Tag: poetry

May the Birthweek Commence

Inspiration

Yesterday I handed in my latest four pieces of coursework, including my interview piece with Benjamin Zephaniah. I met with my Gran at the Tate Modern, where we started our day with the Yayoi Kusama exhibition.



I first came across Kusama whilst studying my art foundation at Central Saint Martins and I became fascinated by her use of polka-dots and her use bright colours, and her poetry. I bought a book of hers which I sadly lost in a photocopier (or so I suspect). I did write down this quote:

“A polka-dot has the form of the sun, which is a symbol of the energy of the whole world and our living life, and also the form of the moon, which is calm Round, soft, colourful, senseless and unknowing. Polka-dots can’t stay alone; like the communicative life of people, two or three polka-dots become a movement.”

I was also inspired by use of cherry blossom depicted in the poem below, which I used in my paintings in order to symbolise the conflict between childhood and adulthood.

I want to eat cherry blossoms.
I want to kiss their pink colors.
Their scent that would have reached the universe dissipated in my youth.
Remembering that, now tears roll down my eyes.
Scattering cherry blossom petals on the path of my faint love, I will be facing death someday.
When that day arrives, all the love that I have had in my past, I will enwrap life.
On that moment, the flower path of cherry blossoms will envelop the whole of me without fail.
Cherry blossoms, cherry blossoms, cherry blossoms.
They explore my life and death.
Dear Cherry blossoms, I thank you


I first saw her exhibition at White Cube, and so this exhibition was interesting in terms of exploring the variety of her work, of which I loved every bit.

We went for a quick meal at Mon Plaisir which was nice. The main meal was quite small, but the desert was lovely – a rich chocolate mouse with a passion-fruit ice cream. Then, it was time for my birthday treat – Matilda the Musical! I thought it was good that it was faithful to the story-line but also was not restricted by it, making adaptions, and infusing more magical threads to the narrative. It did feel really magical and I loved the songs, as well as some of the messages they conveyed about being the writer of the story of your life, and although the main star, Matilda, is generally a good girl, that ‘sometimes you have to be a little bit naughty’ when you feel like something is not right to you.

In other news, I’ve had a couple of rejections – the Charles Pick Fellowship and my first application for Arts Council funding. I was disappointed that I’d had to email to ask about the Fellowship and that I would have not been contacted otherwise. I’d had a nightmare about not being accepted for it so it was really gutting that I’d not even made the short-list. Next year I think I’ll reapply with my novel idea, as maybe proposing to write a series of children’s short stories was not good enough, especially as a faculty member at UEA had told of the polarised views of children’s literature by the other staff.

I didn’t expect to be successful for my first arts council application. As I have the money to put my event on from being a Poet Shadow in Shake the Dust, I don’t have to worry about actually not being able to afford it. Though, making a profit will be unlikely. And although you can’t make a profit with Arts Council funding, it does mean the money isn’t coming out of your own pocket, resulting in a loss. Anyway, I emailed for further feedback and got a great response and so have lots to learn for any future applications. Particularly the idea of whether I actually do want to do any more events – do I want to be a writer or a producer? I’d say 100% a writer, first and foremost, but that I would like involvements in events and sometimes enjoy putting on my own events. Also, this pilot project is more about just putting myself out there and learning from the experience, so we’ll have to wait and see!

xxx

Shaking It, Like a Polaroid Picture Etc.

Inspiration, News, Poetry Gigs


Shake off your dust; rise up, sit enthroned, O Jerusalem. Free yourself from the chains on your neck, O captive Daughter of Zion.

Well, it is Easter Sunday, if there was a time for a non-believing Catholic to post a biblical quote, this would be it. As my nearest and dearest have been contemplating their religion and the meaning of life, I have been getting involved in some actual dust-shaking in poetic form.

My past scrape with an increase in white blood cells has obviously not enforced the idea of resting enough. Prone to type A personality traits, I struggled into work at Sainsbury’s and kept up with my coursework until I couldn’t take it anymore. I eventually took a day off work and missed some of my classes for my MA, and it seems I am being punished for not taking work off earlier because apparently you need to take 5 shifts off and have a doctor’s note to be eligible for sick-pay. Long story short, I’ve done some overtime to make up the hours and eventually got some Amoxicillin which I’m hoping will mean I’m fully recovered by next week.

