The Writer’s Eye: Poets who Paint

April 28, 2022

This event took place on April 26 on Zoom and was the first collaboration between in-words and Pindrop Press (pindroppress.com). Pindrop is run single-handedly by Sharon Black – publisher, editor, mentor, designer… Her interest in the visual (book covers in particular) and my own interest in pairing (in a very loose sense) images and verse led to this choice of theme. The result was a challenging mix, as far from ekphrastic poetry, if that’s what one expected, as one can get. Sharon introduced Mike Barlow, Pam Thompson and Ole Hagen.

The word ‘consolation’ is one that resonates in many fields at these difficult times. Poetry provides consolation in various, very personal ways. But as the poet laureate recently said, ‘there’s consolation in concentration’ and for our attentive international audience, concentrating on, and later discussing, the poems and visual artworks by the three poets provided consolation as well as stimulation.

Mike Barlow’s poems and paintings (and one sculpture) did not shock but provoked a pang of recognition that grew as each verse, each choice of words reached a depth all of their own. Themes like ‘elsewhere’ and ‘lost and found’ challenged us while we were allured in by the seemingly ‘conventional’ form.

Pam Thompson’s work bounced us between the immediately recognisable and the experimental. I for one found it comforting that it is possible to play with written words, even those by our ‘heroes’. Her paintings expanded on this, with ‘elsewhere’ being a repeated theme.

This crescendo of playfulness reached its apex with Ole Hagen’s set, which brought a non-English absurdist turn to the evening, with surreal images, gestures, chanting and use of repetition.

I feel delighted that such a different event, a true end-of-term-extravaganza, marked the beginning of in-words summer break.

Do contact pindroppress.com to buy collections by these amazing poets, and others!

Events

Tuesday October 8th: ‘Loving Nature in Troubled Times’
7pm at West Greenwich Library

As close as we could to National Poetry day, the launch of Derrick Porter’s and Jude Rosen’s new poetry collections (The Art of Timing and Reclamations from London’s Edgelands respectively, both with Paekakariki Press), who will be joined by Alex Josephy and Jane McLaughlin.

A free event. Books and pamphlets will be available to buy. Plenty of refreshments (donations welcome). Door will open at 6.45 for a 7pm start.

Here’s some information about the poets:

Before moving to Rye, Alex Josephy lived in London and sometimes in Italy. Now her imagination and her poems live in three different worlds; she feels lucky to be discovering a new one among the East Sussex marshlands. Alex has worked as a teacher and university lecturer and as an NHS education adviser. Her most recent collection is Again Behold the Stars, a Cinnamon Press pamphlet award winner, 2023. Other work includes Naked Since Faversham (Pindrop Press, 2020) and White Roads (Paekakariki Press, 2018). Her poems have won the McLellan and Battered Moons prizes, and have appeared in magazines and anthologies in the UK, Italy and India. You can find out more on her website: www.alexjosephy.net

Jane McLaughlin writes and publishes poetry and short stories. Her publications with Cinnamon Press include Quintet (poetry with four other poets); Quartet (short stories with three other authors) and Lockdown (prizewinning full poetry collection). Her short stories have been widely published by Arachne Press, The Frogmore Papers, Under the Radar and elsewhere. Her short story ‘Trio for Four Voices’ was included in Best British Short Stories 2018 (Salt). She has been longlisted in the National Poetry Competition and has been placed and listed in many other competitions. Ephemeral, her collection of thirty poems on the themes of climate emergency and the natural world was one of the winners of the Dreich Classic Chapbook competition in 2023. Phil Barnett writes of Ephemeral: These fine poems are like breaths on a window pane. Her words condense the ineffable…into something we can see, read, feel.

Derrick Porter grew up in Hoxton and why he began to write poetry from the age of thirteen remains one of life’s unsolved mysteries. From the time he first began to write, to well into his thirties, he wrote in ignorance of there being a poetry scene. In his early forties he joined a ‘Writing for Pleasure’ group tutored by the poet Ted Walter – the first poet he ever met. Ted suggested he send his poems to Envoi, and from then on Derrick’s poems began to appear alongside mainstream poets. In 2002 he joined the Poetry School where – under the guidance of Mimi Khalvati – he became part of the wider poetry scene. His poems have appeared in magazines such as Magma, Acumen, Interpreter House, The New Writer, Brittle Star, Poetry Review, The Long Poem Magazine, and in two anthologies: I Am Twenty People, and This Little Stretch of Life. He has also enjoyed success in a number of poetry competitions. His second collection, The Art of Timing, is coming out in September for Paekakariki Press.

Jude Rosen is a former historian, urban researcher and translator and as a poet currently runs workshops for refugees. Her pamphlet, A Small Gateway, (Hearing Eye, 2009) explored East End Jewish life and intercultural exchange with Berlin, Sarajevo, Palestine. At the moment she is writing a long sequence on Gaza. Reclamations from London’s Edgelands,  which emerged from artistic resistance to the Olympic redevelopment, has recently been published by Paekakariki Press (May 2024). Poems from it appeared in The Art of Dissent: Adventures in London’s Olympic State, (Marshgate Press, 2012); Long Poem Magazine, South Bank Poetry London Poems Anthology and Envoi and were performed on poem and living history walks of the marshes, 2015-19 (poemswalks.wordpress.com). A video “Desire Paths – a film haibun” of a walk on Leyton Marsh was produced by Fawzia Kane in 2016 (https://vimeo.com/197324168).

NOVEMBER 26th – an evening with poets who write in English while English is not their native language – with Natan Barreto, Isabel Bermudez and Kostya Tsolakis (and more).

FEBRUARY 4 – readings by Jacqueline Saphra and Sue Rose