Uncategorized Archives - Page 7 of 91

Posted on November 8, 2024November 8, 2024 by Seren Books

Friday Poem – ‘If We Were in Llandudno’ by Wendy Allen

Photo of Llandudno seafront taken from the pebbled beach.

This week’s Friday Poem is ‘If We Were in Llandudno’ by Wendy Allen from her newly published pamphlet Portrait in Mustard.

If We Were in Llandudno
Today you ask if I remember
when we went to Llandudno for my 20th birthday.
You still have the train ticket.
Did we drink tea from polystyrene cups
or pints of snakebite? Did I wear a floral dress
like twenty-four years later
still wearing too much make up?
Your clothes fall off the same way
corduroy sounds in my mouth.
You were always writing something
political in the university newspaper office.
I wrote blank pages, drank pints, thought about how
I was falling in love with you and if
we were in Llandudno again,
I’d tell you—

Posted on November 1, 2024November 1, 2024 by Seren Books

Friday Poem – ‘Afterwards’ by Betty Doyle

Image of a dying star in the middle of a swirling cloud of dust and light

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This week’s Friday Poem is ‘Afterwards’ by Betty Doyle from her newly published pamphlet Fruits of Labour. Join us on Wednesday 6th November for our joint online poetry launch celebrating Fruits of Labour and Portrait in Mustard by Wendy Allen.

Afterwards
the pain was so much that I curled
inwards as my breath was ripped
out of me: the I of my body curved
until my head was buried inside my belly,
contracting to a dying star. I could see
the implosion at my core, hot-white,
radiating outwards with high winds,
light waves flying out of me
when all I wanted was to unfurl,
straighten, stretch my spine beyond
its half-moon, point my chin sunwards,
uncross myself, stand palms-up, legs spread
mouth wide, to let my face, chest
belly see it all – and feel it.

Register via Eventbrite to join us online on Wednesday 6th November for the launch of Fruits of Labour and Portrait in Mustard.

Join Poetry Launch. Portrait in Mustard by Wendy Allen and Fruits of Labour by Betty Doyle. 6pm Wednesday 6th November. Online via Zoom. All welcome. Book via Eventbrite.

Posted on October 18, 2024October 18, 2024 by Seren Books

Friday Poem – ‘Teach Jackdaws Avionics’ by Taz Rahman

Purple clematis clinging to a hedge near bright red brick houses

This week’s Friday Poem is ‘Teach Jackdaws Avionics’ by Taz Rahman to celebrate his collection East of the Sun, West of the Moon being longlisted for the Laurel Prize 2024. Taz will be reading alongside other long- and shortlisted poets at the Laurel Prize Ceremony tomorrow, 19th October, at Yorkshire Sculpture Park.

Teach Jackdaws Avionics
The sun does not fuss, days survive, clematis curates purple
in alleyways for blackbirds to core arcs in hunger, sing
to flowers, discourse evenings stretched on grass. Fingers
frack surfaces, erupt touch, catch aphids, time, molten
cores, questions – questions like why is the asphodel so
hardy in its narrow grass-like leaves, the stem elongating
the handsomest spike in white so unheard lives may
meadow in its six flirting petals. The sun hides in roof-lines
past noon, enters fan vaults warming chimneys to seduce
the fattest pigeon lit like silty grains carrying miles. May
bees shake their own cowbells, vine inquisition into mahonia
blooming too early in inclines no right to smile, a kingdom of
floating purr climbs a wall, wags tail like another species, in
the field nearby goats cough, neigh soft, thud hooves, pretend
to be stallions feeding a chorus of want wanting to stir, morning
chairs touch napes of human arms inside a high street café, pine
flesh, the leftover rose, its wilting stem aching to sit upright, trace
the night gone, one last glance at something to trail lost snails.

