Under The Radar – guest edited by Tom Sastry

Perhaps it was in the stars, perhaps it was the guest editor, but after a five year gap, I have a poem in Under The Radar again. It’s a lovely magazine, beautifully spacious, with creamy white pages of up to 35 lines, offering cutting edge poetry and fiction three times a year. It’s published by Nine Arches Press and edited by Jane Commane and Matt Merritt.

Guest editor, Tom Sastry, refreshingly admits to having been “continually disappointed by the lack of mediocrity in the submissions.” What a tormenting joy an editor’s life is! Poets in this issue include Claire Booker, Josephine Corcoran, Louise Crosby, Abigail Flint, Caroline Hammond, Penny Hope, Ed Limb, Bryony Littlefair, Ewan Mackinnon, Elizabeth McGeown, Sophie Meehan, Alexandra Melville, Hilary Menos, Peter Sansom, Kate Scott, Hilary Watson, Julia Webb and Cathy Whittaker.

As well as a rich haul of poems, there are also two strong pieces of fiction by Cheryl Moskowitz and Jane Pearn, plus reviews of collections by, among others, Naush Sabah, Hannah Lowe, Raymond Antrobus, John McCullough and Jane Wong.

There’s also a mini showcase for the up-coming Nine Arches Press anthology, After Sylvia. The book celebrates Plath’s 90th anniversary with new poems and essays inspired by her life, work and legacy. If the three poems (by Rosie Garland, Caleb Parkin, and Merrie Joy Williams) are anything to go by, this anthology will be high on my to-buy list.

If you’d like to buy a copy of issue 29 or take out a subscription to Under The Radar, please click on the following link: Poems, reviews, short fiction in Under the Radar Their current submissions window for poetry is open until December 7th, and for short fiction until January 7th. The theme is ‘journeys’.

And for my final word, I’ll take a mathematical turn with a short Fibonacci poem I had published recently on The Fib Review (issue 43): You can read it here: https://www.musepiepress.com/fibreview/claire_booker1.html

The Fibonacci poem is a poetry form based on the structure of the Fibonacci number sequence; a mathematical sequence in which every figure is the sum of the two preceding it. Thus, you begin with 1 and the sequence follows as such: 1+1=2; then in turn 1+2=3; then 2+3=5; then 3+5=8 and so on. The poetry sequence therefore consists of lines of 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, and so on with each number representing the number of syllables or words that a writer places in each line of the poem. Tempted to write one? Go on, you know you want to!

Prole and Caduceus – offering accessible poetry

When it comes to clear, compelling, enjoyable poetry, Prole is up there with the best. They’ve been kind enough to take another of my poems for issue 33, alongside succulent work by Bob Beagrie, Sharon Black, Matt Broomfield, Pat Edwards, Matthew Friday, John Grice, Kevin Hanson, Robin Houghton, Sue Kindon, Wendy Klein, Richie McCaffery, Emma Pursehouse, Nikki Robson, Joel Scarfe, Sue Spiers, and Gareth Writer-Davies.

With its trade-mark black and white covers and familiar layout (short stories first, followed by all the poems), Prole is a trusted companion, still able to surprise (in a nice way!). So thank you to co-editors Brett Evans and Phil Robertson who have been ploughing this happy furrow since 2010. As well as the magazine, they also manage to squeeze in several writing competitions each year, and publish pamphlets too.

I enjoy the World by Sparx which always livens the final pages of Prole. But who is Sparx? I wish I knew. Answers on a postcard please.

If you’d like to submit a poem or short story to the next issue of Prole, find out about future competitions, subscribe or buy a copy of issue 33, please click on the following link: www.prolebooks.co.uk

“Our anatomy is a common trope for poets, as is the deep connection between people and plants,” writes Dawn Gorman in the latest issue of Caduceus. As a medical herbalist, I’ve always been interested in different ways of looking at health, so it’s a pleasure to have a poem selected for publication by Dawn, alongside some lovely work by Anne Adriaens, Claire Coleman, Maggie Harris, Rosie Jackson and Susan Utting.

Dawn is a creative writing tutor and mentor, broadcaster and prize-winning poet. Follow her on Facebook to find out when her next call for poems will be (and to check out her radio programme on West Wilts Radio).

