Thoughts of a Soo

 This box of 50 arrived...   This guy congratulated the achievement... Orders were posted And I readied to send out more...

There is no space to have large a large canvas or two hanging around just in case I feel like painting so it was lovely this week when I was asked to create a painting to brighten up an office. Efficient delivery service saw the canvas arrive within 3 days of ordering and my paints could be unboxed and put to good use.

Green! A promising apple harvest develops in the backgarden and there was an invigorating walk in a forest. These things make me grateful.

I got a superb boost to my writing this Summer thanks to the Arvon Course with Caroline Bird and Richard Scott which means that more of my poems are like this:   I absolutely loved making first drafts that had me excited and eager to revisit them. 'Dropping Your Baby' was described by my sister as 'dark' which of course I love and 'Silence' a poem written during the Arvon course was given a home by One Hand Clapping on 11/09/2020.

My favourite part of photographing the creations of Kath Andrews is flying the shawls... 'Beth March' Shawl August 2020 'Angel of the North' June 2021   'Into the Vortex' (small) September 2021 'Into the Vortex' (large) September 2021

I have recently emerged form the newly designed Queer Poetry Arvon course and find myself amazed by the energy and adrenaline that has been through my body and the amount of words I have been able to set down. To have been able to focus so deeply on my work in the company of excellent tutors and like-minded writers has been incredible and feels like a gift. Lockdown has opened doors for me that I am so glad I walked through. I am developing my voice and learning to push harder and go further thanks to this immersion.

There was a definite theme of glasses this June. Glasses with words. Glasses received with gratitude and happy tears.

'Flamingo' was awarded second place in the 2020 Cheltenham Poetry Festival..."There was nothing tame in the hundreds of entries in Cheltenham Poetry Festival’s Wild Poems competition. Judges Ben Ray and Anna Saunders worked extremely hard to develop a longlist of 14 excellent poems, each of their authors vying for the prestige and value of a prize." This is what Ben Ray had to say about the poem: "This poem is so warm, so immediately loveable and welcoming– it almost flows off the page when read. Imagery and colour is used intelligently and carefully here, employed at just the right moments across the piece – as a reader you can feel the pinkness and sensation of feathers seeping through the words! The narrative poem format can often be heavy, but is used with such expert lightness of touch here, with a strong fairy-tale element giving the structure a deeper resonance that questions initial interpretations. The storytelling is deliciously dark, with a

Loved the fact that there was a display at StAnza 2020 to celebrate the HapWrap. Grateful to Helena Nelson at HappenStance Press for tweeting in the lead up to the exhibition and then sharing a photo of the displayed wrappers. It was fun to read those shared along the way and I enjoyed writing my two. I think I just might capture more in the future when I am unwrapping food items in a poetic mood.

Loved seeing that my poem received the following comment: I love this poem. It feels so authentic as I read it and brings a smile to my face as well. I love the line 'I couldn't tell if we were yet halfway to our halfway.' This is a poem that I can empathise with. I really enjoyed it. Grateful to Dr Charley Barnes for selecting it for Dear Reader

This poem found its home in issue 73 of The Interpeter's House

THREE LIES AND ONE TRUTH ABOUT A BANANA after Henry Normal It’s a telephone and someone is ringing for you. It’s a smile. It’s a sad mouth. I do not love bananas, but I do love you. I have included this poem here in case anyone wishes to borrow it for someone they love. I enjoyed writing it for National Poetry Day 2019. The theme was Truth and I wrote it in response to a poem by Henry Normal that was shared in the resource section on the National Poetry Day website. You can find Henry Normal's poem, Three Lies and One Truth about the Moon, by clicking here.

 Sunset, 1st January 2020 'Diamonds in the Breeze' shawl flying on 12th January 2020 Sunrise, 31st January 2020