EST.
Issue 2: November2012
First and foremost, I would like to thank all the contributors so far, whose commitment to poetry inspires me: I am honoured to showcase the work of these fine poets and artists to you.
ESTABLISHMENT
nd so, off the back of the success of Issue 1, we come to another quarter, another issue, another version of ‘something different’ — hold on to your poetry hats!
It is also important to me that you get your money’s worth when it comes to Est. Contributors, event fliers and reviews all link beyond these pages, and those links are there entirely for you. See this not only as a magazine, but your own personal poetry portal. We do all the hard work so Google doesn’t have to. So go on, follow up on someone you’ve enjoyed in here, pop along to an event, maybe even buy a book…(!)
Jo Langton EDITOR
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
And finally I will leave you with my editorial yearning for colour. I hope that you take inspiration from the cover of this issue. Let’s break down the convention of black text on white paper one experiment at a time...
ESTABLISHMENT
CONTENTS INTERVIEWS Jo Langton interviews Tony Frazer REVIEWS Steven Waling reviews Elaine Randell Jo Langton reviews Kit Fryatt William Garvin Reviews Marcia Arrieta Peter Hughes reviews Ian Seed Sarah Crewe Reviews S Kelly & S Fowler Peter Hughes Reviews Kevin Corcoran POETRY | ART | VISPO Mark Burnhope Gary Barwin Ira Lightman Ek Rzepka
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
Rhys Trimble Bruno Nieva Leanne Bridgewater Steven Waling Sarah Kelly Jack Little Kevin Higgins Amy Ekins Michael McAloran NEW & FORTHCOMING TITLES
ESTABLISHMENT
ISSUE 1: AUGUST 2012
ESTABLISHMENT
JO LANGTON INTERVIEWS TONY FRAZER Why chapbooks, why now? On the one hand, it feels like a publisher’s response to the socio-economic hardships we're facing at the moment. On the other, advancing technology and print-on-demand has had a radical effect on the affordability of publishing in general. In your opinion, how do these factors affect Shearsman and poetry publishing more widely? Well, I have done chapbooks before, when it was a case of collating and stapling them, and I proved categorically that I have more thumbs than fingers. The results were dreadful to look at. I’ve gone back to them now, for the very simple reasons that (a) I felt a need to be able to offer something as an in-between product for “mature” (& I don’t mean in years) poets and as an initial step for those not yet ready for a full collection, and (b) my printer suddenly started offering the option of publications of this size at a halfway-acceptable cost. The fact that the chapbooks could be produced through the same process as the regular books meant that the shift was really easy. I like the way they’ve turned out, and I will repeat the experience in 2013.
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
This year’s Forward Prize saw a phenomenal number of small/independent presses in the running, including Shearsman. How has the public face of poetry and poetry prizes changed in recent years: are we moving 'forward' to bridge the gap between the popularity of small and large presses, traditional and experimental poetry? I have a suspicion that this is not a harbinger of new developments, but more a case of a one-off judging panel that included some free spirits, unhampered by received opinions. I thought that was further borne out by Jorie Graham actually winning (and Carcanet is an independent press too, remember) for a kind of poetry that is wholly outside current UK mainstream norms, and Denise Riley winning the single-poem prize for what was in fact the best thing I’d read all year.
You speak here about the reluctance of women to submit, and a desire to reach that elusive equal ratio between male and female poets in both the Shearsman magazine and the catalogue. I am already encountering the same problems as an editor, regardless of the fact that I am female. I think poetry looks, on the face of it, as pretty phallocentric. What can we all actively do to balance the male/female equation in poetry? I don’t actually feel a personal need to balance the genders, and I’m more than happy to have more women than men in the magazine (for instance -- although it’s only happened once), but I’m very, very aware that the reception the magazine and press get will be coloured by any perceived gender imbalance. It is thus market-driven rather
In the specific case of women poets, I’ve been told the same thing by other women editors (to whom I’d turned in some despair, given the sheer lack of submissions coming in here from women), and I have no idea what the corrective action should be. “Build it and they will come”, I was told, but it’s a circular argument. Even today, when I have a healthy line-up of women poets, I depend upon the US, especially for good first collections in a non-mainstream idiom. On my US list, women outnumber men by 3 or 4 to 1. I do think it’s harder for a male editor to attract women poets, and the cynic in me thinks that, perhaps, some women want to be approached rather than submit cold. On the other hand, if I don’t know they’re there I can’t approach them. And the next stage of the process is that many who are approached then ignore you, or say no. (Being turned down is fine; the worst is being totally ignored: it’s a little like being at a school dance -- in my case that would have been in the ‘60s -- approaching someone for a dance and then getting a response of giggles behind the hands, in my case perhaps for not being cool enough.)