Anyway, back to the big news! As I mentioned previously, I was chosen as a Peer Mentor for Shake the Dust, the biggest youth poetry slam the UK has ever seen (organised by Apples & Snakes). However, now Sam Riviere had to pull out, I have been promoted to being a Poet Shadow! It’s a great surprise and honour to be selected as a replacement for someone so successful. I’ll be working with Poet Coach, Ross Sutherland at The Netherhall School in Cambridge, who I remember Tom Chivers of Penned in the Margins describing as one of the hardest working poets. I’ve seen him perform a few times and had the pleasure of reading the Twelve Nudes manuscript during my internship at PITM – and in the couple of years since Ross has managed to put out two more books!

Last Tuesday I went to a professional development day for the East region at The Garage and soon discovered I personally knew/had met about half of the people involved, and the rest I (mostly) knew of a poets anyway. I did feel a bit overwhelmed at first, being surrounded by so many admirable poets, but everyone was lovely and I soon got into it and ended up having a fantastic time. I’m feeling more confident about helping out at the workshops and think that it’ll be a really great experience! I feel so lucky to be able to participate as a Poet Shadow, and although I have applied for funding for my own event in August, I will now not have to worry about the financial side as the income from my role at Shake the Dust will cover my basic budget. So, everything’s pretty good right now, just need to be feeling healthy again and have a little bit of sunshine!

Also, my Gran got me a book about Angela Carter – someone I definitely think I should have read by now and want to do in the future. I’m now reading The Great Gatsby, which is also a long overdue read! Now, off to eat some egg-shaped chocolate!

xxx

Living It Up

Inspiration, News

I don’t know where to start today because this morning I spoke to Benjamin Zephaniah on the phone! I’ve got quite a bit of news but since I’m feeling so inspired by tour conversation, with a massive scrawl of notes surrounding my typed questions, I’ll start with this. I had been in contact via his agency about emailing some questions, however, I was told Benjamin doesn’t do email interviews and to give him a phone call. I was so scared at the prospect that my initial reaction was to run away in fear. Obviously, passing up the opportunity to speak directly to one of my idols would have been a stupid thing to do. So I did it.

It’s one of those days where Metric’s Help, I’m Alive comes into my mind. These are the things you need to do to feel alive, to be really living. I don’t like dealing with phones at the best of times, so talking to such a successful writer was bound to be daunting for me. I’ve admired his work since primary school, and got to see him perform live during secondary school. I  even discovered I’d done a project on him when I was at school, so it seems almost meant to be that I have decided to do a piece of coursework on my MA about him again.

So, there was a bit of a mix up with timings but after a few nervous words from me, I began the questions. The rest of the questions connected with what Benjamin was saying, and just flowed very naturally, until I even began to ask questions that just occurred to me on the spot. I related to a lot of what he told me about feeling the desire to become a writer ‘deep in my bones’ and with wanting to do a range of work because of a ‘need to express yourself’.

It was so interesting hearing him talk about his experiences and the way he really lives and had no doubt that he would be able to achieve the dream he had when he was ‘eight years old’. It inspired me so much, especially the way he spoke about his belief in ‘love and peace’ and that it is something I really connect with, and something that if everyone did, a world without war would be able to become a reality. We are one world after all. He is a man with a lot of compassion and understanding, and sees the importance of being both serious and playful, and how even with lighthearted work, sometimes humour can ‘show the absurdity’ of something.

So, overall, I am so glad I got this amazing opportunity to speak to Benjamin Zephaniah. He spoke of receiving a hand-written letter from Bob Marley, and how it gave him a ‘big push’ and I feel this has given me the same push. When you speak to someone like Benjamin, it restores your faith in everything. I have always had this conviction that I will achieve my dreams, but it can be hard when you feel like you have to convince others, and that they don’t understand where you are coming from. I feel that I can look back on this day whenever I face any opposition or rejection, and know that I will not let the doubts of others affect my mind.

Just to end this post with a few bits of good news. I have entered a competition with Ether Books and need to get the most downloads of my short story from their app. It’s free, so please click here to download. You need to have an Apple device to access the app (I can use my iPod Touch) and then you just type in my name and should be able to find it. The ‘genre’ it would be under is ’18-25 iPad Contest’.

