Podcast: A poet's life in Borth with Rychard Carrington

This podcast comes from Borth, home of poet Rychard Carrington. Rychard explains why he decided to leave Cambridge, his home for 30 years, and live in a village on the coast of west Wales. Rychard explains how this small community has become a haven for many artists, nestled between mountains and the sea in a remote and beautiful part of the country.

"There's all sorts of artists but it isn't like there's an elite or underground. The artists are very much a part of the mainstream of the village culture."

Rychard shares some of his poems and sets a prompt to write a poem about another poet. There are also poems on Dave Daggers' prompt from the last show to write about an inflatable Elvis Presley.

Scroll down to read a poem by Rychard

Albion My Way

Of all one hundred and ninety-six countries in the world
You were allocated to me
So when the team called England scores a goal
I'm supposed to shout 'whoopee'

I ate your chips until eventually
I came to hate the word 'quintessentially'
Tomato ketchup, HP sauce
Custard for the second course
Pork scratchings for the morris dance
William the Conqueror go back to France
When Queen Victoria finally dies
I'll admit I prefer French fries

Convert your feet into Shakespeare's meter
Sherlock Holmes, Geoffrey Boycott, Blue Peter
Kenneth Williams, Sting, Boadicea
Arthur Scargill, Charles I, Edward Lear
English breakfast, there's bones in your kipper
Union Jack, Jack Tar, Jack The Ripper

We live in hope but few true glories
Half of us vote for the fucking Tories
There's great scenery in England
And in other countries too
There are good people in England
And in other countries too
All the depression and mediocrity and crime
I've witnessed have been in England, each time

What I have taken I now give back to you
And no damn foreigner is going to spoil it
Plant a flag in my patriotic deposit
English shit in an English toilet

God save the Queen and the English Band
Captain Birdseye and the ship he sails
Enough merry stiff upper lip England
I don't believe your old wives' tales
Adieu boo sucks to you dear England
I am going to live in Wales

Rychard Carrington

Podcast: Dave Daggers mixes music and poetry

Poet, photographer, musician and host of RARA open mic night Dave Daggers introduces some of his poems set to music and sets a prompt to write about an inflatable Maralyn Monroe or Elvis Presley. You can also hear my response to Bridget Leggy Tanner's 'fit' prompt from the last episode.

Dave is playing on 11th August in Cardiff and you can hear more of his music and poetry here.

Podcast: Bridget Leggy Tanner on writing a poem a day for NaPoWriMo

Bridget Leggy Tanner talks about writing a poem a day for National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo) with the help of my book: Poetry Non-stop. Bridget's commitment and willingness to try writing about anything generated an impressive collection of poems about everything from rabbits to slot machines. She shares some of her poems and after a month of taking prompts from me, she challenges me to write a 'fit' poem. The prompt is open to all as always and I encourage you to submit your poems as comments below or by email. You can also hear my response to Clive Oseman's 'Family' prompt from the last podcast.



Here's another of Bridget's poems written from the prompt super hero or heroine. I'd like to see what Marvel would make of this creation!

Wheelie woman in her wheelchair
Appears before you from anywhere
Understands and empathises
She does really care
If you cross her, beware of her stare
She immobilises ‘baddies’ with a glare
Circles them in her wheelchair
Which has secret powers
So you had better beware!
Of the Steely Wheelie Woman
In her wheelchair

For more tips on writing new poems every day read this article or buy the book:

Show: 17.09.08 With David Francis and John Guy

Here's another show from the archive featuring a terrific Cambridge poet, John Guy, and a poet and musician from further afield. David Francis from New York dropped in during a UK tour to chat and play a few tunes.

The Beastie Boys - Sabotage

Melt-Banana - Cat Brain Land

Gorillaz - Fire Coming Out Of The Monkey's Head

The Psychotic Reaction - Hand-Me-Downs (made me the man I am)
Moth Conspiracy - Turbo Funk
Alex Brooke - Prapatang Grooves
Dan Deacon - Piggled
David Francis - The Penultimate Actual
Keith Dersley - Pulp
Tom Adams and Dan Jeffries - Iceland
Justin Grounds - Bird Wings
Hamell on Trial - John Lennon
Deerhoof - Green Cosmos
22-Pistepirkko - Don’t Play Cello
Alice Wroe - Sunny Inside
Lydia Mendoza - Palida Luna
Ivor Cutler - One at a Time
Dog Latin - The Way to The Way Back Home
Melted Rubber Humans - Coming Down to Ground

Podcast: Clive Oseman on performing poetry

Clive Oseman tells us how he went from writing haiku to performing poems that cover a full array of styles and emotions. He shares his work and challenges listeners to write a family poem. There are also poems on fear, as set by Renn Hubbuck-Melly on the last edition.