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
Is poetry phallocentric? I’m really not sure. The mainstream poetry world in the UK looks the reverse to me, with successful women poets everywhere, with regular books, prizes, readings, etc. My one criticism would be that few of them take real risks, apart from Alice Oswald. There are no Ann Carsons or Jorie Grahams here. Where there is a problem, almost certainly, is in the lack of women holding visible editorial roles; I know there are some, and Zoë Skoulding is doing a splendid job at Poetry Wales, for instance. Agenda, Envoi, Poetry Scotland, Chapman (names off the top of my head) all have women editors, as did Poetry Review until recently. I’m not sure if any of those were founded by women, though, which suggests that the “problem” has its origins in that old divide between the more risk-averse female side of the gender divide, and the more risk-taking (and, yes, cock-crowing, tail-feather-shaking, strutting, breast-beating, testosterone-fuelled) male side. This results in more male-run mags and presses crashing and burning, of course, which might reinforce the risk-aversity problem. So the real question in respect of editorships might better be, “why don’t more women start up new ventures?” The cost of entry has never been lower and computer-based layouts and design mean that one’s excess of thumbs (if that were a problem, as it was in my case) need no longer be a barrier. Where there is probably an issue is in the area of young poets starting out and getting noticed; given that the majority of reading series and magazines seem to be run by men, it can perhaps be harder for women to put themselves forward confidently, but, frankly, that’s supposition on my part and I have no viable evidence either way.
ESTABLISHMENT
than something that arises from an innate need to keep things balanced. If one were to pursue the balance requirement, at what point would you stop? Should I publish Welsh and Gaelic work (with translations)? Should I have a demonstrable number of certain ethnic minorities? Or of refugee/diaspora writers? Should the number of pages balance as well as the number of authors? That way is the road to insanity and Arts Councilstyle box-ticking. It’s not a recipe for aesthetic continuity, or indeed quality work. However, having said that, I’d still like to see more work from all those sectors of the community, and I hope that I’m open enough to having my preconceptions challenged.
ESTABLISHMENT
Bristol is a real culture city, but how do you feel your positioning outside of London has helped/hindered the dissemination of Shearsman titles. Do you feel that UK poetry, and poetry publishing, flourishes outside of the Smoke? Well, I’m not part of any Bristol (or Bath) scene, and only moved here a little more than a year ago. It seems to me that poetry flourishes everywhere, in some way, but it does help if you have someone around for people to look up to. A role model, if you will. I was in Exeter before coming here, and the poetry scene was good there; Devon also has a very large number of poets with books to their names. There were several groups who got together to workshop, to hold readings, to support each other. My sense of things here is that Bath is slightly better served for my kind of poetry than Bristol is -Bristol seeming to be a hotbed of performance poetry, which really isn’t an area of interest for me. Poetry publishing only flourishes outside the capital. Just look at all the presses that operate beyond the M25. Inside the orbital road, there are the famous big publishers but they put out very little. There’s Penned in the Margins, Donut Press and tall lighthouse, but I can’t think of much else. Outside there’s Carcanet and Bloodaxe, Salt and Shearsman, Eggbox, Smith/Doorstop, Waterloo, Pighog, Cinnamon, all the Greater Manchester small presses, and a couple of dozen other significant players that I won’t bother listing here. I would suggest to you that poetry is kept alive OUTside the capital. Having said that, I launch new titles there because the place is so big that I can get an audience, and it’s also a place that a lot of people can get to easily because of the good transport links.
