For all poets out there, whether beginners, would-be, well established or occasional; following on from the success of Tabula Rasa, and the brilliant launch at Collected Books (read about the night here) Linen Press have decided to publish a second anthology of women’s poetry.
The anthology will be loosely themed on relationships between women: family, friends, strangers, the real, and the imagined etc. The anthology will be entitled, Duo, and will be published in April 2024.
You can forward your poems for consideration to rosie.pundick12@gmail.com
The closing date for submissions is December 4th. Linen Press are happy to consider both new and previously published work by women. I am less involved than I was with the first anthology but I’m still part of the team. This is an international callout and we are excited to be collaborating with poets in the USA of the calibre of Ellen Bass, whose poems will be included. Please do submit and please do spread the word.
Last year profits went to Stirling Women’s Aid - this year it has yet to be decided. Sadly we cannot pay poets for their contribution.
Still on the subject of poetry - Poetry Digest from Dave Bonta is his personal selection of posts from the poetry blogging network, and well worth following. There is always something of interest to be found there.
Now to postcards. I said last week that I would report back on Linda Lappin’s, The Soul of Place. Well, I’m making my way slowly through this multi-layered text. There is so much here, none of which disappoints. It is both rich in content and in inspiration.
As, Lappin, says,‘ This book invites you on a journey across your personal geography to rediscover the important places in your life from your present surroundings to your childhood home.’ But it also journeys into the magical places that exist only in dream and fantasy. The places of fiction. It encourages the reader to find the narrative in all landscapes and to deep-map any environment, including interiors, physical and mental. I loved the mapping exercises, and also the exercises for postcard narratives. It’s expensive as books go, but I can’t help but recommend it.
On the subject of postcards; I was once part of a workshop led by a poet who began by scattering a pile of old postcards with pictures on the front and messages written on the back, onto the table. She invited us to choose one. We then began free writing, prompted by a series of questions. I don’t remember them exactly now, but they were along the lines of:
Where is this? Describe the landscape.
Place yourself or someone you know in the scene, who is it?
Why are they there?
What can they see, hear smell? Use some, or all, of the senses
What is happening outside of the postcard, that we cannot see?
She then suggested we take lines from our writing, and begin to compose the draft of a poem, which would also include some of the handwritten lines already on the card.
I’ve never forgotten the exercise, I think because the writers at the table enjoyed it, and because it worked. I wrote a poem, unlike any I’d written before (and I’d written plenty) about my mother. I remember I found it quite emotional, quite sad . It was also one of those occasions on which the poem somehow wrote itself.
Here is that poem
Postcard from a Daughter
I think I see my mother, but she doesn’t see me.
I’m not sure if she’s real, if she would ever have stood
at the edge of the sea like this.
She’s wearing
the velvet coat, the one she didn’t make
and shoes with heels that sink in the sand,
toes laced with an incoming tide
hem trailing in its salty wake
she is looking out
at the castle on the other side
stranded on a foreign beach,
combing for her reflection
in the shallow skim of water
blue as the taste of morning,
blue as the stitching on the lining of her coat,
I think I see her when her mind is lost,
contemplating the dance. Here they have dancing
every night on the castle slopes, we stay up to watch.
We don’t send postcards much anymore. The anticipation and curiosity of a card from a faraway place landing on our doormat has mostly been usurped by email and by social media. By the Instagram - Wish you were here. How jealous can I make you? Isn’t my life wonderful, post. You may note a hint of sarcasm here in my words, but I am guilty too. We all do it, and after all we don’t much feel like engaging with the world on those overcast days when we’re feeling less than good. I’m certainly not inclined to share those days publicly. Yet some do and why not? For there is support out there despite the horror show that can be X or Instagram or TikTok… there is also kindness and warmth to be found on social media. It’s not all bad. And it certainly encourages us to write in a postcard form and that can be useful, not only for the poet, but for the essayist, and for the writer of fiction too. Postcards can be a great place to begin. I am thinking of using them to kickstart a new fiction project, more of this another time.
Finally, I wonder what you’re reading? I’m struggling to find a book that I can commit to, so all recommendations gratefully received. BTW did you see that Ben Meyers’ Cuddy ( review here) won the Goldsmiths Prize. I was delighted. I think it’s monumental.
Thanks for reading
Avril x
PS With, dare I say it, Christmas on the way, I can’t resist sharing my daughter’s beautiful watercolour Christmas Cards - if you’re interested you can buy them here
Thank you Avril - have just bought a copy of the Soul of Place... And ordered some of your daughter's beautiful xmas cards!