Family, Animals and Other Things – Zoom reading on June 24

June 25, 2021

For former US Poet Laureate Billy Collins, a poem is ‘a flashlight, an instrument of discovery’. I don’t think this can be surpassed as the most perfect concise definition of poetry.

Sarah Westcott, Gordon Meade, Gillie Robic and Neetha Kunaratnam confirmed this definition last night with verses that shone a light on and helped us discover many different ‘elsewheres’ – some painfully real, like the moment a cancer diagnosis is received; or when a parent is desperately worried about a child’s health; or when one witnesses a parent’s sickness or when caged animals are given a voice. Others almost mythical, where one flies again with an injured bird, watches hawks, listens to ‘the old man by the sea’ or floats out to the ocean without flipflops through a flooded London… And others again, where you’re taken for a literal ride with family members to times and a society so different that it feels like watching a Hollywood movie.

Beautiful voices and not only in the poetic sense. Sarah, Gordon, Gillie and Neetha have beautiful reading voices and I could have listened to them for a lot longer. Comments from the audience expressed the same. If you enjoyed the evening, or if you didn’t make it and would like to read their work, here are some links:

You can order Sarah’s books from the publisher https://liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/books/

Gordon’s Zoospeak is published by Enthusiastic Press.

Gillie’s books are published by Live Canon https.//www.livecanon.co.uk/store

Neetha’s collection Just Because is published by Smokestack Books.

Events

TUESDAY MARCH 4 at West Greenwich Library, at 7.30
“In His Own Voice: Geoffrey’s Grigson’s Poetry”
A special evening on the poetry and the creative, colourful and influential life of Geoffrey Grigson (1905-1985). With his daughter Caroline Grigson, grandson Joe Banks and poets Graham High, Blake Morrison, and poet and editor John Greening.

Free event with refreshments (donations welcome) and books on sale. Texts will be projected on screen. Doors open at 7pm for a 7.30 start.

Geoffrey Grigson lived and worked through amazing times, culturally and politically, and was a prolific poet, writer, critic and editor. At the centre of English intellectual life, he knew the poetry grandees of his days and greatly admired those of the past. When he was only 27, he founded the bi-monthly journal ‘New Verse’, thus becoming hugely influential in the poetry world. He wrote over 500 poems himself, and on March 4, 1968 he recorded a number of them, which we’re going to hear in the course of the evening (exactly 57 years later!) – as well as many stories about him and his life. Other works have been selected and will be read by poets Blake Morrison, Graham High, John Greening (who also edited an anthology of Grigson’s works), by Grigson’s daughter Caroline Banks, Frances High and myself.

TUESDAY MARCH 25 at West Greenwich Library – ‘Mica Press launch: new poetry from Rosie Johnston, Michael Vince and Antony Johae.’ With Nayma Chanchoun, Michael Foley and Leslie Bell.

TUESDAY MAY 13 at West Greenwich Library – ‘Maggie and Maggie’. Same name, different voices: poetry from Maggie Butt and Maggie Harris.

TUESDAY JUNE 24 at West Greenwich Library – ‘Telltale Poets: Sarah Barnsley, Robin Houghton and Peter Kenny’