All Blogposts

  • A new pamphlet in 2023

    A new pamphlet in 2023

    I’m very happy to share the news that I was one of three winners in Live Canon’s 2022 Pamphlet/Chapbook Competition and a pamphlet of about 20 of my poems will be published in 2023. These poems have been accumulating in my notebook since the 2018 publication of my full collection What Are You After? (Nine…… Read more

  • On getting poems published

    On getting poems published

    A few notes from recent chats The poetry group I belong to, Trowbridge Stanza, met earlier this month to talk about routes into publishing, sharing our own stories of publication, and chatting about the different options available in the UK. We’re a mix of published and unpublished writers of different ages, backgrounds and experiences. Most…… Read more

  • On Reviewing

    On Reviewing

    The poetry group I belong to was talking about reviews. I said that one of the good things about writing reviews is the way it helps you to grow your poetry community, bringing you into contact with other poets and with publishers. It’s of value to your reading practice since it encourages close reading of…… Read more

  • Time for a Pause

    Time for a Pause

    (Thoughts on refreshing more than my newsfeed). I’ve also shared this post to Substack. I’ve joined Mastodon although I’m finding it slow and glitchy. I’m gently learning how to find people I want to interact with there but I’m also using this ‘wondering what is going on and what will happen at Twitter’ time to…… Read more

  • The impact of receiving funding on my creative practice: update about a 2018 Local Artist’s Bursary

    The impact of receiving funding on my creative practice: update about a 2018 Local Artist’s Bursary

    Poetry is a slow business, at least it is for me. In 2018 I was awarded a local artist’s bursary of £2000 from Ginkgo Projects/Bloor Homes to write poems in response to the landscape in and around Amesbury. I wrote a little about the bursary and my research for the poems on this blog as…… Read more

  • Poem of the Day at the National Poetry Library, UK.

    Poem of the Day at the National Poetry Library, UK.

    One of my visual poems, an ecopoem called ‘poem with no rhyme or rain’, was selected as a joint winner in a competition for Instagram poems on the theme of ‘the environment’ – which was the theme for National Poetry Day (UK) this year – run by the National Poetry Library. It was also chosen…… Read more