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
Do you write, or, rather, do you have time to write? Do you fall into the stereotype of a publisher who has no time for his own poetry? I'd like to know about your relationship with your own poetics... No I don’t write at all, although I did some 30 years ago. It wasn’t worth reading. I do translate from time to time, but I’ve not had time to do that for a while. I have a crazy notion for my eventual retirement: translating the complete poems of Nelly Sachs, but it’ll probably never even get started. On a more general aesthetic level, as a reader I’ve been marked for life by the New American Poetry from the ‘50s and ‘60s, by the first-generation New York School, by chunks of what’s been called Cambridge Poetry here, and by dollops of European and Latin American surrealism. I have been known to read some UK mainstream work too.
Who is the one to watch… and who has been overlooked? There are enormous numbers of overlooked poets; always have been, always will be.
One to watch? I really could not choose one as it would be unfair to others on my list, and choosing one off my list would be unfair to everyone on my list. So I’ll keep schtum on that one. I will say, though that Elisabeth Bletsoe has to be one of most under-rated poets in the country, and that (this time not from my list) Helen Macdonald deserves really serious attention.
ESTABLISHMENT
Never underestimate the effect of fashion upon so-called aesthetics, or the ability of loud poetasters to outshout quiet geniuses. In fact, always distrust anyone who shouts very loudly about themselves or their friends. It means they have an agenda, and it’s probably only to benefit themselves. Anyway: it’s time for a ‘40s revival, I think. Some of the New Apocalypse poets were just terrible, but some were really interesting and deserve to be brought from the dusty back shelves of the library store. It was good to see Lynne Roberts being brought back into print, and also, thanks to Waterloo Press and Andrew Duncan’s editing, J G Macleod. From the US I’d nominate Hilda Morley for revival, and I would like the late Gustaf Sobin to be given more attention. I knew him well, and published a lot of his work over the years, but I fear that his maverick nature, and his expatriation -- he lived in France for over 40 years -- means that his work will slide out of view in the US. Very few people know about him here.
When I first contacted you in regards to this interview, you hinted mysteriously about a having a new director on board. Are you in a position to talk about this further? How is the structure of Shearsman changing behind-the-scenes, and what is in store for the future?
Thanks Tony!
Visit Shearsman here
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
Well, there’s no particular secret. Kelvin Corcoran will come on board here as a director, and I expect others to do so in the next couple of years. It needs some more heads involved, and I need to rethink the way things are planned and run. All businesses need to be rethought radically every now and again, and this one is no exception.
ELAINE RANDELL
ESTABLISHMENT
Selected Poems 1970-2005, Shearsman, (2006) 148pp. £9.95 Faulty Mothering, Shearsman, (2010) 80pp. £8.95 From this end of the telescope, the Poetry Wars of the 1970’s might seem to be a minor argument between a bunch of hippies and a bunch of squares. However, it has meant that a substantial body of British poetry has been consigned to a kind of wilderness of fugitive publication and small press obscurity. Some, no doubt, relish their outsider status and live up to it; but others, I feel, are neglected simply by association. Elaine Randell seems like one of those poets. Though written in a style that could only be called “English Objectivist”, she’s neither forbiddingly difficult nor an easy poet. I first read her poems when in the late 80’s I came across copies of the Poetry Review edited by Eric Mottram in the ‘70’s. Though I was just dipping my toes into the turbulent pools of the British Poetry Revival at the time, her poems seemed to me to be so selfcontained and discrete that she stood out from the rest as a voice of compassion and clear-eyed objectivity among the at times bewildering wildness of British and American experimentalism. The poem that stood out for me at the time was ‘Diary of a Working Man’. Its arresting first lines have the resonant strangeness of WS Graham or Basil Bunting:
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
His arm is a brace of pigeons. Shouting across the yard the figure darts forward slumps back, drops. But it’s not always the memorability of her lines that grab the attention: it’s their attentiveness. By that, I mean the way that the poems focus themselves on the object of their concern without any attempt to drag the writer into the picture. Many contemporary poems seem to be not about the subject, but about the writer’s feelings about the subject, or about the writer’s clever and witty way of drawing our attention to the subject. In Randell’s poems the writer is often absent, or only a part of the landscape; or seemingly so, because, of course, to take up a position of discretion is still to take up a position. This is at once a political and an apolitical poetry. The poems that come from her work as a social worker, such as ‘Hard to Place’, ‘Watching Women With Children’, ‘Along the Landings’ and the title sequence of her latest collection, ‘Faulty Mothering’, never take up moral stances or comment on the issues involved. Like the seemingly detached poems of Charles Reznikoff, there is a documentary element to these poems: the voices of the people she is writing about are allowed to speak for themselves, not as part of an agenda or as exempla of human foibles, but as people.
