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.