I have some love poems up on the Something Fine website, so check that out. And, last but not least, I have managed to just scrape a distinction in my MA coursework submission from last term. I got two 69 marks, and two 71 ones, so that averages out as a 70. I really want to work hard so I can achieve a distinction at the end now! Well, Benjamin Zephaniah wished me luck, so I’ve got a lot going for me right now! Also, look out for his next dubstep album, and see him live at Broadstairs Folk Week in August.

xxx

Don’t Fritter Your Fiver

Other

Since I’m saving for my MA whilst on little more than minimum wage, and, I’m pretty sure this recession stuff is still rolling, I thought it would be useful to think of little ways to save money.  One tool I should point out is the Drink Aware website, as it promotes healthier drinking habits too.  Out of interest, this month I kept track of how I’ve spent my fivers.  Although I have at times given into the urge to splurge on sale items I can’t afford, it is often the little things that add up and make all the difference between a a healthy balance and, well, overdrawn.  As my mum always says, ‘look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves.’

So I looked at ways that I have been frittering my fivers!  This way I can see what my spending habits are and whether I am spending it on necessities or luxuries.  It went a little something like this…

– 04/01/12: £1.50 – Basmati Rice from Iceland.

– 07/01/12: £3.26 – Chocolate Crêpes, Terry’s Chocolate Orange, and 5 Aero Xmas Trees, from Sainsbury’s.

– Chocolates and a present: £4.50, from Sainsbury’s.

– 10/01/12: £1.52 for postage of poetry submissions.

– 21/01/12: Dessert at Nando’s.

– 26/01/12: More chocolate.

– Various: £2.60 to get to work in Epsom.

So, looking over my spending, I spend a lot on chocolate, which tends to be when I’m visiting my boyfriend.  I had a feeling I was doing this and told him maybe we should try not to do it so much.  The only necessities were the rice and travel for work.  The postage was also a wise spend.  And the present could be argued as unnecessary but I think it was worthwhile!

Okay, I’m partial to a bit of chocolate in the evening but I think I can go for a couple of days without (as I write, there’s a strip of chocolate in the cupboard which I am foregoing to get some things ticked off my to-do list.  So, if I stopped buying as much chocolate, I could save approximately £10-15 a month.  That’s £120-180 a year!  That could practically get me a festival ticket or a cheap holiday! That could buy me more poetry books – even though I have around 10 to read, my Gran got me a membership for the Poetry Society which I want to use.  And I think supporting poetry is probably more important than chocolate (although that arguably helps with serotonin levels and increases happiness – yay!)

So, if you fancy not frittering your fiver, you could use it to buy some poetry… perhaps even help me out and get a copy of my book/eBook, as I could do with the feedback (and the chocolate money – okay, what if I promise I won’t fritter?)  So, I’m not doing anything silly like giving up chocolate, but I am thinking more wisely about spending so much on it, so maybe I’ll only get some if it’s like a really good deal! 😉

I’ll end this post with a new poem that Matt and I are going to use for a project we’re working on.

January

New year, same you; but with added shine,
a slicker rhyme, I’m feeling fine,
each day is mine – and I’m on fire.
I am climbing, I am always getting higher,
as I shoot and grow,
my roots, I know, are firmly on the ground.
I am free to feel, myself, so real,
I am finally unbound.

xxx

Know Yourself: Your Inner Core

Inspiration, News

The past few days can be explained by something that happened to me yesterday morning.    I had bought two travel-cards for that day and today.  As I stepped off the train at Waterloo and my ticket for the day somehow flew out of my hand.  Everything turned to slow motion as it slipped between the train and the platform’s edge and on to the tracks.  In a panic, I rushed to someone who worked there at the barrier’s and explained what had happened.  He said I would have to buy another ticket if I couldn’t find it, and so he followed me as I sped along the tracks trying to find where I dropped it.  Thankfully, I found it and I stopped my shaky panic as another worker lent down with a litter picker and fished it out.

It was a microcosm of the emotions I had been through the past few days.  For personal reasons, I had been on an emotional roller-coaster (excuse the cliché) and felt a switch between unlucky and lucky.  I’d cried myself to sleep for the first time ever, and learnt that the only way you can combat that is to take some sleeping pills to send you off.  The next day I tried to keep my tears at bay whilst doing yoga, being told I was ‘strong’ and to remember my ‘inner core’ (actually something my mum always says, but at this point coming from the dulcet tones of Leah Bracknell).  I made my way through the work day at Sainsbury’s and was nearly about to break when during my review session, my manager said ‘you always come in with a smile on your face,’ due to the irony of how utterly rubbish I felt at the time.  The review was great and made me feel a lot better about myself and I even managed to get my Saturdays back by asking to change my shift pattern in April.

