Cremin, Bernadette
Award-winning poet and performer who has published four collections of poetry: Perfect Mess (2006, Biscuit Publishing), Speechless (2007, Waterloo Press), Miming Silence (2009, Waterloo Press) a pamphlet, Loose Ends (2012, Pighog Press) and Papercuts – New & Selected Poems (2015, Salmon Poetry).
She has performed frequently at venues in Britain and Ireland, including major festivals such as Glastonbury, The Big Green, Replay Festival and Limerick International Poetry Festival. Her work is collected in the Metropolitan University of London’s archive of Irish and Anglo-Irish Literature.
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The Challenge – Extinction
January 5, 2021https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8IAzxpps5k The Highgate Challenge on extinction actually got 3 poems out of me. I was able later to link in with Extinction Rebellion Tower Hamlets and contribute a video sequence to one of their fundraisers during lock down. Delighted to present it here. My co-reader is ...
The Challenge; Ideas for Preventing Climate Chaos
December 22, 2020In June 2019 we were surrounded by images from Extinction Rebellion. The Highgate Society Poetry Group had several members active in the movement. No surprise therefore that we chose a challenge looking at the issues. Ideas for Preventing Climate ChaosJust one camera, one news crewAnnouncing ...
Stairway to nowhere
December 17, 2020My very first memories of my grandparents’ home include the stairway to nowhere. The architect was apparently so appalled by his finished building that he climbed the pointless stairway and hung himself at the top. Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven has, for me, always been haunted. Just ...
Jennifer Lee Tsai: poetry as an offering, an incantation, an invocation
December 16, 2020Jennifer Lee Tsai is a poet, editor and critic. She was born in Bebington and grew up in Liverpool. Jennifer is a fellow of The Complete Works and a Ledbury Poetry Critic. Her work is featured in the Bloodaxe anthology Ten: Poets of the New ...
100 Meters; I Wanna Be Like Paul Crowther
December 15, 2020One thing I do, from time to time, in spoken word events is present something simple and topical based on my own prejudices. I published this on social media at the time. it may not work so well on the page so many months after ...
Signs; Ice Skating
December 4, 2020I’d have liked more years in work. More time away from the welfare line. But credit the welfare line, its written they don’t want me either. And thats fine. My situation ain’t shit. I can use my photos and photography a bit. Away form the ...
100 Meter’s; Archie
November 27, 2020This takes me back. Things I don’t like: 1) The Royal Family 2) The fawning attitude of the media towards the royal family 3) The perceived view that we all want to celebrate them and their tawdry occasions 4) Glib comments I wrote this on the 9th May 2019. I ...
The Daily Shell Fish
November 17, 2020The Daily Shell Fish is a corruption of the Daily Selfish that Keith Bray mocks me with as I project my current arts project into virtual space. Its simple. Its primitive. It depends on a) zoom, b) colour, contrast and cropping as provided by free Shotwell ...
Tesco Delivery Man, from shielder to non shielder
November 17, 2020This Tesco delivery man didn’t want to be photographed, nevertheless, I showed him my blog and photos of many of his colleagues which he enjoyed. Because of lockdown, delivery men aren’t allowed into houses to help with shopping so I sit on the piano stool ...
Access Contextualised
November 11, 2020A collection of 17 poems compiled as a contribution to UK Disability History Month. The compilation seeks to broaden the brush usually applied to access. Whilst access remains a key issue it has to be seen, in my opinion, only as a part of wider issues derived ...
Can you tell me Why?
November 11, 2020Can you tell me why? Don't you remember me? No matter how hard I try, I just can't foresee. I think I have lost my mind, I forget the simplest of things, Can you tell me why? I can't find my cup of tea. I feel lost and confused, I can't remember your name, Can ...
Juice; Slap
November 6, 2020For Yoko’s Body Sound Tape Piece. Yoko your body sounds are kinder than mine, more curious too, though I have some good ones. Here I revisit a one off incident (well, twice is more than enough really) before going back to the violence of special school and ...
I blame Marcel…
November 5, 2020Marcel Duchamp wanted to change the way we think about art, claiming to make work for the brain rather than mere pleasure for the eyes. Duchamp might only have sought to throw a spanner into the art establishment to shake up the whole concept of art, ...
This panto bites
October 29, 2020No one in my family is mentioning the C-word. As festive season creeps closer, those of you who remember pantomime will no doubt be wondering how on earth you will cope without it this year I have astonishingly good news. You won’t have to! 2020 is the year ...