Finished Creatures rises to the surface

Issue 5 of Jan Heritage’s lovingly produced Finished Creatures, includes the work of 60 poets, each offering a different interpretation on the theme of ‘surface’. I was delighted to read my contribution at the magazine’s Zoom launch this month, along side stablemates Clare Best, Carole Bromley, Susannah Hart, Cheryl Moskowitz, Paul Stephenson and many others.

The full roll call includes Dean Atta, Judy Brown, Matt Bryden, Oliver Comins, Claire Dyer, Charlotte Gann, Maria Isakova Bennett, Karen Izod, Maria Jastrzebska, Tess Jolly, Lisa Kelly, Jane Lovell, Antony Mair, Jenny Mitchell, Fiona Moore, Jeremy Page, Penelope Shuttle, Richard Skinner and Helen Tookey.

“The theme of Surface invited so many beautiful and intelligent responses: new landscapes, delicate textures and intricate stories of concealment and exposure,” writes editor, Jan Heritage, in her foreword. “This selection of poems asks the reader to move from one environment to another and to continually readjust the focus as we stand by icy foreshores and frozen lakes, or on the crust of the Earth with its ancient fractures and secrets: as we climb mountains and fells, or look out to sea ‘keeping watch for the future.’

“Our eye is drawn from infinite horizons to the miniscule detail of fungi, moss, mulch and skin. We are weathered, windswept and often drenched as the climate and seasons change; sometimes we are invited to curl up and hide.

“These are poems that ask us to get soaked and muddy; to dive below the surface of rivers, oceans and dreams; to excavate for lost people or to hear the hearbeat of the not yet born. We are asked to look closely, to look again and, as Lisa (Kelly) says, ‘Consider’.”

To buy a copy of Finished Creatures (issue 5) or to subscribe to the biannual magazine, please visit: www.finishedcreatures.co.uk The next submissions window will open early in the new year, with a new theme, so keep your eye on the website for news.

Solstice Shorts Festival lights up the Darkest Day

Arachne Press pulled off a seven-venue, four-nation, simultaneous festival of stories and poetry on the theme of Time & Tide last week, including two of my poems (seen here being performed in Hasting’s Fisherman’s museum).

This is the sixth Solstice Shorts Festival to light up the darkest day of the year. Festival Director, Cherry Potts put out a call for stories set on, or beside, the sea or tidal rivers, with a historical flavour. Sailing under the title of Time & Tide (named for the Suffragette’s newspaper), Cherry was keen for this year’s festival to include pieces with a strong female voice.

My poem ‘The Fisherman’s Daughter’ is inspired by Brighton’s fishing heritage, and was performed in Lisbon (Portugal), Maryport, Hastings, Greenwich (England) and Clydeside (Scotland). My second poem about ‘mail order’ brides for British soldiers on a remote Atlantic island, was performed at Peterhead, Clydeside, Lisbon, Maryport and Greenwich. Neither poem made it to the Welsh event in Holyhead, but three countries out of four is a good innings!

In the slick, darkly covered anthology Time & Tide, you can find every story and poem performed at each of the venues of this year’s Festival – wonderful pieces to stir the blood on long, dark nights, including tales of diaspora, refugees, sex in beach huts, cockle women, Crosby Beach, Noah’s wife, the wisdom of halibut, and much, much more.

There was live-streaming from each venue, and you can watch some of these films on Facebook. Facebook Solstice Shorts page It’s fascinating to see how different actors bring their own take to the exact same poem or story.

I managed to make it to the Hastings gig, which was held in the enthralling (if slightly chilly) Fisherman’s Museum – a beautiful old church where men would worship before facing the dangers at sea. We were plied with mulled wine and mince pies by the volunteers who run this gem of a museum, and the turn-out (on a rain-battered day) was hearteningly good, with standing room only (well, two of us had to sit on a box!). The actors gave forth from a lectern on the deck of a fishing boat in what proved to be the perfect setting, both acoustically and thematically.

Thank you to Joan Taylor-Rowan for organising the Hastings leg of the Festival, to Simta Ali for filming it, and to Kate Dyson, Rebekah Wilkinson, Jared Stoughton, Patrick Keiley and Umi Sinha for their pitch-perfect performances. A big thank you also to Cherry Potts for keeping a steady hand on the tiller of this extraordinary Festival, and to all the crowd-funders and The Arts Council for financing it.