So, on to more positive and self-affirming things.  On 12th January, my eBook was officially released on iTunes.  It appears one person has bought a copy from California, so whoever you are, please let me know what you think!   I think it’s important to get excited about these little things and to remember the words of Leah Bracknell in day-to-day life.  Sometimes I read over my school reports and even things like my Facebook page, just to remind myself of who I am and that I like who I am.  My dad has always taught me it’s very important to like yourself.  And despite being labeled “shy” by others, my mum has always said I have an inner confidence about myself.

Some other things I wanted to share are related to the poetry of others.  At my Aunt and Uncle’s house, which is a lot more like mine will be than the spotless house I live in with my parents, they have a poem on the fridge by Rosie Milligan:

Dust if you must.

But wouldn’t it be better,
To paint a picture, or write a letter,
Bake a cake, or plant a seed?
Ponder the difference between want and need.

Dust if you must.
But there is not much time
With rivers to swim and mountains to climb!
Music to hear, and books to read,
Friends to cherish and life to lead.

Dust if you must.
But the world’s out there
With the sun in your eyes,
the wind in your hair,
A flutter of snow, a shower of rain.
This day will not come round again.

Dust if you must.
But bear in mind,
Old age will come and it’s not kind.
And when you go, and go you must,
You, yourself, will make more dust.

There’s a band that I saw at Bestival, that I really want to see again, called Los Campesinos.  I just wanted to share a spoken word section of their song This is how you spell ‘HAHAHA, We Destroyed the Hopes and Dreams of a Generation of Faux-Romantics.’  I find the combination of music, song and spoken word inspiring but, not only that, I find the words very poetic and yet witty and contemporary.  Have a read:

You walk in from your mother’s balcony
Panda-eyed and freezing cold
You bury yourself in my chest to warm
I notice the goosebumps on your arms, millions
And whether it’s because of the numbers of hours spent laid facedown on my bed listening to white noise, or, well, obviously it’s not, I somehow manage to translate them from braille

The trails on your skin spoke more to me than the reams and reams of half finished novels you’d leave lying all over the place
And every quotation that’d dribble from your mouth like a final, fatal livejournal entry
I know
I am wrong
I am sorry

With that, I am going to wrap up.  One last thought; if you picked up a copy of The Times today, there was an article by Francis Beckett titled ‘Take the penury out of the penmanship’ which is about my MA course in Creative Entrepreneurship.  I’m feeling quite organised and excited, though still a little scared in a Metric-Help-I’m-Alive kind of way.’

Also, I’ve found there’s a Canadian woman who is also an entrepreneurial writer who’s stolen my name!  Well, she’s called herself La Carmina, and her real name is Carmen Yuen. I think we’re different enough for it not be annoying or add confusion, but as I like the uniqueness of my name and she’s more well-known than me, it disheartens me a little.  But to end, it is important to know yourself and remember your inner core.

xxx

Christmas is Coming…

Music, News

Winter has been rather chilly (no surprises there Radiohead) but the sun was glorious the week before.  Here are some photos I took whilst waiting at Worcester Park train station.  The skirt is from Primark.  I bought it and then realised it’s verging on the ‘midi’ which I didn’t think I’d like but it’s nice and floaty and whooshes around when you spin.

So, me and Matt have been posting these little cards around – you can grab one from two of my local libraries (Worcester Park and Sutton) as well as the Poetry Library at the Southbank Centre.

I’ve taken a few comparison shots of Christmas trees as I’m pretty proud of our tree this year 🙂  Mine is the one at the end, and you can see it all lit up on the left of this text.

A slight digression here, but I had my iPod on shuffle and found these two tracks went really well together: Enter Shikari’s Mothership, followed by Bloc Party’s Talons.  I’ve got them to listen to via YouTube just below…

Speaking of music… after buying tickets to see Rihanna in May for my birthday, the day finally came!  I went with my friend from uni, Josie, and some of her friends.  Calvin Harris began the night, get everyone going (well, some people going… as we worked our way through the crowd there were a few people standing very still and leaving piles of bags and coats for us to trip over).  The lady herself was, as expected, amazing!  Highlights include Rihanna playing the drums, pole-dancing as an art-form (along with her own rather saucy dancing) and the finale of Umbrella, ending a night of fantastic tunes.  It was also quite cool seeing all the different costume changes as well as witnessing someone who can keep breathing with all that singing and dancing.

