Take Cover

It’s here! you asked how to pre-order Spectral, so I’ve set up a means to do so on the new Allographic Big Cartel shop. Which means I get to show off the beautiful art that Sa’adiah Khan created for the front cover of the book from Burning Eye.

I knew I wanted Sa’adiah’s art for this project well before I knew that Burning Eye were going to take it. As soon as the concept blossomed, I realised it needed her take on it to bring it further to life. You may know her as a community artist in Cambridge and nearby – she’s dedicated to bringing art to life in tiny, intricate, intimate pieces, and huge murals, broad and bountiful, and one of her most enduringly beautiful pieces is the collaborative mural which still adorns our local Co-op in Chesterton.

Sa’adiah had already provided the artwork for my show The Selkie a few years ago, somehow taking my rambling depictions and turning them into (sometimes eerily accurate in matching my mind’s vision) images to match the narrative, and I was thrilled to manage to book her for this project shortly after Burning Eye confirmed publication. 

With this being a much vaguer conceptualisation, she had to work in innovative ways to pull out what I needed, and, after various colour cut-ups (literally), kaleidoscopic animations, consultations, and very patiently tiffling about with hues and shadows until I was happy, she produced this absolute beauty:

Isn’t it lush?! I can’t wait to see what Clive does with the design, and am looking forward to making badges of it. In the meantime, please enjoy losing yourself in the layers (and, better, head over to Sa’adiah’s website to see more of the gorgeous colours and holistic visions she has to share; you might even find yourself joining in a drawing workshop!).

And, if you’re feeling as though, this close to Christmas, you’d like to support an independent publisher who does a great deal to make the work of performance artists come to life in print form, you could do a lot worse than donating to or buying some work from Burning Eye who, like a lot of artistic platforms, have been severely hit by the Pandemic.

Over on my poetry blog I’m also sharing sneak peeks into artwork I’m producing for certain pieces in the book, so do check those out – I’m hoping to bring new ones out every week from now until launch.

Applying Myself

 

Next year sees the tenth anniversary of publishing house Burning Eye Books, who’ve produced the collections of some of my favourite UK performance poets. Their focus has been consistently on platforming the work of word-wranglers who inhabit that interesting place between poetry, theatre, music, and stand-up. The sort of people who used to be traditionally, well, invisible to standard page publishers.

People like me, I suppose.

Imposter Syndrome is a funny thing – it can have you thinking you’re cheating and faking, especially when you do well, especially if it’s taken a while for other people who at least look like arbiters of success, to recognise your achievements and skills. Especially if you’ve ever been given grief for your endeavours. It makes it difficult to put yourself forward for opportunities because, well, they’d never pick me.

Last September someone told me that the next window for submissions to Burning Eye Books would give specific emphasis to welcoming artists inhabiting that interesting place between male and female. The sort of people who used to be traditionally, well, invisible to standard institutions.

People like me, in other words.

So I, high on the adrenalin of an excellent night of slam poetry, vowed (in front of witnesses) that this time, I’d actually apply. And in the new year, having moved into a different phase of my life on several fronts, persistently encouraged by a bunch of lovely people, I made a spreadsheet (obviously) for all the poems I felt folk would want to read, and started cataloguing them. And then I got ill. And then I hurled myself during the final 48 hours before the deadline into writing a proper submission for a grown-up version of the kind of stuff I’d been producing (a sample, a bio, and a proposal for the shape of the book; why will people buy this? who are you? what makes this – and you – special?). And, for once, I wrote that down and told them. (And got friends who know their stuff to check it, and they reminded me about other things I could say, so I said them too.)

Writing poetry is easy. Delineating your literary worth in an online form? Bit more of an ask.

Anyway, you may have seen this on social media already, in much pithier, more confident-seeming formats. But, in short: Clive and Bridget looked at the proposal, and in March, they said yes…

(Author image by Matt Widgery at the SHINDIG Storytelling Special.)