You can see the entire Hastings at: Time & Tide Hastings

To buy a copy of the Anthology (Time & Tide), or to discover more about any of the Solstice Shorts Festivals, or the many other activities at Arachne Press, please visit:  Arachne Press

High Window, Ekphrastic Review and Celebrating Change – why publish on-line?

A recent flurry of my poems being carried by The High Window (issue 15), The Ekphrastic Review (August 2019) and Celebrating Change (September 2019) has made me ponder the pros and cons of online publishing.

You write a poem, you re-write a poem, you workshop it, you work on it again, eventually you submit, sometimes it’s accepted for publication. So far, so normal. Appearing in a magazine or anthology enables us to share our craft, our vision, our voice.  Being published doffs its cap to posterity.

So what can online publication offer that printed books and magazines can’t?  Well, for a start, online magazines are usually free to read. This, together with the fact that content can be shared more easily via social media, means you potentially reach more readers. There can be greater immediacy too when you by-pass the laborious processes of printing and posting out. This is particularly relevant for political poems. Online is so handy for journeys – no more lugging heavy books around. Stuck in a jam? Pull out your mobile and get reading. Online magazines allow you to search for individual poet’s work, often across many issues. At magazines like The Ekphrastic Review, you also get to see the painting or artwork that inspired the poem – a delight that books can usually only dream of. Online creative collaborations such as Celebrating Change can use film, music, written word or spoken word in ways that printed form simply can’t deliver. Not least of all, online poetry saves trees!

For many writers (and readers) however, the printed book or magazine simply can’t be beaten. There’s something about the quietness of paper that conduces to contemplation and absorption. Bad habits of dipping and diving on-screen can be left behind and poems given the space (literal and metaphorical) they deserve. Many online magazines can’t take unusual formats because line breaks get easily mangled. Goodbye concrete poetry!  In terms of longevity, a book can be retrieved from your shelves and re-read in years to come, whereas online work tends to plunge into oblivion remarkably quickly (unless it’s a bad review or embarrassing photo!)

There are no right or wrongs, of course. Clearly, online and print both have a place in our reading lives. It’s fun to embrace them both. As far as I’m concerned, thank you for taking my work, and vive la difference!

The Ekphrastic Review, edited in Canada by Lorette C Luzajic, publishes poems on a daily basis and accepts reprints: “We’re an online journal devoted entirely to writing inspired by visual art. Our objective is to promote ekphrastic writing, promote art appreciation, and experience how the two strengthen each other and bring enrichment to every facet of life. We want to inspire more ekphrastic writing and promote the best in ekphrasis far and wide.” Check it out here at: The Ekphrastic Review

The High Window is published quarterly by David Cooke and includes reviews, guest poets, poems in translation, occasional articles, and new poems by established and up and coming poets. He has recently started releasing it in instalments to allow for less pressured reading. By clicking names on the contributors’ list, you get taken straight to that person’s poems. Poets in the autumn 2019 issue include Claire Booker, Rebecca Gethin, Rosie Jackson, Maitreyabandhu, Angela Topping and Gareth Writer Davis. The High Window (issue 15)

Celebrating Change is an ACE funded story-telling project based in Middlesbrough led by Laura Degnan and Kirsten Luckins, which combines film, poetry and writing workshops around social change. It releases a poem every ten days, and accepts reprints. Guest editors have included Amy Kinsman and Jess Green.  Some of the poets published so far are Claire Booker, Rachel Burns, Sarah L Dixon, Catherine Fulkner, Moira Garland, Ye Min and Marka Rifat. Check it out here at: Celebrating Change

 

Prole issue 20 is out and proud!

Winner of Best Magazine at The Saboteur Awards in the year that Wales magicked itself into footballing history, Prole has a lot to be proud about. 

Issue 20 of the Welsh-based lit mag is packed to the rafters with short stories and poetry from the Anglophone world. Poets published in time for autumn include Claire Booker, Matt Duggan, Mab Jones, Joanne Key,  Lisa Kelly, Tess Kincaid, Sue Pace and Jonny Rodgers.

