December 2015 Catch Up

It's been a great six months - passing my driving test means I can now attend meetings of the Fire River Poets! I can't wait to get back in the swing of discussing and workshopping poems.

I've spent the last four weeks in Hawthornden Castle near Edinburgh, where I was a fellow with four other writers. We had snow, and I even managed to spot the deer twice. Ruth Shannon provided the cooking, Hamish Robinson ran an excellent table.



Thanks for the snap, Anke!

I left Somerset with several foot-deep piles of paper, and returned with five thin wallets.

Before that, I was in Greece for a couple of weeks, exploring some sites from the Iliad, and the Mani region. Again, I also enjoyed some great cooking, and swimming, with poet Margaret Eddershaw and Keith Sturgess, who so kindly put us up.



Mistras, near Sparta

Do check out No Landing, the blog of Harry Man and Jennifer Essex's exploration of 
Hurst Castle. I was lucky enough to be stationed there a couple of days, and whipped up a couple of poems. 

I've a couple of placings to mention: 

‘Respite’ was shortlisted for the Live Canon competition, and appears in the 2015 Live Canon Anthology.

‘Putting Away the Birds’ was commended in the Torbay poetry competition. 

Earlier in the year, ‘The Sitting’ was highly commended in the Gladstones Library Mystery Lady competition.

And some publications: 

'After Peter Blake' appears in the beautifully produced Paris Lit Up, 'Classroom' in The North and my translation of 'A Grave Life' - by Ami - in Modern Poetry in Translation. ‘New Year’ appears in Live Canon's New Poems for Christmas.

I was also really pleased to have a poem in Other Countries - Contemporary Poets Rewiring History, edited by Claire Trevien and Gareth Prior, earlier in the year.

For those who can afford £47.99, I’ve 3 poems in the Teaching as a Human Experience anthology from Cambridge Scholars Publishing.