A quick update

I’ve been quiet on the blogging front recently.  I’ve done a few readings and events this year, all noted on my Diary/News page.  My review of Filigree: Contemporary Black British Poetry (Peepal Tree Press, 2018) has been published in the current issue of Under the Radar magazine.  I’m currently reading new collections published by Pavilion Poetry (Liverpool University Press) for reviews which I hope will appear in Under the Radar later this year.

I have no more readings booked ahead which feels fine.  I feel lucky to have been asked to do as many readings as I have and it hasn’t yet been one year since What Are You After? was published.  I’ve been trying to write new poems since late last year and they are accumulating gradually.  I’m currently at the stage where I think they’re pretty bad so I should probably spend some gentle time with them, turning off all my distractions  and trying to assess them with an editorial eye.

I’m currently mentoring a talented poet and feel privileged to be involved with their work.  This, and an online course at The Poetry School, Channel Hopping: A French Exchange (Transreading) tutored by the brilliant Paul Stephenson, is keeping me comfortably busy.

Our unmowed lawn, possibly a wildflower meadow, is progressing nicely.  Here is a tiny video of its wild glory (my son’s band can be heard rehearsing in the shed at the end).