The book is currently called Spectral. It’s going to have a very specific concept underpinning its construction, and very beautiful cover art by local Cambridge artist Sa’adiah Khan, and I’ll be producing an audiobook version to match the current release date for the physical book in March 2022. You’ll be able to buy it in bookshops and online and did I mention that I’m still freaking out about this?

Today the knowledge that this is actually happening sinks that bit further into my psyche, and I’m abruptly grateful that the process of publication takes a lot longer with big publishers than with my own platform. (Oddly enough, my label, Allographic Press, has seen other of our writers ’graduate’ to Burning Eye and… I guess I’m one too, now…?)

The tenth anniversary publications list for BE looks like a grand mixture between some of my favourite poets (including people I’ve acted with, which is an interesting bit of world-collision!), people I’ve only heard of, and others I’m really looking forward to getting to know:

So I’ll be keeping you up-to-date with progress as it goes, in between small bouts of freaking out and rushing to complete deadlines at the last minute because really… that’s not going to change any time soon, let’s face it… Expect to see at least hints of art and contents pages, and possibly the occasional flail about audiobook production and other such fun stuff. I’ll be posting on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and possibly Soundcloud about All This, but expect the longer rambles to turn up here. And yes, this may be the final impetus I need to actually update my website for the first time in… okay, I’m not going to work out how long it’s been, just crack my knuckles and get on with it!

To everyone who’s encouraged, proofread, witnessed vows, made space for me to write in, squeaked with glee, and/ or shown absolutely no surprise whatsoever when I’ve told them this news… thanks! And if you’ve read this far, thank you too!

See, it’s important to have good friends around you. Folk who’ll gently (or not-so-gently) nudge you toward the things that make your life brighter, remind you that there’s space in which you can make and grow and thrive. That there are chances for those who might have considered themselves invisible to standards they think unattainable.

People like you. And me.

Blimey…

Talking About Talking About Thinking About Change

I’m heading back to “real work” soon – or at least that part represented by an office job (which will see absolutely no geographical shift away from my study/io for the moment, so adaptation will be… challenging on that front) – and, as I ease back into morning meetings (unnatural!) and people with different priorities and vocabulary to those with whom I’ve been interacting of late, they’ve already been asking how my year of Sabbatical has gone, what I’ve got up to, all that. Unlike those who use Sabbaticals to travel the world, I don’t have a ready store of photos and maps to demonstrate, and the last 5-6 months of this have been… less than ideal, let’s say… What I will say about residencies and commissions and adaptation to extreme conditions and writing fanfic to keep myself sane (hyperfixation on research has been a great tool of denial) and finally being able to pick up the voice work again will – I suspect – sound super-vague, though I should really give these clever, sociable, professionally good communicators the benefit of the doubt! Besides: in some ways we’ve faced more of the same challenges this year than might have been anticipated…

And so, ironically, it’s the most recent work I’m engaged in that might resonate most with people whose job is managing business change, and the psychological stages that go with it. I’ve been creating a poem commissioned by someone who needs to use it to talk about death and grief in a non-religious way. (So obviously it’s one enormous metaphor and, being me, I’ve snuck in references to the four elements, water being somewhat dominant here.)

One of the most fascinating aspects of this process has been writing something that needs to fit someone else’s voice, to a certain extent, because this poem is to be a tool that will doubtless get reshaped by use. Today’s discussion included not only hearing which bits they felt they could use and others… less so… but having the client read it aloud, while I tweaked a couple of lines to fit that, noting what stumbled and what flew, making further notes for more deep-seated transformations later. This is something I do on an almost unconscious level when writing something for my own voice, but doing it for another feels almost like brand-new process for me, and luckily the client’s ability to self-reflect is both skilled and generously shared.

I’m pretty sure this process could not have worked without that trust.

It now occurs to me that this is (new analogy alert) like creating a garment for someone else to use - not only do you take detailed measurements at the beginning, but you have to get them to try it on so you can make some parts tighter, others looser, and ensure that yet others can stretch as necessary, depending on circumstances. Sometimes you have to unstitch an entire panel and do it again.