In other news, I have had my haircut so that it’s no longer asymmetric.  I hadn’t had a cut for 7 months so I splashed out at Toni & Guy (Mustafa is expensive but he’s my favourite) and I know you’re “supposed” to go every 4-6 weeks or something but I’m going to leave it until May now.  I’m growing it out and I can’t wait!  I have a full fringe as well which I haven’t had since I was at Primary school or something!  I spent a few days in Norwich and Matt got me some lovely presents (he made me open some but I’ve saved a few) and below you can see the amazing picture he’s drawn off us 🙂

I came home to London to find my self-published book!  It had typos which I have hopefully sorted now but I’d really welcome some feedback.  When I get published by a publishing company (remaining positive and not saying ‘if’) I want it to be very visually exciting but I’ve just done the basic bones so that if people want to rip it apart for the poetry they can.  That said, if someone completely hated it, they probably wouldn’t like anything I did but I am welcoming any constructive criticism.

I’ve also got an eBook and priced them both quite cheaply.  The hard copy comes with extra poems and costs £2 more than the eBook.  Both are available here from Lulu by clicking here.  In about 6-8 weeks they’ll be available from other places like Amazon too.  Great if you end up with a new Kindle or Ipad in your stocking this year.  It’s Christmas in half an hour – so have a great time celebrating!

xxx

Hold Your Beliefs Lightly

Poetry Gigs

Last week I saw my friend Siobhan Belingy for her birthday and she gave me this cool pink ring – it’s eyes move!  I also saw Grayson Perry’s exhibition at The British Museum and loved it!  My Gran and Siobhan had both said it was unmissable so I’m really glad I got to see it.  I loved the mix of old and new, Perry’s unique style (with the use of some of my favourite colours) and the use of text and poetry.  It also dealt with really interesting subject matters, and I’d really recommend it.  There’s a picture of the bike outside with my boyfriend Matt.  We also went to the East London Design Show (good but we had to pay to get in?!) and Winter Wonderland which was lovely but neither me or my boyfriend could afford even a bag of candy floss!

Lastly, on Tuesday I went to my last open mic night for some time at Herne Hill’s Half Moon pub for Needle & Thread.  I did some new material but stumbled quite a lot so wasn’t the best gig.

I’m now going into hiatus for a bit to concentrate on my MA work as the essays have been stressing me out.  I’ve got a few things in the pipe-line (I met up with another poet this night to discuss future event plans) but I’m not going to hit the open mic nights regularly until at least around May.  Also, Angel from Big Brother was performing at this open mic!  I don’t know if anyone else knew who she was but I’ve watched every year of Big Brother so I found it rather exciting! Me and Matt have been flyering and getting organised with that but him mum reckons we should be charging for them.  We’ve actually learnt a lot from doing it but it would be great if anyone knew how to get different shops selling them!  We could have made about £90-390 from them!

I’ll keep an update on what I’m up to other than not going to open mic events 🙂

xxx

Savage Messiahs of London City

Inspiration

I have just updated my status on TweetDeck that I am “craving drink and fancy dress. instead i’m attending talks and blogging. oh, how grown up i have become since time/money have been eaten up”.  I am actually too tired to write this blog now so I’m going to start/finish it on Thursday, if I remember…

I’ve got a spare half an hour at the moment, so am updating in chunks.  On Halloween, I went to a discussion about Laura Oldfield Ford’s Savage Massiah; a book where her work from 2005, in the ‘zine of the same title, has been collected and formed into a linear format.  I travelled straight from work and so had to eat dinner out.  I went to a Thai restaurant called Mae Ping which was a welcome change from my frequent Nando’s trips (much as I love them, I had eaten there the three days prior to this).  I ordered pretty much straight away, from the ‘express’ menu, and it took a mere five minutes before a steaming plate of Prawn Pad Thai was in front of me.  It was quite spicy and had nice big prawns, and absolutely delicious, and cost just £7.15 (including a 65p service charge).  I was able to pay quickly, and had a lovely little after dinner mint. I was disappointed that Laura didn’t give a reading from the book, but it was an interesting, thought-provoking discussion.  I had wanted to see her since in my undergraduate Creative Writing modules, I had been compared to her in terms of writing.  The book is set out like a graphic novel; with Biro drawings alongside poetic musings.  It is definitely on my Christmas list.

