More acceptances than rejections

Well, I haven’t been posting much poetry lately, but I have been busily employed in the world of literature, and poetry in particular.

Having completed April in a heap after writing a poem a day throughout the month, here I am at the end of another month. And I have completed just one poem in the last 31 days!

However, I have been busy editing and collating all the work I did through April, together with other material already completed over the last 11 months. Submissions of single poems, small selections and even a mini-collection have been sent off far and wide; and there are more yet to send.

I have been spurred on to press that ‘send’ button as much as possible because of one or two acceptances that have come through. There will be more news on those as they are published, but for now I am pleased to say that the number of acceptances are exceeding the number of rejections – so far! It’s a small start towards wider publication, but a definite start, and a very encouraging one.

I am involved in organising a couple of local projects that are taking up a lot of my free time right now. One is working on the committee of the PENfro Book Festival, which I joined earlier in the year.

Beautiful Rhosygilwen Mansion

This is held in mid-September in the fabulous location of Rhosygilwen in Pembrokeshire (links below) We have an evening of the spoken word -- poetry and prose -- with the Cellar Bards and Friends, a day of workshops for writers (I’ll be doing one on freelance journalism and ‘Selling Your Story’); a book fair and talks and meetings with writers in all kinds of genres. And there are some very special guests headlining on the Saturday night – I am currently working on the press release to make that big announcement.

The popular Book Fair, in the Oak Hall at Rhosygilwen

There is also an Open Poetry Competition – for anyone aged 16 or over, which is being judged by award winning poet Samantha Wynne-Rhydderch. Her wonderful collection ‘Banjo’ is shortlisted for Wales Book of the Year. I am running the admin for that competition, so I hope to be very busy around the closing date of July 19. It’s the first time PENfro has run a poetry competition. If it goes well we will do more in future years, so do enter – and please get your entries in soon!!!

There is also a short story writing competition for children, which closes on June 14. Link is below.

Oh, and I am one of the PENfro Poets – the workshop group based at Rhosygilwen that grew out of last year’s PENfro Festival. We will publish a small collection of our work later this summer. And, of course, some of us will be reading our poetry at the Cellar Bards and Friends evening at PENfro 2013.

So, busy times – and much more info to post up later.

More info/links:

http://penfrobookfestival.info/

http://rhosygilwen.co.uk/

Entry forms and info on the PENfro Open Poetry Competition, to download from the website: http://penfrobookfestival.info/?p=493

Children’s Short Story Competition:

http://penfrobookfestival.info/?p=502

PENfro page on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/PeNfroBookFestival

The Cellar Bards Facebook group:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/333544513348067/

They will shoot him

His beauty traps her breath

in her throat,

as she watches, unmoving;

and he looks at her, without seeing.

His secrets are hidden in darkness,

dusk-time creature rummaging and rooting;

heavy and strong, yet he glides

lightfooted over the earth.

He goes about his business in private,

touches no-one,

is confident, solid,

self-contained in his honest life.

He lifts his head, nose-twitching.

Ears prick, a stick cracks …

He’s off, the stocky swagger

powers forward … and disappears.

He is free to breathe

his noble and gracious air

as he travels in darkness

through his world.

He knows only his night-places,

lives in the underground;

and has no need of us.

Yet he is significant to us,

so vital-essential that we

call our ills his fault,

we reproach him

for our shortcomings

and seek to damage him blamelessly,

simply because he lives.

‘Knowledgable’ men and women argue about him,

discuss his trapping and killing.

Misguided, mistaken, ill-advised —

They will shoot him.

This is a revision of a poem I wrote last year after the badger cull was prevented from going ahead in Wales following court action by The Badger Trust.

Now, the killing has started in Somerset, and soon will in Gloucestershire, so this is the rewrite for England. 

See also:

http://www.badgergate.org/guest-articles/the-damned-shame-of-it-all/

Update

I am overwhelmed by the numbers of people who are reading this Blog now -- more than 10,000 views since I started posting regularly last July. Thank you all for reading and thank you too to those who post comments, whether on here and on my Facebook and Twitter accounts.

Just for your information, I have been through the Blog today and deleted a lot of the National Poetry Writing Month posts -- a Poem a Day through April was some task and most of them now need revising and editing.

I have also deleted other poems that are being further edited and submitted for competition or publication. 

It is time that I spent time and effort working on submissions and I am now doing this. I am braced for many rejections -- but we poets are hardy folk. I reckon if you survive long enough, get through the tough times and then are able to write from the heart, you can put up with a few rejections along the way.

Maybe there will be some good news too.

For the time being all the haiku are staying on the site; and most of the political stuff stays too. I believe that here is the best place for the protest/political work. I prefer to publish that here and promote it myself through Facebook and Twitter.

By far the biggest readership on the Blog is the political poetry. It gets a bigger -- and more relevant -- readership here than anywhere else.

The other poem that stays, for the time being at least, is the one called 'LOVE', which gets so many views a day I dare not take it down! I hope to include it as part of a collection I am submitting this summer, but publication on here does not preclude it from that project, so it can stay for now.

I will be posting more new material soon, so keep reading.
And most important, keep writing!

New Vision

It is a year today since I had my cataract operation. Afterwards, the change in my eyesight was staggering – life turned from an impressionist painting to a 3D hi-tech movie, every detail highlighted.

And as well the improvement in the eyesight, I somehow gained new vision in other ways. As it turned out it was an event that changed my life.

I waited about nine months to see the specialist after being referred by my optician, because he thought he saw signs of macular degeneration, and I was thought to be a bit young to be starting that.

That was a very difficult nine months for me. With early onset ARMD (age-related macular degeneration) I had no idea what might happen to my eyesight. I could quickly lose the ability to see well enough to drive, for instance, and I live in a rural area where having a car is essential. Even worse, there was the fear I may go blind.

It was also possible, of course, that there would be no change; or that there was an error. But until I saw that specialist, I had no idea what I was in for.

Waiting nine months not knowing what would happen was tough – but the relief was amazing when the problem was diagnosed; and even more so when it was corrected and I could see clearly again.

That whole process made me think a lot about my life and what I was doing with it. And after the op I had four weeks off work in which to decide what changes to make.

When you have a cataract op you can’t do stuff like gardening – bending over is not allowed for several weeks; and lifting anything heavier than a pen and paper is not allowed either.

And so, with loads of time to think,  and write, by the end of the four weeks I had made the decision to leave my job in journalism, go freelance again and to start doing more creative work.

And here I am, still writing -- putting together a poetry collection, sending off submissions and competition entries -- and wondering why I didn’t do all this sooner.  So, this is an anniversary I celebrate.

Oh, and this Blog, which I started at the end of June 2012 when I left my job,  has today hit 10,000 views. People from all over the world drop in regularly to read the poetry.

Thank you all – and keep reading, there is plenty more to come. x

Cardigan Castle

30 Poems in 30 Days. National Poetry Writing Month. April 2013.

Day 30.   

A haiku to finish this challenge and to celebrate another. There was a great achievement and cause for celebration in Cardigan this month --

the revealing of the walls of Cardigan Castle.

Walls of stone rise up;

nine-hundred years of history,

shouts to open sky

 

Resting muse

30 poems in 30 days. National Poetry Writing Month, April 2013

Day 23

I am still here, just, but the muse is having a break, so two haiku today.

Stone jar is empty,

good words have all taken flight;

fallow lies the muse.

  *

Light shines through crystal,

so rainbows circle around;

but they can’t be caught.