And the knowledge that the creation will shape the user as well as the consumer is a heady one.

This poem is going to be released publicly as well, at some point in the future, for other people to use if appropriate, and I find myself quietly excited by that prospect, again in a different way from usual. It feels good to make something for people to use, when art is so often seen as a decoration, a luxury, a nice to have, when it actually underpins so much of what it means to be human, connecting our present to past and future, communicating so many things and used everywhere. That this is to be, far more explicitly than usual, a tool, gives me a very calm kind of satisfaction.

And if that’s all I ended up having to show for this year, it would be a mighty thing indeed.

Update: The text of the finished piece is here.

River Cam, August 2010

#Multicultural #Cambridge (or: I've only just realised that #Brexit's nearly here)

I’ve been living in Cambridge for nearly ten years now (come July) and – much as I rail at its many structural inequities, and the inaccessibility of many of the wonderful things it does, there are some major things (and people!) I properly love. Among all the art, history, culture, and technology (and things which span all of these categories!), there’s an attitude of proper liberalism and a truly international spirit here. The first time I visited with a view to “we’re going to live here shortly” I heard about five languages spoken on the streets in the first hour or so, and it immediately felt more home-like than Milton Keynes, where I was living at the time.

Without Milton Keynes I may never have been pushed to write poetry (take that as you like!), but I grew up in Cardiff, a massively multicultural place, raised by polyglottal people who considered themselves Europeans, and raised me and my brother to think likewise. The idea that I can no longer call myself European is... painful to me. The idea that wonderful people (some of whom I work and make art and memories with) in this city I now call home would feel unwelcome here after the end of March is abhorrent.

So while I’m applying for an Irish passport (born in Belfast in the 70s, I’m entitled to one), and resolving to learn and use more languages, and signing any petition that comes my way, none of that feels like a celebration of what we are and can be together, culturally, artistically, and linguistically.

This morning, it finally, finally hit home for me how close Brexit is, and that I really wanted to do something to commemorate how amazingly international Cambridge (and the UK in general) is. Within about 90 seconds, the following Crazy Project blossomed in my brain: I’d like to put together an Allographic anthology of creativity in all sorts of languages by the end of the month.

It would be in the mould of the long-overdue-for-resurrection publication “Small Words” – small (A6), environmentally sourced, physically pleasant to hold, short run, and a mix of poetry, stories, photography, artwork, (and I think essays this time too, given the subject matter). We’d launch at the next Allographic open mic (Sunday 31st March).

From concept to Proper Project in a couple of hours – this is how I do. So, if you would like to submit poetry, short fiction, essays, artwork, or photography to the Allographic Small Words Brexit Special celebrating multiculturalism and international cooperation in Cambridge and the UK, go here: http://bit.ly/smallwordsbrexit. The deadline is Thu 21-Mar-19 8pm GMT.

Pieces should reflect the themes (however loosely) of multiculturalism, international cooperation, Cambridge(shire)/ Britain and its international links, and the power of peaceful protest.

There’s no money to be offered for your work (this will be a short run, aimed at breaking even), but no entry fee either, and you will receive a free copy of the anthology. We especially encourage multilingual pieces (i.e. those incorporating more than one language), though monolingual pieces in any language are also welcome.

The anthology will be published in hard form (A6, recycled materials), and electronically.

Please feel free to share this wherever you think it would be welcome. ☺

Poetry Sells…?

So, someone opened the debate again today about performance poets “doing” adverts for large organisations. I suspect that this is what they were talking about: http://www.campaignlive.co.uk/article/nationwide-strips-back-ads-authentic-connection/1408827# At the time when the adverts in question came out, I was very ill, so let a whole bunch of people fulminating about artists “selling out” slide past my eyes without saying anything. But now I’m feeling better...