To lift a quote from one of the many Saboteur Award voters: “Prole takes risks, is innovative and don’t take no bullshit from no-one.”  Yes indeed, Prole editors Brett Evans and Phil Robertson accept only clear-sighted work that isn’t dressed up in literary pretention.

One of the highlights for me in this issue is Bill Schillaci’s story The Artist Between Lives which had me hooked from the beginning with its ironic take on sessions with a psychotherapist. Also, Maureen Cullen’s Ring of Fire with its great observations and Glaswegian verbal dexterity. Poems that stand out for me include Tess Kincaid’s surreal poem Totem and Lisa Kelly’s Angelica’s Apology. There’s a guilt-inducing little gem from Robert de Born about slug extermination too. And a cartoon by Sparx rounds off the issue

If you’re a prose writer, there’s still time to enter the 2016 Prolitzer Prize which closes for entries on October 1st. Word limit is 2,500. For more details of the competition, or to submit poetry and/or prose to Prole, or buy a copy of issue 20, please click on: www.prolebooks.co.uk

Structo interviews North Korea’s ex poet laureate

Can poetry truly exist in a totalitarian state?  Structo (issue 15) unearths some painful answers in its interview with Jang Jin-sung, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea’s ex poet laureate.

Jang was once employed by Section 5 (Literature), Division 19 (Poetry) of Office 101 of the United Front Department (jeepers  – room 101!) where, as a privleged member of the elite, he was allowed access to Byron’s poetry. It had a profound effect on him.

Now living in South Korea, Jang explains how culture in the DPRK was (and still is) a matter of state politics. “Even on gravestones you cannot write what you want, because when over three people are able to read it, it is considered propaganda and is therefore subject to censorship. No private or individual literature can be written. No artists are free to be creative.”

Structo contributors and editors

More fortunate poets making a mark in Structo’s 15th issue include Daniel Bennett, Claire Booker, Marianne Daniels, Claire Dyer, Siobhan Harvey, Michael Metivier, Timothy Otte, Maria Ferencuhova (translated from Slovak by Juana Adcock) and the eternal Sapho (translated by Kate Wise).

The launch drew contributors from all corners of the UK and was a convivial affair in Oxford’s Albion Beatnik Books, with chat, tea and fabulous chocolate cake.  Holding up the side for poetry were Claire Dyer and myself, both reading some of our work published in this issue. I was particularly moved by Picture This  – Claire’s paean to maternal love (and loss). 

Structo without short fiction would be – well, something else altogether. We were treated to some eye-watering originality from Jude Cook, Stephen Hargadon, Paula Hunter, Dan Micklethwaite and Barbara Rennel who performed their short stories with gusto.

A highlight for me was Stephen Durkan’s one-man blitz of a story ‘A Day in the Life of a Modern Man’. His first published piece, apparently. Bravo Structo for spotting a winning new talent!

Never judge a book by its cover, so the saying goes. But it turns out a good cover is: “a distillation, a haiku, if you will, of the story.” Structo’s interview with leading book cover designers Jennifer Carrow, Daniel Benneworth-Gray and Oliver Munday left me with a much clearer idea of what makes me stop, browse and buy. Think about it next time you make a purchase.

Talking of which, to buy a hard copy of Structo (issue 15) or to submit your work to the magazine, please visit:  www.structomagazine.co.uk   Twitter or Facebook  To download a free copy of Structo (issue 15) click on:  https://issuu.com/structo/docs/structo15

New drama grid-lock at The Pleasance

If you’re a director, actor or playwright, Director’s Cut Theatre Company are on the look out for new blood (see below for latest call).

They’re utterly professional, command healthy audiences and are a pleasure to work with, as I discovered when my 10 minute play, Pig in a Blanket, was performed at The Pleasance Theatre, Islington, earlier this year.  It was part of a showcase of nine new plays – No U-Turn! – based around the theme of people trapped in traffic. Ironic, as it turns out, because on performance night, north London was plunged into havoc by engineering works and a defunct Picadilly Line. Despite this, more than a hundred people managed to get through to see the show.

Artistic Director (Heather Ward) and Dramaturg (Jessica Mayne) selected plays by Claire Booker, Mitch Day, Clare Knights, Callum McGowan, Michael Pearcy, Nikki Racklin, Julian Ross Davison, Julian Warren and James Withey from nearly 200 submitted to a very specific brief.  We had to create up to four characters stuck in traffic, unable to leave their cars, with a specific place they were heading to. At the end of each play, the traffic had to move on, yet we weren’t allowed to reveal what had caused the jam.