Poem: NUMBERS by Clive Oseman

New podcast coming up featuring well-travelled Swindon-based poet Clive Oseman. Here's one of his poems as a taster.

NUMBERS

As the numbers get bigger
barriers grow higher.
Some are real, ultimately insurmountable
others, illusions amounting to prison walls
confining you to your own time zone,
your mind trapped in better times
when you felt part of it all, finger on the pulse
and all before you.

It's a fallacy of course.
The tracks of memory are long,
will stretch to anywhere life takes you.
The scenery will change,
let it challenge your senses anew.
Visions of the past are mere images
which never return and are rarely true-
yearning for them wastes your later years. 

It's easier for me.
The darkness i have come from holds no sway,
just spurs me to disown the scars and travel far.
My barriers block my past,
the present and future are my manor.
You, you're in reverse,
can't move on from light that burns only in your head,
will never illuminate where you are.

Let go, look around, listen.
Young and fresh does not equate to hopeless mess.
This day is just as sharp, just as bright
as any you have known.
Immerse yourself, be bold,
don't let numbers lock your doors
with impenetrable codes,
because if you do you've not grown up.
you've just grown old.

Poetry Non-stop out now

My new book Poetry Non-stop is now available on Amazon. It's a guide for poets of all levels to writing a poem a day for 30 days coming out ahead of National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo) in April.

The book includes:

• Techniques for quickly generating ideas for poems on any topic
• Forms that can be employed to turn any idea or flash of inspiration into a poem
• Daily writing prompts to complete the 30 poems in 30 days challenge
• More than 30 original poems written using the prompts and techniques in the book to entertain and inspire
• Advice on redrafting and developing poems to a publishable standard
• Useful resources for reading, writing and publishing poetry

I've put the price as low as I can for the first few days, so grab it now and get ready for a creative month. I can't wait to see what poems you come up with!

Podcast: Renn Hubbuck-Melly

Renn Hubbuck-Melly talks about how she grew to love poetry and her hugely successful performance poetry open mic night Juke in Cardiff. We also hear poems on the theme of balance from Fran Smith, Clive Oseman, Will Ford and myself and Renn invites poems on the topic of fear as well as sharing some of her own poetry.

Matchwood

I have a splinter in my finger,
the needle, a slip of metal
prods like a blind prick trying to gain leverage
over the hair of wood.
The whorl distorting,
bark-eye sweet with blood.
Tweezers pinch the sloping rings,
I count them as they expand for excavation.
Thirty one arêtes shape the plumb of my thumb,
red sap curves and bleeds into the tributaries.
The chip comes loose,
small enough to be cargo on an ants back.
Does the tree feel this loss?
I wish to bring home this shard of limb
yet it is dead already,
a clipped nail forced under the lid of skin
flesh would reject
no longer as body
but as the outside we must protect against,
sapwood, heartwood whole, intact.

 By Renn Hubbuck-Melly

Podcast: Mark Curtis

Mark Curtis reads some poems and discusses his life-long passion for writing. There are responses to Des Mannay's poetry prompt and Mark invites you to write poems on balance. Share your responses in the comments below or email info@patrickwiddess.co.uk.

Podcast: Des Mannay

On this episode Newport poet Des Mannay looks back on an amazing year in which he has been placed in three competitions and had poems in numerous publications. He shares some of his poetry and offers tips on boosting your chances of success in competitions.
He challenges listeners to write a poem about your final message when you have three minutes left to live and offers a couple of pieces of work for inspiration: And Death Shall Have No Dominion by Dylan Thomas and Galliano - 57th minute of the 23rd hour. Share your responses in the comments or to info@patrickwiddess.co.uk. 
You can hear poems by myself and Des in response to John Eliot's baby's shoes prompt from the last podcast and a poem by Clive Oseman.
You can read more of Des's poems via the following links: 