I have an opinion about this (of course I do). It goes something like this:

Poetry, as an artform, especially performance poetry, is one that is still low-profile and with a real lack of opportunities to make a career in, full-time. Have talent, work hard, get to the stage where people are willing to pay you, promote you, and tell everyone else that you’re excellent, and you’re faced with dilemmas at several turns. These dilemmas apply, I suspect, to pretty much every artform.

Do any job other than your artform and you’re at risk of being accused (even if only tacitly/ in your own head) of not being a “proper” artist, of diluting, of compromising. So how do you follow your creative path, and make enough money to feed, house, clothe, and transport yourself and your dependents, let alone develop yourself as a human?

If someone is willing to offer decent money for your work in a way that will raise your profile and that of your artform, where you’re not asked to compromise yourself by directly advertising the product at hand, I think that’s a good thing, personally. (It’s also worth bearing in mind: Nationwide are not Barclays, or HSBC, or Lloyds (or Monsanto, or Proctor & Gamble, or Nestlé, etc.). They’re not even a bank. On the Evil Corporations Scale, they’re pretty darned low...)

And, as someone who is still not in a position to leave the dayjob (while simultaneously wondering whether not leaving the day job is the thing that is holding me back from just saying “the fuck with it - let’s just go, commit, be awesome!”), and as someone active in promoting the artform more generally, above and beyond my own practice, I’m pleased to see performance poetry given a mainstream platform in a positive way (how many cheesy stereotypes of shit, pretentious performance poetry have we seen portrayed in mainstream media...?), with an admirable diversity of artists, considering they only picked three.

I remember the artsy, talking-heads Barclays adverts made at the turn of the Century, featuring actors who people accused of “selling out” their indie cred, their otherwise edgy images. One of them was Gary Oldman, who openly discussed how he was willing to make the compromise because the money was going to pay for his outreach programme getting children off the street and into community theatre.

Nationwide were going to make money and produce advertising. I’m glad that they decided to produce sensitive, non-exploitative showcases of artists who are ambassadors for my artform. I’m glad they promoted this notion of performance poets as bard, as voices for the nation. I don’t know the other two artists, but one of them is someone whose work (and work ethic, and politics) I admire and support, and I very much hope she got paid well.

Poets used to make their living from patrons, unless they were independently wealthy. Over the years poets have made their living by writing things other than poetry for other people, teaching, or doing other jobs to keep body and awen together. Arts grants are on the decline, commissions aren’t that easy to find, and not everyone has the time, training, or temperament for teaching. I choose to use my non-creative skills to muster a part-time day job to muster stability for the platform under my creative endeavours. I’m still not sure if I want to make 100% of my income from the creative arts, but I won’t denigrate those who sell their poetry to those with the money to pay for it, especially when these modern-day patrons aren’t particularly evil.

What are your thoughts?

#NaPoWriMo 2015: Some Conclusions

Well. Bloody hell. That's it - I'm done for the year! :) What am I going to do with myself?!

If it plays out like the last couple of years, I'm probably going to spend the next couple of weeks still writing new poems virtually daily, as the momentum and discipline (and reduction of self-doubt and pre-editing) persists but I'll also start going back to edit, trim, and - in the case of the performable pieces - learn what I've written this month.

Since I also had 2½ days of Poetry To Go in the mix, plus a wedding commission piece to write, I will have written more like 45 poems this month, which was an epic achievement, I guess, but did make things a little harder. Turns out creative energy can be quite finite, especially when you're trying to administrate it - poetry admin cramps poetry writing (and possible vice versa).  I'll try to remember that.  (Handling major, seismic shifts in my day job wasn't particularly conducive to mental energy either!)

Some other observations about my output this year:

1. More (end-)rhyming than usual.

Not only the now-traditional triolet, terzanelle, and sonnet from me, but also clerihews, limericks, and other comedic iambic pentameter end-rhyme (one about perennial enemies, another about an imaginary political candidate encounter, and a seasonal one).


2. More comedy

But only in rhyme. It would appear that, when I try to be funny, I feel the urge to go tumpty-tumpty, ABAB.


