Biography

Carolyn O’Connell lived in London but has now moved to Hartford, Northwich , Cheshire and is now a member of Blaze Mid-Cheshire Stanza, The Vale Royal Writers Group and is Member of the Second Light network. She started to write poetry after working in the Civil Service and the R.N.I.B. She is a member of the Ormond Poetry Group. She is also a member of her local W.I. and has read for them. Her work has been published in The Interpreter’s House, Brando’s Hat, Envoi, and Airings, and online. In 2009 in the Genius Floored series of anthologies arising from Ruth O’Callaghan’s Camden and Lumen readings, also visiting Loose Muse, Poetry Meetup at The Tea Box Richmond . She was a prizewinner in the St. Thomas Aquinas Justice & Peace Poetry Competition, 2011. It has also been featured on Poetry Space, Stare’s Nest and I am Not a Silent Poet and other online magazines. Carolyn’s poems were featured in National Poetry Day booklets published by John Powls for the National Probation Service in 2001 and 2003 and she has work accepted for Poems in the Waiting Room. Her poem Night Ride was Highly Commended in the Poetry Space Competition 2012, judged by Cheryl Moskowitz, and is published in Words That Signify (ISBN 978-909404-01-4), a collection of poems selected from those submitted to the competition and edited by Susan Jane Sims. Black Star was listed in the 2014 Competition and several published in the ‘Photo & Poetry Challenge’. Erosion was included in Paragram Remember Anthology 2014. Poems have also appeared in Reach, I am Not a Silent Poet, Writers for Calais Refugees, Stare's Nest & Poetry Space She works with Richmond and Cheshire West Libraries to promote poetry and has lead workshops, hosted at The Tea Box in Richmond and been a Guest Read at Rhythm & Muse. Having worked on the poetry pRO project her poems have been translated into Romanian and broadcast on Romania radio via the Translation Café of the University of Bucharest. Her work has been published in America where she has collaborated with the author/poet Paul Morabito in the production of Mirrored Voices: Emerging Poets Anthology (ISBN13: 978-1-5077107-1-5) published by Star Investment Strategies LLC which seeks to promote unrecognised poets from accros the world. The first edition was published in January 2015 and is available both as print and e-book. Her first collection, Timelines, is published by Indigo Dreams (2014, ISBN 978-1-9093575-3-2) and is also available at Ham House National Trust Bookshop & Waterstones.com

Samples

52:25 -2 Turbulence Windows open heat seeps in stretchy trying to sleep deep within darkness far off guns boom who are they when will they come? The chill of battle fills my soul shall I stay, can I go but this is not war but the peace of night what I hear is an aircraft's flight? Far away the last plane’s gone to land in China but noise goes on as the city sleeps repairs repeat cleaners sweep, stranded carp, twenty miles away I weep waiting sleep. Carolyn O'Connell June 2014 Published Poetry Space Autumn showcase 2014 ©   AND ALL AT ONCE I SAW A CROWD Daylight breaks the lamps turn off busses, cars, trains spiral into the hub of the town; spewing hordes erupt in human floes from underground into the beating heart of commerce. Attached to every hand and ear a phone, texts, calls keeping everyone engaged smart phones emailing from everyone and incessant video, photos uploaded. The view is limited by the city structures rising in hosts of spires, erupting fingers scraping the blue from the waking sky. No ways to see accuracy, to look at length, absorb the essence of the moment find what lies behind the patent in the rush to be connected, confined. Charmed by constant connection even the stray sign wings its way to iPhone assuming the status of an ancient icon but yet all ways of seeing are confined to the macro aperture of the viewfinder, the bigger picture and the moment past. The freedom of now has flown swallow-like into a past when time offered space to see beyond the crowd of bent heads blowing in the ethereal breeze. Carolyn O’Connell from Timelines Published Reach Poetry 198 ©

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