For What We Are About To Receive
October 27, 2020I attended a class on Ritual once, listened to definitions, added lines of my own in order to make a prose piece. I have reviewed it. I have pointed out the errors. I have used it, used it again and used it afresh. This is ...
Initial; Patch Remembered
October 15, 2020A First Time for Everything demands memory of a first pet. Patch was his name. I remember two things about him; his vomit and him coming to see me at school Initial; Patch Remembered Patch pukes spaghetti On a linoleum floor That leads to the step To the garden Burial place Of ...
100 Meters; Sweet No Sugar
October 13, 2020Taking a sharp swerve from the concept of poetry as an expression of misery here’s something far more juvenile. Me and Jean will often throw rhymes at each other as a means of having fun. We converse about our rituals not being a sign of ...
Missing myself
October 8, 2020I miss the conversations – the basis for my artwork – the inspiration for drawing and for visualising the words in 3D sculpture. I miss the creative challenge of engaging with complete strangers for their opinions on exhibitions, performances and the value of art. I miss being ...
Tesco Delivery Man, up close and personal …
October 6, 2020This week has been another difficult week. I'll start with the Tesco Delivery Man who totally brightened up the week, by the way, for the purpose of people who are offended that we are breaking the 'rules', I'll tell you, there is a possibility this ...
Disconsortia Means
October 2, 2020Colly Metcalfe shares a creative response in British Sign Language of the impact of being part of the artists' collective 'Disconsortia' on her practice as an artist. Disconsortia is based in the north-east and supported by Disability Arts Online through our D4D project https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQfd2BfsKDE Disconsortia means permission to be ...
Declaration 16; Change the Same
October 1, 2020So we were operating this conservation campaign and petitioning when we met a family on the street who seemed worthy of a poem aligned to this article of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Article 16.1. Men and women of full age, without any limitation due ...
Home
September 25, 2020Petrichor - earth-scent after fresh fallen rain - envelopes me. Cold, wet diamonds drip from the trees that close over my head. Impossibly long pine needles line my path with golden-brown hair-like strands, spongey and giving, as I move over them. Here the path forks. To ...
different battle same war, the third
September 23, 2020Disability Arts Online · different battle same war the third this text is adapted from what we wrote for the zine thats part of our show called provoked 2 madness by the brutality of wealth. in the show everyone gets a free copy of the zine ...
Communicating with the Tesco Delivery Man, nearly in the dark
September 22, 2020The nights are drawing in and so are our liberties, freedoms, human rights. I feel like I'm living in a dictatorship, not a pandemic. All these RULES, I don't understand, and can't keep up with. The rule of 6? I think Doris must have spelt ...
Apathy
September 19, 2020I've been doing most of my shopping online - just essentials. There have been no frivolous fripperies, until the leggings. I ordered them for gardening, but was hugely disappointed by the result and decided to return them in person. Maybe to find a more appropriate ...
A Day in the Life of an Artist: Deaf poet, Sahera Khan
September 11, 2020Deaf poet, Sahera Khan lets us behind the scenes of making her video BSL poem 'Hurts Me,' offering top tips for other creatives. This is followed by a performance of the poem itself. The voiceover is provided by Kuli Kohli. https://youtu.be/lNpVnz9BQJE
The Challenge; Dreams and Wishes
September 4, 2020Blue Collar, White Collar. Class War. Comrades bleed on the factory floor. The dead remain sat typing at their desks. I am put in mind of the Highgate Society Poetry Group’s monthly challenge (this one being for March 2019). I take a walk to walk ...
Haiku; Fair Minded Killers
September 2, 2020Inspired by The Daily Haiku 153 where the daily theme of darkness meets the weekly theme of water. Hands up if you remember LDAF – London Disability Arts Forum (the forerunner of Disability Arts Online)? I think it was there that I read one of our ...
Tesco Delivery Men bringing plastic I have to have and they won’t take back
September 1, 2020I hate all this extra plastic (you can't receive Tesco delivery shopping any other way now), there is no scientific evidence (and even if there was I am sceptical as science changes so fast, and each scientist changes their minds, just look into Pasteur and ...
Fringe event
August 31, 2020Tucked in behind the council offices and the police station is the Bee Garden. You can get to it through the grounds of the Arts Centre (a decommissioned church)... that's close, oh so close - certainly the closest I've got to an arts offer in ...
Acorn; Feet Firmly Planted
August 27, 2020It's another Yoko Ono Acorn response. This time to Earth Piece III. Its written two days after a REaD Rhymes Live gig, engulfed with talents full of critical voices, who rehearse themselves into states of nervousness whilst my lesser ability gets gobby again.Acorn; Feet Firmly ...