3. More darkness

There were some seriously dark imagery coming out in places - the aforementioned imaginary right-wing encounter was pretty violent, the other explicitly politically-themed one was sinister, and there was plenty of interpersonal tension depicted - here, here, here, here, and here. Also the plea to a friend who'd been threatening suicide online that I didn't have to send, after all.


4. Resolution

However, there were lots of "Je ne regret rien" and even happy/ practical resolutions. One of them explicitly inspired by the fun of turning forty this year, and others depicting care-free days and the will to live my own life, unjudged by (and unjudging of) other people's preferences.


5. Welsh

Again, as per tradition, poems cropped up that referenced my heritage and upbringing. This time, however, it was in the form of my one concrete poem, and playing a new form (for me).


6. Conforming

I tend to write free verse; it's just a preference, and I have nothing against rhyming and syllable-bound forms at all, it's just that, to me, it's more obvious when it's done wrong. (And yes, you can have rubbish free verse - generally it looks like what Stephen Fry memorably described as "shredded prose".) If you have to force the words into scansion or rhyme at the expense of good meaning, consider free verse. Please. But don't shred prose.

However, during NaPoWriMo, I push myself to more form - and not only were there the aforementioned end-rhymers, but two from my happy place with form (haiku and senryū), a new one - clogyrnachau (ion? pluralising is hard in Welsh), and an accidental following-of-an-earlier-prompt in the form of abecedarian poem.

(I also ended up in a debate about the merits of socks on Facebook, where all our statements were made up of words beginning with the letter 's' - after last year's stab at Nordic-style alliterative poems, that was a breeze!)


7. Promptless

Last year I either explicitly or accidentally followed quite a few of the "official" prompts.  This year, I think only two came out (clerihews and abecedarian), but I honestly wasn't bothered enough to check either way. Whether this is cause or symptom of my feeling of disconnection, I'm not sure... (Particular props to Emma for following all the prompts - that's extraordinary dedication right there; and I was so impressed at how well they came out (especially when the prompts were a bit... well... let's say tricksy...)!)


So, how did that all make you feeeel?

Oh, you always ask, dontcha? ;)

It's been interesting - I found it harder than previous years, and felt more detached from the process. I started well, and was ahead of myself, in fact, but then I fell behind far more, and for far longer, than I ever have done before in NaPoWriMo, and felt simultaneously more under pressure to turn out good quality work, and just let go and throw whatever out there, and experiment with form. Of course, this pressure all came from me...

And then, about five days ago, that pressure suddenly dropped off.  I'd bought myself a bit of space by posting a couple of the Poetry To Go poems I felt were suitable to share publicly (i.e. none of the haiku/ senryū, and nothing where I'd've had to explain quite why "hide-and-seek" or "apples" or "elephants" meant so much to the customer), and then, after writing two on that aforementioned care-free day, I steamed away through the backlog (courtesy of giving myself a break in the form of linked haiku/ senryū, a concrete poem, and rambling free verse about a legendary queen, and then a brilliant workshop exercise, which brought me one of my favourite of my pieces this month). I followed other impulses and inspirations, and some lovely stuff came out just this week.  I feel very pleased with them.

I already have some notions for editing and improving these poems.  I know that most "proper" poetry competitions and publishers won't touch 'em as they've already been published by dint of turning up on the blog(s), but - thanks to this successful final week particularly - I'm feeling pretty darned confident about my poetry skills.


Would you recommend other people to take part in NaPoWriMo or similar challenges?

YES. For several reasons:

1. Comparing this year's output with 2014 and 2013, I can see immediately that I've improved a lot. My writing is tighter, and there's a consistent voice (what Leanne calls a Fay poem - all internal rhymes and knight's move images) And writing challenges, commissions, games, and workshops have been a big part of that.


2. You have to write a lot of crap out, like clearing the pumps before the clean water flows. This kind of thing will do that, so you can winnow the good stuff (yay! mixed metaphors!) out afterwards.