Posted on October 11, 2024October 11, 2024 by Seren Books

Friday Poem – ‘The Blood, Oh The Blood’ by Carrie Etter

This week’s Friday Poem is ‘The Blood, Oh The Blood’ by Carrie Etter from her collection Grief’s Alphabet in honour of it having been Highly Commended by the Forward Prizes and featured in the Forward Book of Poetry 2025.

The Blood, Oh the Blood
The month after your death,
the month I searched, gathered, sorted,
begged, wept, argued, and slept,
I bled and didn’t wonder.
I bled again and did
and asked why
and though you were everywhere–
the curtains’ cornflower meadows,
an Irish novel bookmarked Best Mum,
the silvertone watch on the dresser
still improbably ticking
without the company of your pulse–
you didn’t answer or
you were the answer,
the loss my body
revolted to bear.

Posted on October 4, 2024October 4, 2024 by Seren Books

Friday Poem – ‘Golden Shovel: After Iris Murdoch’ by Katrina Naomi

Photo of the golden sky over a foamy sea

This week’s Friday Poem is ‘Golden Shovel: After Iris Murdoch’ by Katrina Naomi from her collection Battery Rocks in honour of it having been Highly Commended by the Forward Prizes and featured in the Forward Book of Poetry 2025.

Golden Shovel: After Iris Murdoch
The sea is something that happens to you. An mor. An mor. This
is what I’ve learned as I rush each morning
like a penitent – diarghen – before a decent shrine. I
cannot – ha ny vynnav vy – help myself. I know this is simply
stated – forgive me – words mean so little since I dived
head and heart into
high tide, every pore, every follicle, alert. It goes deep
this affair. They say I was dunked in the water
at three days old. I’ve never dried myself off
never wanted terra firma – the
sensible, the understood. That isn’t living. The sea rocks
me awake, like sex; good sex, is the nearest
to swimming on a chill, bright day, out to
the far west – further. An mor. You’ll say I’m bragging but this is the
place to swim – to be freed, away from the house
– its reminders of being settled, where
you find all the oughts and shoulds, those horrid visitors. They
– their commanding voices – can’t be heard as I descend
into lanow, its bleak welcome, its byrla, one I almost
understand, am warmed by, despite its sheer
fall into nothingness out past the rocks. Yet
this neuvya – this swimming – still terrifies with
the light unable to filter through the folds
of cold, into the deep of under, how it blends, forms, reforms. And
darkness gathers like a shoal; where ledges
of granite glitter-shout. They are enough
to stop me sirening up, to
the known – aswonnys. Who wouldn’t make
every effort to stay? Yes, this is an obsession, a
glorious reacquaintance – kales – precarious
at best. I plunge from the rough-cut stairway
Kernewek (Cornish) words: an mor – the sea; diarghen – penitent or barefoot;
ha ny vynnav vy – and I don’t want to; lanow – a rising tide; byrla – embrace;
neuvya – to swim; aswonnys – known; kales – difficult.

Posted on September 27, 2024September 27, 2024 by Seren Books

Friday Poem – ‘Everyone Will Be There’ by Kathryn Bevis

Close up of a colourful silk parachute open with sunlight streaming through it

This week’s Friday Poem is ‘Everyone Will Be There’ by Kathryn Bevis from her collection The Butterfly House in honour of it having been Highly Commended by the Forward Prizes and featured in the Forward Book of Poetry 2025.

Everyone will be there
in their tea frocks, their slim fitting
suits, their lumberjack shirts, their sequinned
skirts. They’ll arrive in their dozens by wagon,
on horseback, in cars and on unicycles, shod
in their heels and brogues, their spats
and chunky trainers. Amy will have manicured
nails. Dillon’s buzz-cut will flatter their face
more than they know. Everyone will come
as themselves. Noah will untie bright balloons
from backs of pews and we’ll watch them rise
to bob on the vaulted ceiling. Rosa will trapeze
from arch to pillar, from gargoyle to crest
to scoop them up in shining armfuls.
And there’ll be cake, more cake
than you’ve ever seen: custard slices,
black forest gateaux, a Victoria sponge
with cream, raspberries and mint,
a lemon drizzle drenched
in elderflower syrup, French macarons
in fancy flavours — rose and pistachio,
lavender and orange, almond and fig.
Everyone will get to eat their favourite
cake. It’s going to be delicious.
Lucy will invent outdoor games and Matt
will win them all, though there’ll be trophies
and medals for everyone. Then we’ll play
with a huge parachute and there will be no
winners, just a silken circle held
in all our hands, on whose whirling centre
we’ll bless the babies, bouncing them in turn.