…Another chunk.  I liked the ideas of Laura showing her work on different levels.  Something I had been thinking about starting, and will experiment with soon, is hand-made poetry booklets.  I was inspired at the talk to try out fly-posting, and one idea I have had is to go on walks around residential areas with photocopied poetry sheets, and post them to different houses, as it’s always nice (and rare) when you get something actually interesting through the post-box.  I agree it is important for art to be communicated with all kinds of people.  Laura also stated that her views tend to polarize people.  This is where I felt conflicted.

I have been irritated by one of my friends who always comments on me being ‘middle class’.  It is not so much me having a problem with the label, but just the assumptions that my friend makes of people with this label, that just make it appear that she has a chip on her shoulder… herself and her partner are educated to a high degree, and she has lived in a nice country house, and is in a financial position to live out of her family home.  Middle-class-me is very fortunate to be able to live in the suburbs with my parents, but I cannot afford to move out and am working in a lower-ranking job.  Here, the boundaries of class are mixed up.  This is why I think that Laura was talking about this subject without acknowledging these elements of confusion – the students that are all in debt (and the future who will face more debts) and the classes where “Daddy” doesn’t pay for everything .  I’m not complaining about my deal, as I said, I think myself very lucky.  I’m just saying that the reality is that if I or my friends (including the one I mentioned) wanted to live in London, we would not be able to.  She seems to consider herself ‘working class’ and I ‘middle class’.

Laura referred to ‘yuppies’ but, essentially, there is nothing wrong with working hard and doing so in finance, or what was called the ‘creative industries’.  She later rephrased this term by stating she meant ‘the rich’ which makes more sense to me.  She spoke very eloquently throughout, yet this term ‘yuppy’ took her backwards because it is, basically, a derogatory term, poking fun at those better off.  In fact, very few people are rich, and she would be faced with a lot more understanding if she used the simple term ‘rich’ because it includes the majority.  Otherwise, like my friend, she appears to have a chip on her shoulder.  What she was really talking about, it seemed to me, was opportunities for artists to work in the system we have.  That is why she is criticizing Capitalism.  I agree with her opinions on Capitalism, but, we need to work with what we have got as well.  She is aware of it, as shown by the fact that her work does operate in galleries as well as the street, and that the audience had to pay £10 to attend the discussion (£5 for me, being a student).  This point was brought up in the questions section and although I thought it was quite clever, Laura seemed defensive… then again, you would be a bit because it does kind of undermine your opinion in this case.

Well, I’m just going to wrap this up quickly because I have actual important stuff to write, like one of three 3000 word essays in for January that I’ve only written under 400 words for after over 3 hours of work.  With just two days free, and those mostly taken up by seeing my boyfriend, I don’t really have that much time on my hands.  Not that I’m complaining, I love my boyfriend.  It just means I need to work out how to stop writing so much in my blog entries whilst still saying everything I want to!  I went to a talk on the relationship between poetry and visual art on Wednesday.  I didn’t know of the artists (should probably look these things up) but it was interesting and I made some notes on it.  The picture above is by the artist in the discussion, Simon Lewty, and the poet was Peter Larkin.

I’ve bumped into a couple of people recently on my way to my MA. One was a guy from college, and the other was my friend Tom.  It was great to bump into Tom, and we ended up having dinner at Woodin’ Shades which was nice.  It’s my dad’s birthday today so, happy 44th birthday to him!  Now, off to do a bit more essay, call the boyfriend, and have a take away, hopefully watch some TOWIE!

xxx

No Space to Think

Poetry Gigs

So, this week I went to Jawdance.  I had to go after Chris Syrus, and his poetry band.  He was delivering a great message for some school children, and it sounded great combined with the musician, and the female singer had an amazing voice!  I thought I bet I’m next.  And I was. Still, it went okay and there were a couple of people who said they enjoyed my poem.  I had been to Nando’s (again) with Hannah, but she had gone.  I had got a sore throat after talking to my friend Natalie on Skype the day before (I’m not sure how big a part the conversation played) and I was starting to feel even worse.  Although I couldn’t find any online material on her, Subi Shah was another highlight.

