They Shot all Our Horses -- review

Book Review: They Shot All Our Horses 

poetry collection by Harry Rogers. 

THERE is a strong rhythm to the work of poet and songwriter Harry Rogers, who has just published his first collection of poetry.

‘They Shot all Our Horses’ contains 50 poems, which were written between 1981 and this year.

Harry is one half of the performance poetry duo The Chilly Dogz (with Marc Gordon) and he is also lead singer with the west Wales band Scene Red.

It is not surprising that Harry’s words resonate with a recognisable rhythm as he spends much of his time songwriting and performing his music as well as reading his poetry at live events. He’s a regular at the Cellar Bards evenings in Cardigan.

These song-like qualities are real strengths of his poetry.

He also uses repetition to great effect, much as he might in a song lyric. And rhyme, perhaps not a particularly fashionable attribute of poetry these days, is used in a way that helps create and sustain the rhythm.

A short example from the poem ‘Cathy Come Home Again’:

Harry Rogers

‘Just when I thought the world had moved on
Suddenly it seems that I got it all wrong
Like a recurring nightmare it’s all back on top
Unemployed evictions whilst the wages drop.
Now it’s Cathy come home again
Yes it’s Cathy come home again.’

Most of the poetry in ‘They Shot all Our Horses’ is politically driven and is often campaigning in its stance, raising issues around war, socialism, Toryism, homelessness, the Middle East and more. But it is all personal too, based on the writer’s experiences in earlier years in London and more recently in west Wales.

It’s certainly worth a look as this poetry works on the page as well as in performance.

Price is £7.50.  The collection is available to order online from lulu: 

lulu.com/shop/harry-rogers/they-shot-all-our-horses/paperback/product-21128505.html

This review first appeared in the Tivy-Side Advertiser

Stumbling

Wonder at all life,

look up without seeing; so 

no clear path appears

Where women wait

This poem has been inspired by two things. One was the launch in August 2013 of the first single by The Fishwives Choir, many of whom have lost husbands, sons, fathers or brothers at sea. I am proud to call some of them my friends.  The other inspiration is a beautiful painting, 'Flotsam', by Judith Hickling, which at the time of writing was hanging in the Pendre Art Gallery in Cardigan. There are links to information about both of these below. And there is more to come from me on the 'Flotsam' theme.

For now, this is for the Fishwives Choir.

  

Where women wait

Cottage windows look out

on the calming sea

as the slow tide settles;

and tiny lights shine misty

through the glass, all the long night.

Figures are hardened,

like standing stones,

and rocks unmoving by the shore.

Weary eyes search this scene,

where women wait.

Three boats cast off last night

on the full moon tide.

Fishermen fought for footholds

on heaving, slipping decks

as the sudden storm thundered.

Two boats return in the grey dawn.

All day alarms sound,

radios hiss. But the only reply

is the loud beating of hearts

where women wait.

Frail threads of faith

lie buried as deep

as the coldest fathoms.

The Fishwives Choir

Salt licks hair and stings eyes

as they watch from the wall.

As moonrise brings a higher tide

three men are lost tonight.

As hopes rise and fall

waves swell in dull yellow light,

minds reach out to lost souls

where women wait.

Links:

 

https://www.facebook.com/TheFishwivesChoir?fref=ts

http://www.midlandartists.co.uk/members/gallery/Judith-Hickling/275.aspx?page=1

 

Amazing where art takes you

campaigning in Bristol in 2010

Sometimes our creative work takes us in surprising new directions; and this is one example of that, which happened to me over the last few days.

One small step after another, I found myself taken from that famous painting The Scream, by Edvard Munch, to issues and campaigns about female genital mutilation (FGM)*. Surprisingly, there weren't very many steps in this process.

I wrote the poem below in response to that painting, The Scream, which Munch completed in 1893. Art of all kinds is one of my constant inspirations.

I wanted to call the poem 'Silent Scream', but the title sounded familiar, so I checked it out. I discovered that it is the title of a number of films about abortion, but it is also the title of a film, made by a group of schoolgirls in the Bristol area, that forms part of their campaign to raise awareness about FGM and to get it stopped. They reckon that 20,000 girls in the UK are currently at risk of female genital mutilation. See the link below. So, I dedicated the poem to all those girls who are at risk of this barbaric practice.

I read it at the Poems and Pints live literature event in Carmarthen last night. Comments from other women there suggested to me that FGM is indeed still practiced widely in the UK, and that health professionals here collaborate in this practice, which has been illegal here since 1985.

Coincidentally, today there is a report on BBC News online about a new study into the numbers of women in England and Wales who have undergone female genital mutilation.

The aim is to update a 2007 analysis which suggested more than 66,000 women had undergone a form of ritual cutting, with some 24,000 girls at risk.

*Female genital mutilation (FGM) involves the partial or total removal of the female genital organs, sometimes only leaving a small hole for urination or menstruation.
Campaigners say some communities in the UK with origins in Africa, the Middle East or Asia believe it is a necessary part of becoming a woman, that it reduces female sex drive and therefore the chances of sex outside marriage.
The practice can be life-threatening and women who have been cut often experience pain during sexual intercourse and problems during child birth and menstruation.

Here's the poem: 

Silent scream

Do you feel it?

The Scream, by Edvard Munch, 1893

do you feel the scream?

It is not hers, nor his,

not mine,

all of us are this cry.

Do you feel

this thing beyond senses?

Its desolation breathes through us

and wreathes us

in a veil so dark

there is no sight, nor sound;

nothing to touch or taste.

Black air moves around,

seeps into us, becomes us;

unseeing, unseen, unheard.

Only bleak despair

dwells in our silence.

In this darkest place

none of us can know our name.

 

and the links:  

http://integratebristol.org.uk/2011/06/14/silent-scream/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-23404970

Gin

Glass shines in sunlight,

taste sharp of lime skin; watch the

crystal bubbles cling.

Evening haiku

This golden field rests

in quiet sun of evening;

cool breeze sharpens night.