This is the newest draft of a poem I've covered in a couple of posts now: What I've done in this draft, you'll probably notice immediately, is pare down the entire expression into three stanzas, from the last draft's seven. The idea behind this draft was to restructure it behind a specific hospital, Seton. I... Continue Reading →
By the pond at Central Market
A woman, concealed by the wide brim of her hatscans the lines of the water where I've come to drink my coffeeand paw through my notebook, menacing me awayfrom any spot too near her eye-line or her. The turtles, sun-bathingthere's a touch of nature worth watching. But my bodyand the uniform it's dressed in do... Continue Reading →
Getting Sick
I haven't posted here in a long time. For a while now my online presence has been at Encyclopedia.zone, but to be honest I haven't been doing much work. What I've spent the most time working on was editing a collection of poets from the zone, including myself, at https://encyclopedia.zone/Poetry%20Update%20Page/title.html It's been a new experience... Continue Reading →
Editing “Church Going”
Today I'm going to draft the poem from a few updates ago, tentatively titled Church Going, after the Larkin poem. I thought it might interest somebody out there for me to talk through this editing process. There is a persistent lie we tell young writers, that poems are spontaneous and magical, and most of us... Continue Reading →
Church Going,
The dark night is a lie which floats around me a denial of the lamps and cars and houses, but true to my soul, which can no longer know what will could possibly light them my feet find ground as firm as ever, except the odd puddle from six days' drizzle and my lips press... Continue Reading →
A Tactics Ogre Metanarrative
After saving the world from my adoptive sister's dead father – who in traveling through the gates of hell was transformed into an evil ogre wizard – and placing her on the throne, where she rightfully belongs, putting an end to decades of war and creating a peace said to last 1000 years, I was... Continue Reading →
On Sylvia Plath and the lack of recent updates
Should I tell you what I know about Sylvia Plath's suicide? I watched her do it, but I couldn't say a word. It was always going to happen in 1963. She gave herself half a chance at another decade, but despite this I do believe she intended to die. She knew that she was due... Continue Reading →
Revisiting authenticity with Wilfred Owen
This week I've been reading the poetry of Wilfred Owen, and caught myself re-thinking what I've said about authenticity in poetry on this site. Owen was an englishman remembered as one of the greatest war poets of the first world war. The main body of his work was produced between 1917, when he was first... Continue Reading →
On Rebecca Watts’ poem Spiritus Mundi Reloaded
In my last update I mentioned that I had tried comparing Rupi Kaur to other poets and was unable to. That was an update I promised myself was going to focus on Rebecca Watts – my first draft was a comparison of the two, but I abandoned it. After finishing Rebecca Watts' The Met Office... Continue Reading →
The Great Rupi
In the age of Instagram, it's hard not to think of Jimmy Gatz. That young man doctored his entire life around the appearance of success because he thought it would give him a leg up towards actual success, towards his actual ambitions. As Gatsby he decided he had come from a rich family, attended the... Continue Reading →
Poking the Peevish Gutter 