Kay Channon In Conversation with Miss Jacqui: Musician, Performance Poet and All-Round Freedom Fighter.
August 21, 2020https://soundcloud.com/kay-channon/kay-channon-in-conversation-with-miss-jacqui-final The following interview was conducted on the 21st of March 2020, more or less at the start of the lockdown period caused by COVID-19. Due to several extreme medical vulnerabilities, I was not able to leave the house or have any contact with anyone. I ...
It’s the heat
August 17, 2020I’ve always thrived in the warm. I love weather, but can’t actually cope with extended periods of cold. I like my snow and ice in short bursts so that the cold doesn’t get into my bones and cripple me with pain. Overcast and foggy days ...
642 Ems and Eh’s
August 13, 2020642 says to write a scene using only sound effects. Easily done. On 25th March 2019, I was thinking through the edifying decline of a prime minister and was reminded of the time I was given short shrift for not giving Theresa May time to speak ...
No Tesco, too busy having fun at airports
August 12, 2020...I am in one of the those 'little boy in the Emporer's new clothes' moods where I am screaming "listen all, Covid 19 is a political pandemic, the world has gone mad, don't be afraid, don't panic about anything, the more stress and cortisol you ...
Time to redefine ‘reality’ tv?
August 11, 2020The one thing I've really enjoyed about lockdown is the visibility of 'ordinary' people engaged in normal creativity, on the tv screens that have become such an integral part of our homes. By normal I mean the things we, potentially, all do - the arts ...
Initial; Dave the Dodo
August 6, 2020Rich says; “Don’t be a dodo”. Initial; Dave The Dodo Dave The Dodo Dream’t back to life Finds himself locked Behind air tight glass In the Birmingham Natural History Museum Feeling strangely stuffed He jabbers a last wock Before dying again A flat cap, uniformed Black country man Tuts, thinks to himself I’ve known a lot of Dave’s In my ...
The Autistic Marxist Motormouth: Janine Booth and the Poetry of Politics
August 6, 2020Poet, mother, Station Supervisor for the London Tubes, and co-writer of Labour’s Neurodiversity Manifesto; Janine Booth is a woman of many trades, as well as trade unions. She talks to Emma Robdale about poetry and activism. Disability Arts Online · The Autistic Marxist Motormouth: Janine Booth ...
The Girl Who Forgets How To Walk: Artists in Conversation
July 31, 2020DAO writer Richard Downes met Kate Davis and Julia Parks at the conference ‘Extreme Views’ in Art Gene in Barrow-in-Furness last year. After the recent sharing of Julia's film based on Kate’s poetry collection of the same name he spoke to them both about their ...
Am I surviving?
July 29, 2020'It's really hard the first time, but you soon get used to being out among strangers'. I was not reassured. First off I was horrified at just how 'used to it' people seemed to be - most having reverted to their old unobservant ways much too ...
Waiting for the Tesco Delivery Man – Rejection and Resignation, and trying to find the sense in the Chaos
July 28, 2020One of the reasons I love writing this blog for DAO, is that my work is totally accepted. I'm not told it needs structure, or that there have been more than 5 submissions an hour during lockdown. I love that I write and my writing ...
Spoken Word On-Screen: How To Make Your Virtual Event Really Accessible
July 23, 2020Sez Thomasin is an autistic poet and poetry host who has learned a few lessons in what to think about when producing online spoken word events. Here are some of their findings. Since the UK went into lockdown, our spoken word scene has transformed. Even as ...
Photo; Dance the Light Fandango
July 22, 2020I knew I had a photograph from one of my lock down projects which would fit in well with the Jon Adams #metaordinary project being promoted here on DAO and other places. I knew the outcome from my participation in the #metaordinary was going to ...
Her Considered View of Modern Art
July 17, 2020Following a Press Call I asked my traditionalist 1+1 for her view of the exhibition. This is;Her Considered View of Modern ArtThis is not a hitNot one bitThis is shitShit! Shit!! Shit!!! 6th March 2019 And there you have it; an informed comment expressed as criticism. We ...
TBC Beneath The Sheafs
July 15, 2020Actually another REALM poem inspired by look through photo sheets i had made from a walk in London looking for signs i could read as instruction. Dawdle is an inspiring start for me. It focuses on real life criticism from the wife as to my ...
I was out when Tesco Delivery Man came today, and home schooling ends this week
July 14, 2020I was out when Tesco came last, my husband received the Delivery Man and put the shopping away. He did it really well, I could find everything and there wasn't any wierd food in wierd places. I found carrots in the freezer recently. We are ...
