two-penn'orth. So that the result is rather like a shouting match at a political rally, with many hecklers.
I am always willing to listen to another point of view, but there were so many that this blog was, in my opinion, worthless. And my main objection was that someone with an opinion did not follow the rules of logic - rules which allow a case to be made out coherently. You know - the sort of thing they teach you at school when writing an essay, or doing an assignment at university - quite basic stuff, really. Heated ranting never won an argument, as anyone can testify.
Perhaps one memorable verse written by a poetic genius could do more to change world opinion, than an infinite number of blogs. "The Charge of the Light Brigade" was an attempt to put an heroic gloss on a gross military blunder - but it, and the work of World War II poets, such as Siegfried Sassoon, changed public opinion significantly. You can read war poetry still being written today - but it is too introspective and does not touch the real meat of the topic sufficiently.
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