St Andrews - Paris - Glasgow - London

Busy times on the poetry front! Had a wonderful time at StAnza which was a couple of weeks ago now. My worries of bursting into bouts of coughing during my reading thankfully never materialised (was recovering from a nasty sinus infection). How strange it was to be one of the 'proper' readers at the festival this year! I read as part of The Scottish Book Trust award writers showcase alongside Tracey S Rosenberg, Kathrine Sowerby and Andrew Sclater. Our reading was in the wonderful St. Andrews Town Hall in front of a very generous and warm audience, I signed a fair few copies of Vintage Sea afterwards and people were very kind with their comments - overall a very encouraging experience!

I went to a number of events, my favourites being Douglas Dunn in Conversation , the masterclass with Paul Muldoon and readings of modern Chinese poets in translation by Brian Holton and Bill Herbert. Chatted to a great many poets in between events too. Favourite book buy of the weekend was Sujata Bhatt's Collected - bought one of her collections when I arrived there on the Friday and loved it so much that I bought her Collected on the Sunday before I left! Sadly I couldn't make it up to St Andrews in time to hear her or Brian Turner read though I saw her wondering around the Byre theatre many times but failed to pluck up the courage to talk to her or ask her to sign her book for me!

You can read a pre-StAnza interview with myself and Andrew Sclater by the online lit mag The Skinny on our experience of winning the new writers award - here. 

So! Two weeks till Paris!! Last year I was invited by Pansy Maurer-Alvarez to come to Paris and do a reading as part of a monthly reading series she runs called Poets Live. Of course I agreed (Paris in the spring!!!) and I'm excited to be reading with the Irish poet Afric McGlinchey and instead of a usual third reader we are to be treated to a performance by a dancer!


My book is coming out in May - I've arranged to have the Glasgow launch on Friday 16th at Tell It Slant - Glasgow's new poetry bookshop - and I'm excited to have Glasgow-based poets Katherine Sowerby, Samuel Tongue and Calder Wood Press fellow poet Ross Wilson reading at it also.

The London launch is the following week at the London Review Bookshop on the 21st with Mandy Kahn, Rufo Quintavalle and SJ Fowler. Exciting times coming up!  

Had a really good night at the Scottish Book Trust showcase event in Edinburgh. It was great to get a chance to hear the other readers especially the fiction writers who all read so grippingly well that I can't wait for all of their stories, books to come out. I also got to meet and chat with some of this year's New Writers Awardees which was really nice. The Scottish Book Trust produced a great little book with a selection of writing from all of us plus a page of info we wrote ourselves about our writing. You can download the online version of the book for free here.

Here's what I wrote about  about Tree Language - 

The poems in my first full-length collection, which I’ve been working on over this last year, fall into four distinct sections which I only became aware of when putting the collection together; though the same, generally dark, themes are carried through each section.

My main interest in writing these poems was to explore themes of love, death, sometimes violence and how they are played out, reflected in and contrasted against the backdrop of nature and the landscape the poems are set in. I also have a tendency towards the surreal.

Many of my poems begin from observations in the natural world: the shape of a tree and its shadow, the sun on the back of the Clyde, the flowering orchid on my windowsill. I find that through examining the physical details of nature I’m able to gain a level of distance and objectivity which allows me to explore broader human and personal themes.

The focus on nature also enables me to sidestep the confines of narrative logic, tap into the unconscious dream – like processes but at the same time stay rooted in the physical, tangible world.     

 The next event is StAnza. I'm reading on the Saturday as part of the Scottish Booktrust Showcase. There are four of us reading so we get fifteen minutes each. I'm only able to get to St Andrews by the Friday night so I'm gutted to be missing Sujata Bhatt and Brian Turner reading. However I have booked tickets and will finally get the chance to hear John Burnside which I'm incredibly excited about and also the masterclass with Paul Muldoon. 

My next mentoring meeting with Vicki Feaver is the week after Stanza, I have four poems ready for it so far which I'm pleased about. Really working hard to expand my writing and I feel hopeful that these poems are doing just that.

When the lovely folk at Poetry magazine asked if I would be happy to record my poems for the podcast to go with the magazine I thought I would probably record my poems into my phone or tablet and email a soundfile off to them. Well I got that wrong - they booked a slot for me at one of the BBC recording studios in Glasgow!!!

So today I went up to Glasgow, found my way to the BBC and was escorted through tight security to a recording studio with a very helpful sound engineer. It was an odd experience reading into the mic with the headphones on, the sound engineer waving at me from the next room through the glass window and the American guy from Poetry on the phone listening in and chatting to me inbetween reading my poems! It was actually quite nervewracking at first until I got used to the sound of my voice through the headphones. However they were so friendly and helpful that I soon relaxed and enjoyed the process.

So! My poems will be in January's issue of Poetry magazine and I'm not sure how many of the poems they'll have on the podcast. It's been mind-blowing for me this last month or so - filling in contributor info for Poetry magazine, filling in US tax forms which I must say are Very complicated (Poetry mag pay VERY well!!!), reading and checking proofs for my poems and now recording my poems at a proper recording studio! I really am wondering whose life I've suddenly fallen into!

The programme for StAnza 2014 is now online. I'm excited to be reading on the Saturday along with three other New Writers at the New Writers Award Showcase event, my profile is up here.

I've had three wonderful mentoring meetings with Vicki Feaver who has been very generous with her help and advice. I think I have one last meeting with her in January which I'm desperately trying to come up with new poems for - all this other exciting poetry stuff has been quite distracting plus I've finalised and handed in the manuscript for my collection which has been a completely mind-consuming process.

I also have two new poems published - 'The Animal in the Pot' in Northwords Now which you can read online here (p7), and 'View' in Ink, Sweat &amp & Tears here.

Life has been pleasantly busy on the poetry front:

Writing poems, re-drafting poems, filling in author questionnaires, sorting out an author pic, putting together a sampler for the Scottish Book Trust, reading in London, meeting with my writing mentor in Edinburgh and so on...

I so enjoyed the reading in London at the Eyewear event and super pleased to be back down in a few weeks time to be a guest reader at the launch of four Eyewear collections. Aside from the excellent poetry I just LOVE the Eyewear books!! They are all beautifully designed hard-backs and I'm so looking forward to mine coming out in the spring.
It seems things have been on a non-stop roll for a while now and I intend to make the most of it while it lasts!  I've been asked to participate in a reading showcase for the New Writers Award event at StAnza in St. Andrews next year and also been invited to read in Paris (!!) in the spring as part of an Eyewear poets reading night!

Originally the focus of my mentoring was going to be on putting together my first collection and obviously that's now not needed, so instead Vicki is helping me to extend my voice / exercise more control over voice and imagery and think about themes for working towards a second collection, which is tremendously exciting. It's so wonderful (and nerve-wracking) getting input from an amazing poet like Vicki Feaver, such a wonderful opportunity to push my writing further and escape the post-first-collection-slump. 

I've been reading lots of the two WS's (WS Graham and WS Merwin) and listening to podcasts from the Poetry Foundation website. I especially love the Lorine Niedecker podcast (she has such a beautiful voice) and the Stanley Kunitz podcast who I could listen to all day.