Flamingo

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Kathryn Bevis Obituary

Kathryn Bevis is white woman with shoulder-length brown hair. She is wearing a blue beanie hat and a purple scarf and is looking at the camera and smiling.

We are very sorry to hear the news that Kathryn Bevis has passed away.

Kathryn’s relationship with Seren first began during lockdown, when she was a regular open mic reader at our online First Thursday events. Since then we have been honoured to publish her work in Poetry Wales Magazine and more recently in both her acclaimed pamphlet Flamingo, and debut collection The Butterfly House.

Perhaps one of the finest poets of her generation, Kathryn captured hearts and minds with her innovative use of form, language and metaphor to describe everyday life, experiences of women and terminal illness. She had a skill for finding light in the dark, celebration in sadness, and joy in the smallest moments.

Kathryn was a great supporter of other writers. As founder of The Writing School Online, she ran workshops, writing courses and offered mentoring to writers across the UK. She performed at events and festivals across the country and her love for poetry, positivity and, above all, her family and friends always shone through.

Kathryn’s passing is an immense loss. Knowing and working with her was an honour and a pleasure and the entire team sends their heartfelt condolences to her family and friends. For all those who knew her, or will come to know her through her work, we hope that you too will find love, celebration and joy.

Photograph of Kathryn taken by Tina Norris.

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Friday Poem – ‘The Butterfly House’ by Kathryn Bevis

Blue Morphos butterfly resting against a sunlit windowpane

This week’s Friday Poem is ‘The Butterfly House’ by Kathryn Bevis from her highly anticipated debut collection. We’re hosting an online launch for The Butterfly House on Zoom on the 10th April. Details of how to register for the event are below.

The Butterfly House i.m. Ray Holloway Yours is the only death I’ve ever known. We sat with you for hours and stroked your hands. And though it was January — the pond a frozen oval — though each blade of grass had etched itself against the ground and each frail thing had hidden from the stalking frost, a butterfly flew to your window, sudden and strange, with wings that throbbed like a heart. The day we buried you, we saw another: crimson sails unfurled, its body putting out to sea. Today’s a pilgrimage. I rest in mist and heat. Red lacewings gather their silk skirts as I trace a swallowtail’s trembling pulse. Together, apart, together: a pair of blue morphos shiver like black-fringed scraps of sky. Clear as leaded panes, glasswings feast on nectar. They close themselves like hands that meet in prayer, then open up to cup the tropic air. Since my diagnosis, I see them every time I close my eyes. Their flaming wings. Their too short lives.
Join us for the virtual launch of The Butterfly House. Kathryn Bevis. Wednesday 10th April 7-8pm. Celebration publication of Kathryn's debut collection with guest readsers Dillion Jaxx and Jonathan Edwards. Online via Zoom with captions by Otter.ai.
Register to attend
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Kathryn Bevis shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best Single Poem

Left: Kathryn Bevis, a white woman with close shaved hair. She is turned away and is looking towards the camera over her shoulder. Right: The cover of her book Flamingo

Seren poet Kathryn Bevis has been shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best Single Poem 2023 for her poem ‘My Body Tells Me She’s Filling for Divorce’. The poem was originally published in our sister magazine Poetry Wales before going on to win the Second Light Poetry Competition 2022. It was also published in Kathryn’s debut pamphlet Flamingo.

This year’s Best Single Poem categories, which include both written and performed poems, were judged by Joelle Taylor, Khadijah Ibrahiim, Caroline Bird, Chris Redmond and Sue Roberts. Of the shortlists, panel chair Joelle Taylor said: ‘Between the two categories we have curated shortlists that exemplify all that is distinct, innovative, and alive in British poetry and poetic thought.’

The winners of this year’s Forward Prizes will be announced in an award ceremony later this year. The shortlists for all categories including Best Collection and Best First Collection can be viewed on the Forward Prizes website.

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‘Flamingo’ by Kathryn Bevis shortlisted for Saboteur Awards

Left: . Right the cover of her book Flamingo

Seren poet Kathryn Bevis’s debut pamphlet Flamingo is on the shortlist for the Saboteur Award for Best Poetry Pamphlet 2023. 

The Saboteur Awards are audience led, with nominations for each category made by the general public. Flamingo is one of 5 collections on the shortlist for Best Pamphlet. 

  • Devjani Bodepudi, For the Daughters Carried Here on the Hips of Their Mothers
  • Hannah Linden, The Beautiful Open Sky
  • Katheryn Bevis, Flamingo
  • Nikki Dudley, Exorcism Becomes Habit
  • Sallyanne Rock, Salt and Metal

Voting is now open for the second round of nominations where the public can vote for the winner in each category. Votes can be cast via this google form https://forms.gle/r7jyoNvNpzJXYH7K7.

The Saboteur Awards Festival will take place on Saturday 24th June in Birmingham. You can book tickets via their website. 

Other award categories include: Best Short Story Collection, Best Spoken Word Performer, Best Magazine, Best Literary Festival, Best Novella, Best Poetry Pamphlet, Best Regular Spoken Word Night, Best Spoken Word Show, Most Innovative Publisher, Best Reviewer of Literature, Best Collaborative Work and Best Anthology. Find out more about the awards on Sabotage Reviews.

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Friday Poem – ‘Flamingo’ by Kathryn Bevis

This week’s Friday Poem is ‘Flamingo’ by Kathryn Bevis from her pamphlet of the same name. If you missed the online launch for Flamingo, you can watch it back now on our Youtube channel.

This cover shows a surreal still life painting of four flamingos poking their heads out of a blue and white patterned vase. The text reads: Flamingo, Kathryn Bevis.

Kathryn Bevis’s critically-acclaimed debut pamphlet Flamingo introduces us to a troupe of wild, unique, and captivating poems. Life and our own embodiment are brought sharply into focus as we encounter a variety of subjects including work, survival, love, and mortality. Formally inventive, these hopeful and sometimes surreal poems are not afraid to confront complex or difficult emotions. Cancer is posed as a ring-tailed lemur, capering through the sufferer’s body, and the title poem imagines death as a flamboyant transformation where the speaker shapeshifts into the afterlife. Each poem is a discovery and a joy.

Flamingo My love, when I die, I’ll turn flamingo: fall asleep, face tucked in on the pillow of myself. Even as you cry, I’ll be stepping from the bed, feeling plush, pink tulle tutuing from my hips. My legs will telescope, grow thin and rosy. I’ll sense my feet web, feel a new itch to stamp and stir, to suck up larvae from the bottom of the lagoon. In this afterworld, some days I’ll fix one foot in mud, find infinite repose: the poise of a yogi in prayer. Others, I’ll gorge myself, filter feed on brine shrimp from the salty shadows. The other birds and I will grunt and growl over the choicest cuts like church women bickering over rosettes for jam at a country show. My love, do you know that the dead all flock together? We meet at the saline lake, dance our shuffle-legged shimmy, flick our heads like tango partners, flag and flap our scarlet scalloped wings, heads bopping, nodding to the beat. Do you see? After the illness, after the grief, the pain — as you will do, sweetheart — the dead must learn to love again.

Flamingo is available on the Seren website for £6.00

Create your free Seren account and enjoy 20% off every book you buy direct from us.

Watch the recording of the online launch for Flamingo back on our Youtube channel now. Kathryn is joined by guest readers Vicky Morris and Jonathan Edwards.