A total of 16 actors and 9 directors set to work turning our words into theatre, including specially created choreography to link each of the nine plays. A big thank you to Rosie Ward and Lauren Orrock for their finely crafted performances as ‘Rat’ and Ellie (animal rights activists with a nasty secret in the boot) in Pig in a Blanket. I had great fun at the first rehearsal watching them go through improvisation exercises with co-directors Kieran Rogers and Peter Gould, including revisiting Rat and Ellie’s childhood haunts and a pretty hard-nosed police interrogation. 

The next showcase Drafts is coming up on 29th May at Southwark Playhouse for which writers’ submissions have just opened. They’ll be casting next month.

For more details about Drafts or The Director’s Cut Theatre, including future writing, directing or acting opportunities, please contact Heather Ward (Artistic Director and Producer) at: www.directorscuttheatre.co.uk

Salzburg’s Hills are Alive with Poems

Salzburg is the land of Mozart, castles, the von Trapps, whipped cream . . . and English poetry? Yes, the hills are alive with the work of 53 poets in the latest issue of Poetry Salzburg Review. 

A little left-field perhaps, but the literary magazine set up by the University of Salzburg’s Department of English and American Studies has an 11 year record of publishing original poetry in English. So I’m thrilled to have five of my poems included in their latest issue (No. 28).

The magazine comes out twice yearly, and delivers some of the best front covers of any literary publication. This issue’s dream-like sequence was created by Russian-born Michael Cheval who specialises in Absurdist paintings, drawings and portraits.

Content in Issue 28 is an eclectic mix of poetry from the Anglophone world, including poets from Canada, the UK, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa and the USA.

Sharon Black, Jane Bonnyman, Claire Booker, Daragh Bradish, Meg Eden, Piotr Florczyk, Anne Harding Woodworth, Andrzej Lyszkowicz, Lindsay MacGregor, Rob A Mackenzie, Kim Moore, Stuart A. Patterson, Robert Peake, Hagar Peeterson (translated by Judith Wilkinson), Caroline Price, Wally Swist and Ross Wilson share between one and 5 poems apiece with the reader.

Issue 28 also contains reviews of John Silkins’s Complete Poems, Rae Armantrout’s Itself, the German poets Volker Braun and Michael Kruger, and collections by Caitriona O’Reilly, Kim Moore, Gordon Hodgeon, Mike Jenkins and Robert Peake. Plus translations of Michael Kruger by Wolfgang Gortschacher and David Malcolm.

To buy a copy of Issue 28 or submit you work to the magazine check details at  www.poetrysalzburg.com or email the editors at psr@poetrysalzburg.com

Monologue Slam at St James’ Theatre

Twelve actors, ten playwrights, one great concept!

 Director’s Cut pulled off an adventurous evening of acting and writing talent on Tuesday, with its ‘Make The Cut’ slam at London’s prestigious St James Theatre.

It’s always a privilege to have a play performed by up and coming young actors. This time, not one, but two, got to interpret the role of Kips in my play ‘Sperm Vampire’ along with nine other monologues, also performed by more than one actor.

The monologues were selected from among hundreds submitted to the company.  Each play was performed twice, by two different actors.  Each actor got to learn three different monologues.  The first round comprised all 12 actors going head to head in pairs, performing six of the shortlisted plays.  The audience then got to vote who went forward. The six winning actors  then went head to head in three groups of pairs, performing a new monologue.  The final round saw three actors performing the final monologue.  

Simon Desborough and Harry Boyd both gave sterling performances as Kips in ‘Sperm Vampire’ by Claire Booker. A big thank you and congratulations to them both for their excellent interpretations.

Congratulations also to all the short-listed writers, the other ten actors and mazeltoff to the ultimate winners, actor Sukh Kaur Ojla and writer Tom Ratcliffe.

If you would like to know more about The Director’s Cut Theatre, including future writing or acting opportunities, please contact Heather Ward (Artistic Director and Producer) at: www.directorscuttheatre.co.uk or on Facebook at:  https://www.facebook.com/directorscutTC