Thus, for instance, we have a verse from ‘Watching Women With Children’:
A minor incident in a family life, which may or may not reveal a great deal about the emotional relationship between a mother and her son. She doesn’t say, instead allowing the reader to come to their own conclusion.
ESTABLISHMENT
“Hello Mum, I’m home.” He ran into the house. “Yes, I can see that” she said leaning away as he tried to kiss her. “You haven’t a cold have you, we don’t want anything spreading.” He ran out into the garden as far as the lawn would allow.
A lesser poet would have made capital of such an incident, would have us feeling compassion for the boy, or the mother, wherever her sympathies lay. But just as a social worker may sometimes have to put aside feelings of revulsion or anger to see the situation clearly and act in the best interests of the people concerned, even though there is never a perfect solution, so we are asked to read without knowing the rights and wrongs of these lives. I’m aware of making too much of the social work connection, though it’s one made by the poet herself. No doubt William Carlos Williams made much poetry out of his life as a doctor; and Reznikoff used legal depositions as source material for his ground-breaking Testimony sequence. Elaine Randell is not so direct as to use found material in such a way; her dramatic monologues seem rather more deliberately shaped than Reznikoff’s. But neither are they as obviously staged as some of Carol Anne Duffy’s early monologues, like the one about the thief stealing the snowman:
(‘Faulty Mothering VI’) The edge of desperation and anger in this woman’s voice makes you wonder what happened next; and why the specificity of the date? Something has happened, and I for one am left feeling terribly uneasy. But the poet doesn’t let us off the hook, she leaves the story un-concluded, a case yet to be solved.
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
I never asked for much just that they kept the wood basket topped with kindling. Then I could do the washing on the boiler see. I had three sons and a husband that only saw as far as their fishing line. O n the 11th November I went round the house picking up the dirty washing, went to the Rayburn – no kindling. They only have to do one thing, I thought, get kindling and they can’t even do that for me.
ESTABLISHMENT
Another side to Randell’s poetry is revealed in her sequences of songs. There is a strong musical tonality in all her work: a music inhering not simply to the rhythms but also to the words themselves. These are lyrics in the musical sense, but their surface simplicity hide a lot of hidden rocks for those who look a little deeper. Occasionally, she will provide us with two tunes running concurrently: A late bird across the And above on the darkening sky sky high road as if leading down it were to the valley shaking me where the courting couples those thistles so touch and swoon (‘Bitten by it we touch and swoon’) This exploration of the possibilities of lyric continues throughout her work; in the latest collection, she continues to explore the inspiration of others’ writing begun in Songs for the Sleepless, where she explored the work of Elizabeth Smart. In the three sets of Songs in Faulty Mothering she explores the inspiration of various quotes from novels; these lead on to meditative lyrics which explore the in-between feelings, momentary enlightenment, the quotidian. These are beautiful collections to have and to return to. They are, like all Shearsman books, beautifully made. It’s good too to have what amounts to a near-Collected Poems of this important poet, who should be more widely known in all sectors of the poetry world.
