Biography

I was a secret poet for many years, with an even more secret background in performance. Then I discovered the terrific buzz of open-mic poetry! In November 2011 I attended Write Out Loud’s course for open-mic poets at Lumb Bank, tutored by Francesca Beard and Julian Jordan. What an inspiring and confidence-building week! A very springy springboard into the open mic experience. After a break for the first year of grandparenthood, I took the plunge again this year at Wicked Words in Leeds – a generous performance community, well-compèred by Brendan Mcpartlan. To my delight and surprise, I've been offered a supporting slot in a Wicked Words showcase event with Tony Walsh on 4 September 2013. It seems like a good time to compose this profile. I like to write about relationships and to use images from nature to represent them. I'm interested in poetry as therapy, in the way we define our emotions with language. All my life I've read poetry - I suppose it's all influenced me, but Donne, Manley Hopkins, R.S. Thomas, and among contemporaries, Jacob Polley, Andrew Waterhouse and Carola Luther come to mind.

Samples

African Beads Lacquered wood, fat and shiny, variably red, the largest, between my collarbones, two inches across. They bear the thumbprint of the maker, steadying, as he laid on tendrils of blue and gold with a fine brush. Spaced by thin wooden discs oiled to dull yellow, they join at the back with a big brass hook and eye. When they break, I rethread them on kitchen string. A man I do not know says, ‘You are wearing rose hips...’. They make me laugh. They make me bold. One day I will lose them on a train. When I get home I will empty my bag, over and over, turn out my pockets, my sleeves. I will ring lost property, consider going back. But who, having felt them warm on their skin, would hand them in? A string of wooden beads? They will stay vivid to my mind, and when I think of them my gut will twist as if someone has died.

All poems are copyright of the originating author. Permission must be obtained before using or performing others' poems.

Favourite Profiles

Ann Foxglove

Dave Morgan

Francesca Beard

Paul Booth