Some writing is best heard rather than read.  That goes for poems, too. Especially mine. Some of them work out loud, others don’t.

I’ve been fortunate this week to have had the opportunity to read my poetry to large enough audiences, first at The Word in Sligo Library (an open mic) and then in Galway at the launch of the Crannóg Magazine.

Same poem. Different audiences. Same response (a puzzled silence before the polite applause).

It’s one of those poems you need to look at on the page, perhaps savour a little. It’s yet another poem inspired by one of my parents (oh yes, they tuck you up, your Mum and Dad…). This one is called ‘Beacon’ (which was the name of our first hot air balloon many years ago, although that’s totally irrelevant here. You’re welcome). The poem concerns a stone I use as a paperweight which reminds me of my late father and wet weather holidays in Wales when I was a child.

The poem appears in Crannóg 49, which is an excellent compilation of contemporary Irish fiction and poetry with work from writers whose work I know, including Kevin Higgins, Mari Maxwell, Ruth Quinlan, Una Mannion and others, as well as some writers I’m not yet familiar with.

The poem ‘Beacon’ is one of those included in ‘Soft Touch’, my forthcoming poetry pamphlet, chosen by Carol Ann Duffy for her Laureate’s Choice series  2019.

Another poem from that pamphlet, ‘Roots’, appeared recently in an Irish poetry anthology that I’m very pleased to be included in, The Stony Thursday Book, again with a stellar cast of contributors, including Louis de Bernières, author of ‘Captain Corelli’s Mandolin’.  I was particularly pleased with my inclusion in this annual anthology, since I’ve tried several times before to be included, but failed.

I’m always banging on to my writing group members how important it is to be able to take rejection with a pinch of salt. It goes with the territory. Just because your work isn’t accepted by one editor doesn’t mean it isn’t any good, just that it wasn’t right this time for that publication or competition. Try again. Re-write and try again.

For a few months I’ve been getting rejection after rejection for work I’ve submitted to competitions and literary magazines. I was particularly sour about one high profile publication I didn’t get into this summer, but I got over it. I only cried myself to sleep once, although I did stop writing for a while (I think it was a whole 24 hours) because my fragile ego could barely cope.

As if.

I’m champion of denial that one size fits all. It doesn’t, and so don’t try to make it. As I just said, try again. Re-write and try again. If you like it, someone else will too, I promise.

One of my Hennessy winning poems had done the rounds, been accepted, rejected, re-written and all, but I had enough faith in it to keep going, and thankfully persistence paid off.  That poem was ‘Fur Coat and No Knickers’ which took third place in the 2016 Strokestown Roscommon Poets’ Competition, and was published in Crannóg Magazine 43, before I read it out at a Tŷ Newydd Poetry Masterclass with Carol Ann Duffy and Gillian Clarke last year. I came home and re-wrote it (again), re-submitted – and look what happened.

You can see what here  and here

and (some might say) the best bit? Here 🙂