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I’ve just finished another online course hosted by the Poetry School – Accidental Love Poems with David Tait.
Founded in 1997 by poets Jane Duran, Mimi Khalvati and Pascale Petit, the Poetry School is a plethora of all things poetry and the UK’s largest provider of poetry education. It offers a variety of courses of differing lengths and levels, with a new program published each term. I opt for the international courses using its online platform CAMPUS, as there’s no live chat allowing me to write and feed back on work at a time to suit before each deadline.
David is a British-born poet working as a teacher in China and I’ve completed a previous course by him that focused on cities. The prompts have been wonderful and inspired some incredible work, and I’m rather happy with my own batch of poems produced. Before this I did Writing Emotion with Rebecca Tamás and next term I’ve signed up for Elena Karina Byrne‘s Ekphrasis, Art and Translation.
What I love about these courses is discovering new poets, not just through fellow students, but through the assignments and reading set, plus feedback is invaluable, both honing your skills providing it and applying it to your work. And of course they drive you to write! So if you haven’t already, check out the Poetry School, if only to explore the variety of resources and information available.
So our floor has been papered with poems this weekend to help me finalise my first solo collection to be submitted to a publisher. Good job the husband’s away!
Using some of the exercises in Pascale Petit’s Towards a Collection course booklet, I have never had so much fun with my work. And such an intense experience!
Deciding which poems to include didn’t actually take too long. What took time was deciding the order of them. So onto hands and knees I went to arrange them all around me, and I know this sounds weird but pretty soon they were talking to each other. And connections were made and a kind of pattern emerged, almost organically, when I considered form, shape, length, perspective and content. I wanted poems to compliment each other as well as producing contrasts, and alongside the overall theme others emerged, images echoed and after reading it all through in one sitting I felt quite emotional – as all the characters and feelings from each piece met for the first time in my head.
Following Pascale’s advice, I started the collection with a few strong poems to pull the reader in and closed using the same technique because let’s face it, we do all have our favourites in our work. And I must admit I’m very pleased and excited by the final product. Fingers crossed the publisher is too!
This was the title of an article by Pascale Petit in the current edition of Mslexia, and it was an interesting read.
Pascale has a long list of poetic achievements and some fantastic collections, including The Zoo Father and The Huntress, both published by Seren. The latter focuses on her mother, as does this feature, in which Pascale explains the emotional journey she took when attempting to write about her mother and the impact of the abusive relationship she had with her. Those familiar with Pascale’s work know that animals and the Amazon are strong influences, and to be able to write freely about her mother Pascale identified these with her, in particular a golden jaguar quickly followed by a snow leopard, wolverine, giraffe, etc. By doing this Pascale managed to literally exorcise herself of her mother’s ghost, eventually being able to think of her and love together in the same space, thanks to Pascale’s love for the creatures representing her mother in her work.
And this is what I love about poetry – catharsis is one of its many facets, giving us the opportunity to transfer difficult people and experiences onto those things so much more familiar to us and that feel far less uncomfortable. There is much to be said about this painful and then pain-free process.
I met Pascale by attending one of her courses at The Poetry School a few years ago back when I was living in London. The session was called ‘Life Class for Poets’, and focused on generating poetry from image, be they still pictures or a moving life model, encouraging us to free write whatever they inspired within us. I remember I produced some pretty weird and wonderful pieces, which I really should make the time to revisit and develop further.
I’m currently using Pascale’s Towards a Collection course booklet I brought and downloaded from The Poetry School website (I tried to enroll for the face-to-face course but by popular demand it was over-subscribed, so I was thrilled to find I could still access the materials). For anyone looking to do this it’s an invaluable tool, and I particularly like the simple exercise of surrounding yourself with all the poems you’re thinking of including to look for themes, patterns, and a general sense of how they look next to one another. You quickly see what works and what doesn’t, those that belong and those that belong somewhere else.
With the beginning of a new year, I thought it would be a good time to review 2014 and take a look at some of the things I have achieved with my writing.
Producing a short film for my poem
Being one of the winners of mindshare’s When words come to life poetry competition and given the opportunity to create a short video clip to accompany my piece was a most interesting experience. I learnt a great deal about storyboarding poems using impact, music, breath and movement, as well as finding that place you have to get to when reading aloud. And I made some good friends along the way, all of whom have either been impacted by or are involved in mental health.
Breaking into the US market
Having been published in the UK, Australia and Canada, it was wonderful to be accepted into a journal published out of Maine in the US to add to the compliment of continents. The Aurorean was a journal I’d had my eye for a while due to the quality of work it publishes and the awards it has won. I can now be defined as an international poet – long may it continue!
Submitting a draft of my first collection
Having some time off work recently gave me the opportunity to finally develop a first draft of my first collection. Not as easy as you originally think and very all-consuming, but with the help of a course I took with Pascale Petit at the Poetry School and some words of wisdom from Kim Moore on how she did it, I managed to create a fairly cohesive submission that has been sent off to a publisher in London. Let’s see what happens!
What to focus on in 2015
I will continue to submit to magazines and journals but perhaps be more selective, and take a step back from the competitions. I must make more of an effort to attend literary events and readings to network, and keep up with what’s happening on the local poetry scene. And in an attempt to be more organised, I’ve treated myself to the Mslexia 2015 Writer’s Diary, an invaluable resource that I’m wondering how I did without really. If anything comes from my first collection submission then that will take up a large chunk of my time to develop further and fine-tune. I also received news just before Christmas that some of my work has been accepted by a very reputable webzine in the UK run by one of my favourite poets, but more about that shortly.
So here’s to another 12 months of poetry success. A happy new year to you all, keep writing 🙂
When I lived in London I participated in a few Poetry School courses, including a workshop with Pascale Petit and an online course facilitated by Helen Ivory.
Last week the school hosted their first Digital Open Day via CAMPUS, a social network for poets. I signed up to participate in a couple of their live Q&A chats but unfortunately, due to some technical issues our end plus the time difference, was not able to be actively involved.
However, following each event transcripts were posted on the site for group members to access so I was able to catch up on what I missed. The live session Path to a First Collection provided a real insight into the heads of prestigious editors – Neil Astley of Bloodaxe Books (also see Jo Bell’s latest blog) and Amy Wack of Seren – and poets – Kim Moore and Hannah Lowe. Neil and Amy explained what they look for in a submission to grab (and hold) their attention, whereas Kim and Hannah’s perspective was from the submitter and the arduous task of fine-tuning their work before sending it in. It is an invaluable read for anyone making steps to putting their initial manuscript together, be it a full length or pamphlet collection.
Kim Moore is also the Poetry School’s new Poet in Digital Residence. Kim is a wonderful poet based in Cumbria, with her intriguing first pamphlet If We Could Speak Like Wolves published by Inpress and eagerly awaited first full length collection due out in 2015 from Seren. Kim has also been widely published in some of the top literary magazines, such as Rialto and Ambit, and after reading her first blog I’m looking forward to more.
J V Birch 