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
Steven Waling
Buy these books here
RAIN DOWN CAN KIT FRYATT Shearsman, (2012) 34pp. £6.50
ESTABLISHMENT
It would be wrong to put so much emphasis on the (re)arrival of Shearsman chapbooks and then not to indulge, briefly, in the product itself. What seems emblematic of the Lightning Source books I have encountered is the soft matte laminate – a design choice that sets this printing service apart from the commonly used Lulu. It’s just so plush, tangible: I’m not sure there could be a more fitting receptacle for poetry in general. This is a bespoke, elegant fur coat enveloping Kit Fryatt’s work. Coupled with the simple cover design, this endearing chapbook from the 2012 series earmarks that familial Shearsman quality. So then, I guess this book commands some sort of instant respect, albeit aesthetic., that the cover image on the website does nothing to represent. So while we caress the beauty of the exterior, underneath Kit Fryatt’s poems are daring, wearing a burlesque rah-rah skirt. They dance through theme and tone, a graceful see-saw between childlike play and intelligent poetry. ask (aloud) what is the typeface of that voice? (…) eventually I decide I am not a performance poet because poetry is letterpress
Don’t mistake this for some sort of page vs. performance arrogance: there’s a selfawareness that grounds this poem, but also a playfulness that tickles. It’s that naughty burlesque dancer with her plume of feathers… we can can can can cancancancan cancancancancancan. Metaphors aside, this really is a worthy collection: funny, but challenging in places too. I would say that in certain poems it’s just a bit too wordy for me, but when language, sound and play come to the fore, it’s something seductively successful.
Jo Langton Buy this book here
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
(‘Why I Am Not a Performance Poet’)
TRISKELION, TIGER MOTH, TANGRAM, THYME MARCIA ARRIETA ESTABLISHMENT
Otoliths, (2012) 80pp. ÂŁ7.46
minimalist snapshots from a mindful present. subtle, above the edge. a universe of numbers, geometries & miracles. atoms & eyes, ghosts of jung & isamu noguchi. jump cuts as thought process. language cherished/used sparingly. a search for angles, the strangeness/wonder of an unmediated NOW. waves divided by sun divided by dreams. poems that seem much more than their words & everything brushed with a gentle surrealism where lemons abound and fish climb the stairs.
impossible the line. the balance. the circle. staple the head to the sea. float. drift. imaginary lives. understand the path from A to B. the sorrow of a raindrop. careful.
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
study noctilucent clouds. close your eyes. dream. sleep. try to find an answer. binocular a feather. pay attention. subtle. above the edge.
William Garvin
Buy this book here
THREADBARE FABLES IAN SEED Like This Press, (2012), 28pp., ÂŁ5.00
Ways
ESTABLISHMENT
Threadbare Fables by Ian Seed has just come out from Like This Press. Each of the 16 sections is like the seed (whoops) or the stub of a novel or short story. There are missed opportunities, unexplained shifts, glimpses through the doors of the self and others. Here is the first in:
The girl next door let me kiss her in spite of the risk a neighbour might spot us. With my tongue I wrote the alphabet on her clitoris until she came and turned over to offer me the softness of her behind. I thought of the tubes which climb the wall of the Beaubourg Centre in Paris, of how, from the inside, they must make an impossible maze. How should I know which way to go? Who might I meet on turning the corner?
Some of the pieces relate to the death of a father. Others visit a past which is no longer there. Some seem to be fragments of dream which don’t make sense but hover in the memory like a watermark.
