Voices for the Silent – Broken Sleep Books, Channel Magazine, Indigo Dreams

The natural world has found champions in three recent publications. I’m proud to have poems in each of them.

Now on its 7th issue, Dublin-based Channel offers short fiction, poems, translations and essays which encourage reflection on human interaction with plant and animal life, landscape and the self. To buy, submit or watch the launch video, visit: www.channelmag.org

Broken Sleep Books produced Footprints last year containing ecopoetry from more than 90 poets, including Carrie Etter, Kathryn Bevis, Lisa Kelly, Martyn Crucefix, Michelle Penn, Penelope Shuttle and Suzannah Evans. Anthology co-editor, Charlie Baylis, has also launched Anthropocene as an on-line journal for environmental poetry. In the foreword, Aaron Kent reminds us that it’s “time to act, time to stand up.” A tree will be planted for each copy bought: www.brokensleepbooks.com

Any publication with a fox on its cover, gets my vote! Indigo Dreams has a close association with the League Against Cruel Sports, which will benefit from profits from the sale of this anthology. To buy a copy visit: www.indigodreamspublishing.com To find out more about the League, go to: www.league.org.uk

Inside the covers you’ll find work by Margaret Atwood, John Clare, Thomas Hardy, Philip Larkin, Pablo Neruda and William Blake, as well as many contemporary poets.

My new pamphlet is born!

The Bone That Sang has been safely delivered by Indigo Dreams Publishing and is now available to dandle on laps and laptops. It follows my debut poetry pamphlet Later There Will Be Postcards, now a feisty toddler at Green Bottle Press.

You can read five of the poems from The Bone That Sang at your leisure at the link below, and press the ‘BUY’ button if you’re feeling flush!

https://www.indigodreams.co.uk/claire-booker/4595059690

The new pamphlet is packed with 29 pages of poetry. Some of the poems first appeared in The Spectator, Poetry News, Structo, The New Welsh Reader, The Interpreter’s House, Stand, Prole, Poetry Salzburg Review, The High Window, The Frogmore Papers, Ambit, South Bank Poetry and Magma.

The Bone That Sang explores what it means to be human in an imperfect world. A refugee sprints for his life; an at-risk child craves a baby; a one-night stand goes hilariously wrong; a beloved mother-in-law makes a final spiritual journey. Narrative often drives my inspiration, but you’ll also find poems here that stand outside the moment.

“Claire Booker’s second collection of poems has an indefatigable spirit. Even as they explore man’s incredible capacity for cruelty, they reveal a tender humanity and have an unflagging energy. The political nature of many of these poems refuses to let the reader off the hook, but Booker’s fine sense of tone and craft means we’re happy to be left wriggling.” Lisa Kelly.