On Thursday, my boyfriend Matt (who isn’t picking up his phone grrr… hence I’m making use of the time by writing this and watching Stephen Fry on BBC Iplayer.) … where was I?  Okay, so we went to Wetherspoons for some dinner and made it just in time to the Donald Hope Library, which I had never been to before.  I’m not going to lie… I could have really done with the £25 prize, but the winner gave a great speech.  Gutted that I didn’t even make the top 5, but there were some kind comments, and I’m happy to try again next time!

Kathryn Corrick was guest speaker for my MA course this week and we were set a task to create a story from one of two photos from her Feet on the Overground project.  I attempted at a Twitter/Facebook story but it didn’t work, so as a back-up, I did a YouTube video.  As I’m so busy, genius that I am, I dried my hair whilst filming the still photograph and created a kind of train movement/sound image, which I annotated on the website itself, with speech bubbles.

I got offered background work in a film, but being realistic about money, time, MA work, and wanting to see my boyfriend this week… I had to pull out.  But it seems like MSFT is a great place to look out for opportunities like that.  With this cold not getting any better, I am in deep need of a rest… and going up to Norwich for a few days is the closest I’ll get to a rest these days!  Funnily enough, the next event I’m going to is a Speech Motion one!  I’m hoping to feel better by then, but at the moment I’m powering through my last shift of the week at Sainsbury’s.  I just hope UEA London have sorted the bloody heating system out, because if that room gets any colder I’m going to shrink away into a giant wooly scarf.

Also!  Russell, who puts together Apples & Snakes London events, says I’m overdue for a guest spot at Jawdance!  Watch this space!

xxx

Words & Music

Poetry Gigs

Had a busy week! Tuesday I went out with my friend Laura and my ex-housemate Kirstie (who is travelling around India as of today!) Me and Laura had Nando’s (standard) before meeting Kirstie to go to the Camden Barfly for a gig.  For only a fiver we got to see Supercute and the inspiring Miss Kate Nash in her side project The Receeders.  It was definitely worth seeing and an interesting path for Kate Nash.  Also spotted her boyf Ryan Jarman at the bar.

Last night, after a really stressful day trying to work out PDFs, trying to deal with too many DM boot bids on Ebay and a shift at Sainsbury’s (oh, and after walking in the wrong direction to the venue – typical) I found myself a haven at The Gallery Cafe for The Word House poetry event.  I saw a friendly face in Captain of the Rant, (check out his event, there’s one this Friday I plan to go along to!) and after a quick chat and a rather unimportant embarrassing incident I found myself in, Christian Watson took to the stage.  He was incredible!  I don’t really know what else to say.  It started on a high and that high just did not stop.

The open mic included the likes of Emma Jones who performed her winning set from this year’s Glam Slam (and myself, performing my winning poem from the ‘Loss’ category).  John Berkavitch continued the features and was also amazing, and played with the audiences emotions with a poem that began with a cliché, went forward with comedy and ended with words to send shivers across your skin.  He then told us to read The Empty Space, which is so cheap on Amazon I may have to add it to my huge pile of books to read.  I’m currently reading Doris Lessing’s The Golden Notebook.  It’s massive.

Last up before a dash for the tube (both him and me) was Inua Ellams.  I have said before how lovely he comes across and he is so genuine.  Not only that, but he has an amazing way with words, and also an amazing Graphic Artist. Jealous much.  All in all, a wonderful evening, raising money for Oxfam, yay!  And I even made it home for a late-night viewing of X-factor.

I’ve been working as usual, doing lots of useful and interesting MA stuff (including a gruelling day about accounting) and spent a couple of days with my boyfriend in Norwich, forcing him to come with me to a Feminist Society discussion group, and coming back to his only to watch a rom-com.  Sorry love.  Oh yeah!  And we did Yoga.  About 2 hours of it!  It was really hardcore, seriously, my legs hurt a couple of days later and everything.  Oh yeah, he’s starting up this Sketch Club – if you’re creative in any way, get involved!  I also saw my Gran for dinner with my parents which was a welcome return from the coach journey from Norwich.

Matt made me these cool timetables that you can draw and wipe off.  It’s really good because it gets your mind focused and you feel good ticking things off.  I’ve missed a few things off but I think I’m doing pretty well!  I wonder if I can count my Sainsbury’s work as exercise since it’s manual? Hmmm!

Adios!

xxx