Buy this book here
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
Peter Hughes
WAYS OF DESCRIBING CUTS S KELLY & S FOWLER
ESTABLISHMENT
The Knives Forks and Spoons Press, (2012) 22 pp. £5.00 It is beneath the rotten fucia/fingernails of dead infants/that easter eggs are hatched…. It takes a certain confidence to pin such evocative lines on the first page of a collection. Stark, yet imperative. As if you can release this image and all its macabre implications, and just see it for all its beauty, its possibility and its carnival quality, then chances are that the rest of this collection will appeal. In this collaboration, the dichotomy of voice is not as transparent superficially as it often is in others. There are no “Sarah/Steven” interjections between the text. In fact, while SJ Fowler is notoriously prolific, it is hard to track down any information on the elusive Sarah Kelly, which is a shame, as after reading this I for one would like to see more of her work. To return to the book, the dance between stanzas and the knowledge that there are two voices, one male, one female, invites the reader to consider how gender affects writing, if at all. To me, I can hear who the female is through clues, some obvious such as hostess now/your lips are read which indicates a male is addressing the other voice, a female, at the bottom half of the page. Yet the balance of aesthetic is impressive, as is the way momentum is sustained throughout, as is a humour, which seems to contain sea creatures, my favourite being: swim my lady poet/swim vegetable Octopi
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
A delightful juxtaposition, hallucinogenic yet colluding with perfect sense, that this spirited woman being addressed is organic, has many facets, is aquatic in grace and yet is fully equipped to seize on prey. Yet the shadow of something truly miserable, akin to the line first quoted above, is alluded to once more after this, in retort to the playfulness there is a looming sense of horror played out as matter of fact: two, three floors/on all fours/how the red rushed off/the bairn inside/stomach scotched and/pickled by the/tobacco The book imbues a real sense of shared experience between the two characters, which both poets have succeeded in making completely tangible. It leaves me wanting to know more about their story, and for a chapbook of poetry to command such a narrative is seriously impressive. The language is beautiful, the flow seems effortless. There are no stutters, no breaks, just a continuous stream of word/blood plates that somehow manage to turn the surreal into the everyday. I’d love this to have a sequel, but like the best films, it could be the wanting to know more that gives this collection a real edge. Each fresh read provides new light on the script. To see it on a stage or a screen would be immense. Sarah Crewe Buy this book here
SEA TABLE KEVIN CORCORAN Itinerant press, (2012) 10pp. £10.00
Kelvin Corcoran continues to meditate upon an idea of Greece that ranges from the prehistoric, through versions of the present, to futures which sway between hope and despair. Seated at his control desk – a Captain Kirk of the Mani – Corcoran surges in and out of various warp factors. He steers a careful course around Ezra Poundland, which is nonetheless glimpsed at most stages of the trip. The poem paddles in the classics, splashes through the Renaissance, never takes its eyes off love but finds that every word is dyed in trade.
ESTABLISHMENT
This new publication from itinerant press (but up for sale on the Longbarrow website) may be the most handsome pamphlet you have ever seen. From the subtle grey waves of its cover, to its pastel text and translucent endpapers, it is an object to treasure.
Corcoran knows that a poem’s strength is in the freight and buoyancy of the individual line, the rhythmic embodiment of senses and music. This is clever and beautiful and yes, you can still have both. From this wooden ramp the total blue spectrum lifts the sky westward, the wave cache ascatter reshaping the Neolithic deal and Mycenaean rethink. ~~~
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
Lady of the Way, Hodeghetrio the inner knowledge and the outer show us the way restore the city Today we have no petrol, tomorrow we waste a crop of peaches; roads blocked, post office gone, today we have no times around the corner. And then my neighbour called Helen called, to speak about the troubles; and it was a Greek morning for talk and the history was hardly random. Peter Hughes Buy this book here
English PEN are proud to announce Catechism: Poems for Pussy Riot, an anthology of 110 poems in support and recognition of the Pussy Riot, available as a pay-by-donation e-book or via print-on-demand, with all proceeds going to the Pussy Riot Legal Fund and English PEN’s Writers at Risk Programme. You can download or order the book at:
http://www.englishpen.org/the-poems-for-pussy-riot-project/ Co-edited by Mark Burnhope, Sarah Crewe and Sophie Mayer, Catechism was published to call attention to the band's October appeal against their two-year sentences, on charges of 'hooliganism motivated by religious hatred,' for their performance of a Punk Prayer in Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Saviour on 21st February 2012. While Yekaterina Samutsevich's sentence was suspended, Nadezha Tolokonnikova's and Maria Alyokhina's were upheld, and they were transferred separately to notorious prison colonies. On 20th and 21st November, contributors to the anthology will be holding ninemonth anniversary events across the UK and Ireland – in Aberdeen, Cambridge, Dublin, Liverpool, London, Manchester, Nottingham and Oxford. To hear the poets' punk prayers for Pussy Riot live and local, find details at:
http://www.englishpen.org/catechism-poems-for-pussy-riot-live/
ESTABLISHMENT
ISSUE 1: AUGUST 2012
ESTABLISHMENT
MARK BURNHOPE
capital settee
plush punctuation poor eye coordination vacuum packed still round
hand fidget
St Pancras station sat subordination twin cushioned
sit wait dependent on booked-assistance
delayed pending
strap bound luggage in his lap changes hands to hers popcorn tongue tonsil tennis dust population declare credentials or flees calls
fly keen taxi
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
rings her finger lamplight fool
does not notice on yer unicycle
over squashy periphery bound for corridor country flags down
of course go far
hails
get hitched however idio
sync ratic the distances
vows
tourists collect lowercase letters clamorous co dependent angular I could never go up with the all egedly lucky look down on the spreadsheet town sea plan beneath me not mounds
ESTABLISHMENT
hengistbury header and footer
when these scrubland hills f olds crumples swells
dis orient ate already (main body) so giddy I stay by the mesh fence remember a postman land sliding admin
a black mountain in my hand how every divorce ground would finish filled in were workers many or m ore than me anyway
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
under my door the flap stuck how heavy the pile fel t
GARY BARWIN
V&A
andfinity
IRA LIGHTMAN
ESTABLISHMENT
ASS INDIGNATION pavement I want to have sex call of duty the wood is a golf club I want to I want to have sex note to self 6 today alteration to sleep fitness 26 degrees want to have struck off sex sex the 6 I would love it I want to have sex
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
urban dictionary offers it talking to you please x x some where in the shop will b & q wino grand uk blue bloods love to do you love me let this who is the date today in shoes in the tiffin restaurant after this to p*** off a stupid person movie of total losers you really nervous system in total things to make up listen to the avenue receding bodies note body the long haul good thing will you sitting together victory poster looking down the front of your stressful for the tip teen videos of the blues liverpool v everton beef curtains who created using voice to text cooking
DECIPHERING THE MARKS OF THE PAGE UNDERNEATH
ESTABLISHMENT
Put sea sand by, his lies, is no go did I love at your back do you and escalator and alles nicht have justice idea was hand each other lightly you good grand & you God speed wedded by hid ground b'day and loose revealing dreck as head said buddy up he's it swoop body die did we had & would lie village at codex panther suede
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
EK RZEPKA
RHYS TRIMBLE
spag ESTABLISHMENT
Gravelly interchange 2012 I can't read graffiti ... too mannered” Andrea Meredith
junction tafka fen waterknives excise & unction
nationem patch exchange pencil :a scuffle in dirt
uvel dokk luke büws 2004 spurious history meeark canalheart riverheart tarheart "if you're aware of it you're in trouble" spaghetti function dept pove zook & is despite kun zun php veracity ripa pira berg forge duzck volker lazer "the quality of reflection stupendous "hatches
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
"dry cries my heart "no foreskin jus a big nob RAE TAME here fell Michael Swindells DANGER HP GAS hark churchquiet
outer perimeter of happy pylons accident, noaccident "outuhthejunction
it simply rests
floeconc as stick & geoggers fffrun me, the use of
survive or no t the good times roll "patience is a virtue DON'T NUMB YO PAINT
PS(d)A CREW
ESTABLISHMENT
matter & tweet, chavmac & tweed second breakfast is due worth what to destiny destisk
SYNDICATE
defy what is known & smells PUSI LICKER DOSK fuck concrete g'gosling labyrinth 2 return to starting point along perforations re-back infloresce, inference
vortex junct. singularity infacrtion 'verse maquette inchmilliforesculpt by L regs, reign regina britonnae, brython whool or wolves, suction or starform fish or torisk, aster or aston, facicle or fascist megaladetournĂŠ