I Am Not A Silent Poet - https://iamnotasilentpoet.wordpress.com/tag/des-mannay/ 
Proletarian Poetry - http://proletarianpoetry.com/2015/09/21/and-the-dead-shall-rise-by-des-mannay/ The 'Rethinkyourmind' shop - https://rethinkyourmind.co.uk/our-shop/ 
The 2015 Creative Future Literary Awards Anthology - http://www.cfliteraryawards.org.uk/2015-clfa-anthology-impossible-things-out-now/ 
Disability Arts Cymru Poetry Competition Free Download Anthology - http://www.disabilityartscymru.co.uk/literature/dac-poetry-competition-ibook/

Music by Suhov and Zyxz 

Des Mannay by Headstand on Mixcloud

Poem: The Remote Console by Des Mannay

 The next guest on the podcast will be Newport poet Des Mannay. Des only started taking his poetry seriously a year ago but he's not the only one having had a succession of published and prize-winning poems since then. There is anger, humour and affection in his work which often highlights social injustice and looks to a fairer, better world. It is not hard to see why his poems have struck a chord with so many.

The Remote Console

Sometimes I look at you
And think -
Just dreaming really....
Then I listen
And start to sink
When you pour out your troubles
I want to drink your heart
But that's kept away
With the silver wear
And crockery
For special occasions
And special people
Not me....
I'm the invisible man
In your estimation
But I'm real
And I'm here
And I care
When things are fine
You run straight past me
To greet a lover
But when things fall apart
And there is no other
You can find me
Tired and alone...
The remote console

Des Mannay

Podcast: John Eliot

John Eliot talks about poetry's power to tell stories and connect with people if they let it in. He shares some of his favourite lines of TS Eliot and Seamus Heaney and reads some of his own work. He sets listeners a challenge to write a poem about a pair of baby's shoes like the one's from Ernest Hemingway's six-word story and there are a couple of responses to Christina Thatcher's call for mundane poems which are anything but.

To share your poems email info@patrickwiddess.co.uk

John Eliot by Headstand on Mixcloud

Podcast: Christina Thatcher

Christina Thatcher talks about how writing helped her overcome a difficult upbringing and led to her moving from the US to South Wales. In the six years she has been in Cardiff she has put herself at the heart of the creative writing and spoken word scene and completed a powerful collection of poems about coping with the loss of her father. She reads from this and other work and challenges listeners to write a poem about mundane things. You can post your responses here or email info@patrickwiddess.co.uk. You can read another of Christina's poems here.

You can also hear the abuse poem I wrote in response to Reuben Woolley's prompt on the last podcast and you can read it on the Writers for Calais Refugees site here.

Christina's website is: collectingwords.wordpress.com

Christina Thatcher by Headstand on Mixcloud

Poem: Ordinary things by Christina Thatcher

Christina Thatcher is a poet, writer and educator from Philadelphia. She moved to Cardiff six years ago and is proud to call South Wales home. She will be my guest on the next podcast coming up shortly. Here is one of her poems:

Ordinary things

I'm reading poetry on the train -

it's quiet and, as the morning slips by,
blue and fleeting, you find me.
Even in the ordinary things
you find me. I buy a sandwich,
crumple its wrapper to drown out
the sound of your laugh, the sight
of your beer belly, the smell
of a piss-stained carpet. I gulp
some water and remember your
Adam's apple, how it bulged out
of your neck before I moved away.
I look around the train at the people

and want to be like them, want everything

to be quiet and easy again.

Podcast: Reuben Woolley

Poet Reuben Woolley talks about his writing and why his ambition is to close down his popular online magazine I am not a silent poet – www.iamnotasilentpoet.wordpress.com

He reads a selection of poems and invites listeners to write a poem on the subject of abuse. Some of the poems feature strong language and graphic imagery which, while suitable for the hard-hitting subject matter, may not be suitable for all audiences.

Reuben Woolley by Headstand on Mixcloud

Here's another poem by Reuben:

This episode also features poems by myself and Bel Blue written in response to Fran Smith's prompt on trees. My poem is based on the photo Country Doctor by W. Eugene Smith which you can view here. There are no trees in the picture but there are in the poem.

Show: 23.07.08 with Clare Connolly and Melt-Banana plus Nick Stibbs on Walt Whitman

This show from 2008 is a real mixed bag with live music from singer-song writer Clare Connolly and an interview with Yako from legendary Japanese hardcore punk band Melt-Banana. You can read a more recent interview with the band here. Nick Stibbs explores the life and work of Walt Whitman and there's plenty more music and spoken word besides.