3. You'll find you're better than you think you are, especially when under pressure of time.


4. Challenges like this tend to have a community vibe to them - you can celebrate and commiserate with other poets, and even the simple "like"s and "favourite"s from social media, let alone more detailed comments, will help to boost you (I joint blogged this year, as last, with fellow Cambridgeshire(ish) poets).

I was also very privileged to spend writing time with these poets, and it was wonderful to be inspired by (and even, sometimes, inspire!) their writing, conversations, and comments, and to be able to see them explore a form or a topic that might be a jumping-off point for me, and to see them grow in confidence, technique, and flair. :) Knowing people have got your back is pretty precious.

Emma, Mal, Poppy, Nikki, Leanne, Russell, Daisy - thanks for being part of the journey; it was an honour and a privilege. Same time next year?


5. There is something quite energising about completing a challenge - and that confidence and energy can buoy you along for quite a long while. In fact, the idea that I might have my first NaPo not posting my 30th poem on 30th April was what got me pulling my big girl pants on with, funnily enough, the female pharoah poem. I'm so glad I did.


Any resolutions coming out of this?

Yes - doing more Poetry To Go, entering more competitions, seeking more commissions, giving myself more explicit time to write. And give more positive feedback to other people, because it feels very, very good and encouraging to receive (thanks, Leanne, in particular - you rock at that!)

Mnemesis

I've had a few people asking me about memorising poems recently.  I've always said: oh, you just need to rehearse it, but recently discovered that I come from a line of eidetic and semi-eidetic folk, so I may have a genetic advantage - what I consider "normal" memory is, in fact, "abnormally good" memory.

Ah.

In addition, I was a musician (most notably: a singer) before I was a poet, so I have the near-life-long practice and discipline of memorising songs and pieces behind me that I take for granted along with performance skills like breath control, etc.

But there's technique behind the skill, it's just that it's long-embedded.  I've been asked again recently about memorising, so I thought I'd break it down a little, and share what I think you need to do so that you could all potentially benefit. Or comment and add your own tips.

I get the feeling that I'll be running a workshop on this soon... :)


Rehearse. A lot (I still think that this is valid!):

1. Run through it twice, all the way through, at the right speed, with pauses, etc.

2. Take the first stanza and start by doing the first line without text. Look up, gesture, *perform* it.

3. Now add the second line, so you're doing both lines together.

4. Keep going until that first stanza is secure.

5. Do the same for the second stanza, then add it onto the first and do them both together.

6. Keep going until it's all there.


During Rehearsal:

1. Use linking images. Find anchor points (not too many of them!) that you can pin a particularly vivid image in your head to that fits the line/ phrase.

2. Run through the whole thing at high speed, using a daft voice, just to prove to yourself that the words are there. Gallop. Do not stop for missed lines.

3. Start breaking it down a little by starting e.g. in the middle of the second stanza and seeing if you can get the next three lines. Practise until you can. Now pick another random spot and do the same thing.

4. If some lines aren't sticking consider one of these solutions:

a) are they the right lines? Are they not sticking because they actually don't fit the poem?

b) are they emotionally difficult? Learn to take a deeper breath before them - bolster yourself to be able to push through them to the easier bit on the other side.

c) say them over and again and again. Pepper these lines in your head with particularly vivid anchor images.

And rehearse. Rehearse, rehearse, rehearse. Then leave it alone. Then rehearse again. Then leave it.


Before/ During the Performance:

Make sure you're well-hydrated before the performance, make sure you have enough carbs in you. When you get on stage, make sure you have a crib sheet to hand, but not too temptingly in front of you so that you rely on it. Don't be afraid to refer to it if you need to - you haven't failed, you've just succeeded in ensuring that your poem is going to be heard in its entirety! :)

And enjoy the freedom and exhilaration of performing without wires - you will likely feel more connected with the audience, and freer to gesture, make eye-contact, etc. - all those good things that can really help your performance. Also: that extra jolt of adrenalin, baby! :D