Ian McEwen

Biography

I am a poet writing in a range of styles from performance-led to page-based and limerick to avant-garde. I have an academic background in philosophy and a business background in finance. My poems have appeared in many magazines including Poetry Wales, Poetry Review, Smiths Knoll and Stand. My first collection, Intermittent beings, was published by Cinnamon Press in 2013. In 2010 my pamphlet The Stammering Man was published as one of the winners of the Templar competition. I was one of the seven 'runners up' in the National Poetry Competition 2011. In 2014 I've been placed third in the Cornwall Contemporary Poetry Competition, second at Strokestown and first at Ware! I am on the board of Magma Poetry and recently edited Magma 57 on visual elements in poetry. I have given readings at festivals and other venues. I am an experienced workshop leader for schools, community groups and developing poets. I organise Bedford's Ouse Muse poetry open mic evenings and our local events for National Poetry Day including a poetry trail and a 'takeover' of the central library. I'd love to hear about opportunities to lead workshops or to perform.

Samples

Cloud-ode-prayer This dizzy marshmallow expansion, stacked confection, so huge it feels like nothing in the middle, a few acid pricks, too thin to be sensation. O aerial vegetables hover above us: do not be forever wringing your hands boiling your heads cracking your knuckles O clouds. Sonnet beginning with a line from Frank O’Hara Quick! a last poem before I go. I’ll tell the one about the man, his dog and the boat they have to row across the lake. Watch his steady stroke plan out their track, tick after tick, the way those insects do, the ones we call ‘boatmen’: like them the little boat pays out a wake of twisted cord and all the time is scrolling further through the record of its path. The vinyl surface briefly holds a groove while the vibrations play at catch – the time will come when it goes still once more, black & flat. Quick! another and another and another one after that.

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