Posted on September 24, 2024September 24, 2024 by Seren Books

Taz Rahman longlisted for the Laurel Prize 2024

Flat lay image of East of the Sun West of the Moon against a navy background.

Congratulations Taz Rahman whose debut collection East of the Sun, West of the Moon has been longlisted for the Laurel Prize for Poetry 2024.

The prize, set up by poet laureate Simon Armitage and run by the Poetry School, is awarded annually to the best collection of environmental or nature poetry published that year. This year’s judges are Mona Arshi, Caroline Bird and Kwame Dawes.

The shortlist will be announced on Monday 7 October, with prizes of £5,000 (1st prize), £2,000 (2nd prize), and £1,000 (3rd prize) awarded to the winners. There’s also a £500 award for each of the Best First Collection UK and Best International First Collection. In addition, winners will receive a commission from National Landscapes to create a poem based on their favourite UK landscape.

Poets from the 21 strong longlist will be reading at the Laurel Prize Ceremony which is due to take place on Saturday 19th October at Yorkshire Sculpture Park as part of the inaugural Poetry School Summit, as well as being live streamed.

Posted on September 24, 2024September 24, 2024 by Seren Books

Three Seren poets Highly Commended in Forward Prizes 2024

Flat lay picture of Battery Rocks, Grief's Alphabet and The Butterfly House

Congratulations to Kathryn Bevis, Carrie Etter and Katrina Naomi who have all been highly commended in the 2024 Forward Prizes for Poetry.

The Forward Prizes recently announced the poems featured in the Forward Book of Poetry 2025, described as ‘a snapshot of the best poetry published and performed in Britain and Ireland in the past year’. Included amongst them are Katrina Naomi’s poem ‘Golden Shovel: After Iris Murdoch’ from her collection Battery Rocks, Carrie Etter’s poem ‘The Blood, Oh the Blood’ from her collection Grief’s Alphabet and Kathryn Bevis’ ‘Everyone will be there’ from The Butterfly House.

Full list of poets featured in the Forward Book of Poetry 2025

The Forward Book of Poetry 2025 is dedicated to Kathryn Bevis’ memory. Kathryn was shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best Single Poem in 2023 with her poem ‘My Body is Filing for Divorce’. Kathryn sadly passed away earlier this year.

For more information about the Forward Prizes including the 2024 shortlists, please visit the Forward Prizes website.

Posted on September 20, 2024September 20, 2024 by Seren Books

Friday Poem – ‘Nightswimming’ by Lorcán Black

Dark photo of waves rolling into the shore a night time

This week’s Friday Poem is ‘Nightswimming’ by Lorcán Black from his Poetry Book Society Recommended collection Strange Husbandry.

Nightswimming
Games of dominos in Portugal, whistling at girls for laughs off the balcony –
Really, though, September was coming soon & here: I thought you knew me –
those long nights on balconies: my only infringement –
tussles in the sands:
sandals askew, sand in toes, sand-stuck,
those sunscreen, sea-washed days: & a face so golden, so gold –
& where did you think I went: those nights with boys?

Lorcán will be reading from Strange Husbandry at the International Anthony Burgess Foundation on Saturday 28th September 2024 alongside Sarah Howe and Tom Branfoot. 2:30 – 4pm. Free entry. Find out more on the Poets & Players website.