Declaration 20; Free Our People
July 14, 2020Article 20 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights reads. 1. Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association. 2. No one may be compelled to belong to an association. I remember DAN. The Disabled People’s Direct Action Network. We networked free of association, without ...
Kate Davis and Julia Parks: The Girl Who Forgets How To Walk
July 9, 2020Richard Downes enjoys, ‘The Girl Who Forgets How To Walk’ – a collaborative exploration of the ancient topography of south Cumbria made by poet Kate Davis and film-maker Julia Parks based on Kate’s poetry collection of the same name. I met Kate Davis and Julia Parks ...
Disconnected
July 7, 2020Can I be semi-shielding? Like a semi-fledged bird, I'm not actually ready to leave my shelter. I've had a trial run leading up to this - a healthcare check that sees me approach the edges of town. Town is not reassuring. It is busier than ...
The Challenge; Words Are Flowing Out
July 6, 2020The Highgate Society Poetry Group challenge for February 2019 is to take the opening line of a favourite song and build a poem around it. I plump for Across the Universe as the giver of the harbinger guide line; ‘Words are flowing out’, and I ...
A birthday, a funeral and a Tesco Delivery Man
June 30, 2020Last week I performed an 'Artist Presentation' for DAO. Here is the link if you weren’t able to join me live. Thank you to all who were there and asked questions. If there are any unanswered questions, please do comment below and I will answer. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axBZxIuYBIQ On my ...
Going out
June 29, 2020The moment arrived. I'd charged my power wheels overnight. Washed my face mask, cleaned my eye protectors. And practiced mindful relaxation. I was ready. It occurred to me to postpone. I had not actually left my property for 102 days. There was no urgent reason to ...
The Rules of the Realm
June 25, 2020The Realm is turning into a landscape that we make for ourselves. Yesterday I recorded some key words for me as if a poem. The words were instruction words. We were thinking about an entrance to the Realm. Involving viewers in an action that needed ...
Bubbles
June 22, 2020I've long suspected that I live in a yoyocracy. A place where the people governing/pretending they know what they’re doing, recycle their directives so that the up/down, back/forth juggling movement gives an approximation of an attempt at progress - which may, or may not, be ...
Acorn; Of Snow And Ice
June 21, 2020Yoko Ono’s Earth Piece II shows concern for the planet yet finds optimism in our power to find a solution. She finishes with the instruction; ‘melt the icebergs and snow in your life’. I feel a new duet coming onAcorn; Of Snow and Ice(She) I ...
Words On A Post Card; From the Birds
June 11, 2020Found this on a facebook memory, adapted it for a post card. Protect the notes you throw away. Make something with them. Learn you are a poet.Words On A Post Card; From the BirdsRecent readingsFirst a crow flew fastlyThen a nightingale 12 months on Then ...
642; At Six O’clock
June 9, 2020642 Things To Write About invites the scribe to describe a scene where only guttural sounds are uttered. Uh huh. I remember an incident of a Gallic shrug. A six o’clock….642; At Six O’clockSleeping heads stirTo the soundNot of bird songDawn ChorusBut of bootsKicking ballsOne ...
Is isolation good for the imagination?
June 2, 2020Is isolation good for the imagination? For the creative process? Nothing has changed and yet...my room has walls of sunshine - a roof of sky and a window of unpredictable weather with gusts of laughter. It has eyes on the moon and ferns unfurling round my ...
Juice; Highs and Lows
June 1, 2020Yoko Ono’s Building Piece for Orchestra from 1963 exhorts the follower to move around a building, from room to room, to open each and every door and to go from the top of the building to the bottom without making any sound. I have a ...
A new hope in a time of lockdown
May 29, 2020So, here we under ‘lockdown’ and more often than not I find myself vacillating between contemplation and claustrophobic anxiety. However sporadic interludes of euphoria shatter this monotony with an effusive elegance that transforms stoicism to spontaneity. I have never been one to court fame, fortune, or ...
Brainwashing
May 26, 2020I'm getting quite used to my new normal, This Is A Government Broadcast, I've had to introduce some noise into my life. Not the neighbours lawnmowers or power tools, but background sounds that will distract from my tinnitus. I use This Is A Government Broadcast the ...
Corona 11; A Tissue Of Haikus
May 22, 2020Inspired by Jean Bayliss who compared our shielding with the last 3 years of her mother living in a single room in a nursing home. In memory of those who lost their lives in care homes during the pandemic. Dedicated to the ongoing struggle for fully resourced ...