23.07.08 With music from Clare Connolly and Melt-Banana interview by Headstand on Mixcloud

Joe Arroyo - Rebellion 

The Bleechers - Check him out

John Guy - Wells next-the-sea

Moog Cookbook - Novacaine For The Soul
Mr Hopkinson’s Computer - Fools Gold
Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip - Development
The 3 Amigos - Supersonic
Toma - Forever Flight Of The Friend
Luke Van Egmond - Moments of Colour
Melt-Banana - Free The Bee
Aidan Smith - Murder Ballad
Scott Walker - Jackie
The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band - Canyons of Your Mind
Andre Mangeot - Cloud Burst
The Conservatives - Baby
Magic Phil - Sex, Drugs and Uncle Frank
The Yellow Magic Orchestra - Firecracker
The Man From Uranus - Plastics

Podcast: Fran Smith

Fran Smith joins me to talk about how she discovered poetry. She reads some of her poems and challenges us to write poems about trees. There are also sonnets which we both wrote in response to Jonathan Edwards' prompts in the last podcast.

Fran Smith by Headstand on Mixcloud

Podcast: Jonathan Edwards

Winner of the 2014 Costa Poetry Award Jonathan Edwards joins me in conversation and reads from his collection My Family and Other Superheroes. He also sets two writing prompts:

1) A sonnet with a twist – See the poem below for inspiration.
2) Observe people, places and animals. Use your pen as a camera and write a poem from your observations. This technique produced many of the poems in Jonathan's collection which you can buy here.

Share your poems in the comments below or email info@patrickwiddess.co.uk.

Brothers

You know the sort: they borrow each other’s t-shirts,
wear each other’s sweat under their armpits.
In the pub, you swear you hear one’s voice and turn
to find the other chatting up your girl,
or else you catch one, curling up his lip,
as if he’s trying on his brother’s smile,
or you go to the bar and they both show up.
One has a knackered Transit, the other jump leads.
They’ve one gym membership and their own bodies,
tell the punch lines to each other’s jokes
and if you’re fool enough to bother one,
you’ll find yourself outside with both of them.
You know the sort: the elder has a child
who’s got her mother’s mouth, her uncle’s eyes.

Jonathan Edwards

Jonathan Edwards by Headstand on Mixcloud

Podcast: Mab Jones

On this edition I am joined by Mab Jones who shares some of her poems and talks about her recent visit to Japan to learn the Japanese art of rakugo – story telling. She would also like to hear your poems on the theme of Japan. They could be about anything related to Japan or poems in a Japanese form about anything at all. Haiku are easy to go for or try one of these. You could even write in Japanese.
Post your poems in the comments or email info@patrickwiddess.co.uk.
You can also hear the poem I wrote in response to Will Ford's prompt on the last podcast.

Here's another of Mab's poems you can buy her book Poor Queen here.

Wonderland

“I can’t go back to yesterday because I was a different person then.” – Lewis Carroll

Let curiosity be your guide.

Let the dark that dwells inside

Dare here. Let go of fear

As babies do their mother’s hand.

And at your feet: a doorway, now.

A smiling mouth. Step in. Slide down. 

Let yourself be swallowed whole.

Inside, all your life, you’ve yearned:

Eat me. Drink me. Let possibility

Open wide, consume the you

You thought you knew. Sink deeper.
Fall. Let go of all and, like that ancient

Apple, land. Rise up, then. Stand.

Your naked flesh on newborn feet -

Tentative. Teetering. Testing

Soft soles on an old world’s teeth.

Your eyes, unpeeled. Your heart, a seed.
Prepared for an adventure, here,

That’s furiouser and furiouser.

Mab Jones by Headstand on Mixcloud

Poem: Sandstorm by Fran Smith

Fran Smith has written the following poem in response to Julie Prichard's prompt — a grain of sand. Fran is a regular at poetry events in Newport and Cardiff and it's great to have this wonderful contribution. I hope the prompts on these podcasts inspire many more original poems from listeners. You can hear my response to Julie's prompt on the most recent podcast with Will Ford who also has a prompt for you to try.

Sand Storm

Insignificant like grains of sand, molecules of

Shells crushed; a life living once, but now

Ground down to ground catching glimmers of

Sun rays mirroring unity with laser light

Significant for a moment, shining as a star in

Limelight; light moves on, and on and on into

Desert wilderness; deserted in ordered chaos

Blowing up storms of drought causing flesh to

Burn wretched and shrivel to flakes of dust to

Dust to dust: Lost in myriads of desert sand,

Deserted again.