I had the temerity to question this, and was told that it was an American poetry conference and that that was the way they do things; I wasn’t to worry, though, as there would be drink available on the final night.
Continue reading “poems and pints”
Under the headline Dolphin ‘superpod’ seen by wildlife spotters off Skye, the BBC start a story with this slightly disconcerting lede:
A group of wildlife spotters have encountered a massive pod of dolphins on a boat trip off the north coast of Skye.
I guess even dolphins must get tired of swimming sometimes.
The world has not turned to black and white. This is a perfectly normal English day in mid May with 100% cloud cover, a bitter wind, and noisy aeroplanes directly overhead.
Continue reading “do not adjust your screen”
Horse chestnuts hold pale torches high
in green spread fingers and old wisteria
writhes around wrought iron
in a blue-teared cascade.
Throughout the city,
elm trees sway, scattering
indifferent confetti.
These lines have been retrieved and re-vamped from a poem called Flowers for an Easter wedding.
It was written some years ago – in Spain, which accounts for the elms, and for why it’s so out of synch with the English flowering season – and I think it was published as a three stanza piece with 15 lines.
Continue reading “old chestnuts”
In London for a few days and I see they are having an elephant parade.
This is the only one I have got close enough to photograph so far, and although bright enough in himself, he didn’t go far towards brightening the dingy turning off Oxford Street where he was located.
Continue reading “irrelephant”
don't confuse the narrator 