powerplace & fishermen persist
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
antique as '68 9t8 2k04 steel stud me dust bowl dapmarks
BRUNO NEIVA
Whereas 6-9
LEANNE BRIDGEWATER
STEVEN WALING
ESTABLISHMENT
THINGS TO DO ON ARRAN IN THE RAIN
Drink tea in the kitchen then drink tea in the kitchen ___ Listen to the sea and rain make wet music together read the Collected Ted Berrigan “It’s only water ___ Buy the Guardian watch the Olympics medal table 29 golds team GB sudden interest in sport ___
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
Wrap up in waterproofs stand on the jetty wander lonely as a clod absorbing the weather like Lakeland poets then ___ Die young of consumption spot a strip of light in the distance “it’s clearing soon so let’s go out make tea ___ Meanwhile practice unfeasible Scots accents aye och the noo Jings crivens oh mah boabs (Cont’d pg 96 apologise to your Scots cousins for a childhood reading the Broons ___
___ Watch DVDs Motorcycle Diaries Merlin Snow white and the Seven Dwarves make tea because the TV signal’s kaput
ESTABLISHMENT
Visit the distillery get pissed on green tea and rain sluicing down the skylights discuss the merits of the 8 year old or 10 as opposed to the new 14
___ Wonder aloud about what to do on Arran in the rain ___ Wander lonely as a cod to the tearooms for cream tea ___
___ Anyway this is the Zen house so meditate on compassion while murdering cups of tea light crosses the estuary promising tea
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
Read the Collected Poems of Ted Berrigan wonder if this would be the perfect time to smoke dope if you smoked dope which you don’t but if you did
SARAH KELLY
ESTABLISHMENT
JACK LITTLE
Tree House The breeze makes rocking apples and a corkscrew trunk is hollowed by magic, birds and worms – the spy holes and climbing nooks of unexpected places where old notes and memories of children are hidden waiting to be discovered like wishes in a bottle.
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
and yet the tree grows harsh and sad as thorns and ivy swallow and engulf the old love letters and photographs -the familiar, the impeccable– faded in rain, discoloured in the underbelly of a bird’s nest. long summers as children are concrete filled the knife hacking at the bark is the final resting place the tree house was never built.
KEVIN HIGGINS
End of October. You go coatless into a specially arranged coincidence of sunlight. I leave the house just as the rain’s begun taking itself far too seriously. You read mediocre poetry to a different woman every morning over breakfast.
ESTABLISHMENT
On Getting Away With It
My sex life is a door banging in a house where no one’s lived for years. Your greatest ambition achieved; you’re the most charismatic TV repossession man in all Hounslow; always have the children thanking you and laughing at your jokes as you unplug and carry Horrid Henry and Scooby Doo down the driveway.
which I keep quiet in the high weeds behind the garden shed, spend the next ten years afraid someone will make me sit on it.
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
I’m the type who goes out to buy a lawnmower and comes back with an electric chair,
AMY EKINS
ESTABLISHMENT
MICHAEL McALORAN
caressof once/ till stead I/ eye of the eye’s cleft stillness cataract bone/ absurd welt upon a kiss a/lock and the drift speechless (no) drunken the roving asked of it yet no barricade a door I walk through it and the death of
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
(I/ eye) wilts as of the flame’s shadowy caress of stun-like
blind scars/ the laughter’s abyss settled to shiv of breath mocking the
ESTABLISHMENT
stitch-
stitch of reprieve spun dead but one/ lock-alack/… (silent as… wavering of…) when wavering walls blind mine I fragmentary as if/ because/ said/ murmured bleak ash the blood beneath the fingernails of silence
stitch of the redeem
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
mocking the itch
ESTABLISHMENT
NEW & FORTHCOMING TITLES The Red Ceilings Press me, Medusa. Amanda Earl. August 12. Free e-book Pink Fire. Howie Good. October 12. Free e-book Cinderella City. Stephen Nelson. November 12. Free e-book if p then q Joy as Tiresome Vandalism: What’s the Best? 34 exquisite, professionally made, poetry collection trading cards selected by if p then q illustrated by Simon Taylor of Joy as Tiresome Vandalism. £10 MIEL Books A Piece of Information About His Invisibility. Laressa Dickey. 18 September 2012. €9 Mimesis, synaptic. Laressa Dickey. 18 September 2012. €9
ISSUE 2: NOVEMBER 2012
A Guide to the Northwest Territory. Josh Wallaert. 18 September 2012. €9 zimZalla Avant Objects Pomegranates in the Oak. Alison Gibb and Tom Jenks. Sound collage CD. £3 Alternative Anniversaries. Leanne Bridgewater. Greetings cards. £TBD. Apple Pie Editions Pharmacopoetics. Stephen Emmerson. £3 (pill poems to be swallowed with a glass of water)