Liz Bentley anti-social distancing with the Tesco Delivery Man and getting in touch with nostalgia and what that sometimes brings up….
May 20, 2020Apart from this week being horrendous, and my worse lockdown week ever, some thoughts have emerged about the past and the present. Many psychotherapists are working very much in the present, and so am I, to an extent. However, while some of us have been ...
Breaking sense
May 19, 2020As a frequent traveller, I found it impossible to keep pets. I was touched when a great friend of mine appointed me godmother to her new kitten, Alfie. Alfie was a house cat and my friend’s house was not accessible, consequently when I wanted to visit ...
Signs; Just The Ticket
May 15, 2020Happy is as happy is, whatever it may be. Its not a sense I know too well. Not something I have too many words for. But today taking stock of all these forces merging within me I think I can take a pot shot at ...
Grace
May 12, 2020I plan to visit here occasionally to share some of my writing process. Mostly thinking then, or my version of that, but maybe sometimes some practical ideas. To help my writing I try to read as much as I can. Partly this is to make up ...
Liz Bentley feeling the grief, while waiting for the ever more important smiles from the Tesco Delivery Man
May 5, 2020I really didn't know what to write about today. I asked my friend, and before she could answer, I said "Grief', loss", that's it. That really is the only sense I have right now, two deaths that are closer to me this week, one from ...
Initial; Forever Absent
May 2, 2020So, the Initials book requires today, 2 days short of my next birthday, that I write about my first memorable birthday. The book requires that I mark the age it happened, the location, remember presents, describe the cake and list the guests so I trawl ...
Declaration 19; Speak Up
April 22, 2020Article 19. Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers. We who speak up sometimes feel lonely, threatened. Isolated ...
Declaration 14 – Insane Asylums for the Politically Mad
April 9, 2020Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights reads; (1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution. (2) This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary ...
Poetic Prayers: Kay Ulanday Barrett’s New Book, More Than Organs
April 2, 2020Kay Ulanday Barrett is a pilipinx amerikan transgender queer poet, performer and educator. Their second poetry collection, More Than Organs, launched this month with Sibling Rivalry Press. It examines grief and love, and poetically dreams 'Brown, Queer and Trans futures'. Reviewed by Glasgow-based poet Etzali ...
Self Isolating
April 1, 2020I do actually like my own company - which is just as well. I have friends who pale at the mere idea of being alone with themselves. And I am fortunate in having space. With both a house and a garden, I have options. Since acquiring wheels ...
Corona 4 – My Intention
April 1, 2020Its the corona virus lock down. I have been identified as extremely vulnerable. Even though I don’t feel as if I am as labeled I am behaving, staying in. Poetry is a boon. I am following and releasing this first to Corona Verse Poems for ...
The Challenge; Grandad
March 30, 2020The Highgate Society Poets set a challenge to write about a grandparent or as they put it; a grandma, grandpa or grand other. The Challenge; Grandad The head of my clan Was a tic tac man Careless with his shop He’d sooner be off To the gee gees Or Perry Barr dogs Waving ...
‘Self’ distancing
March 27, 2020Ages ago I became a contact-free zone. People no longer offered to shake my hand. Hugging has become almost extinct. Today I reap the benefits of years of involuntary social distancing. (How good we have a name for it) And to think I moaned, crept into a ...
Valentine’s Routine
March 23, 2020This is a two hander. Bean replies to every verse. To hear her answers you need to see a perfomance of the piece. Needless to say the way its structured she’ll get the last word. Valentine’s Routine You don’t love me You wanna see me work You get the ...
Acorn; The Fire Goes Out and Then it Burns Again
March 13, 2020Yoko’s first earth piece asks you to think about the fire at the centre of the earth. This is my fire. Where is your fire? What does it bring you? Acorn; The Fire Goes Out and Then it Burns Again Raking over ashes To find the odd ember Pecking spitefully At ...
Liz Bentley’s thoughts on International Women’s day and Crowona virus while waiting for the Tesco Delivery Man
March 9, 2020Fancy having a granola named after me. And how exciting that Tesco are matching Aldi prices on some of their 'own brand' goods. I'm so excited. Greta would be excited too as my mint tea bags came in a box, just a box, no cellophane ...
Black Widow 3
March 9, 2020Late comers to Black Widow may wish to go back to the start which started here. Stella, the black widow, is a star. Magnetic. Attracts. Pulls them in. One by one. A drink. A cake maybe. Shall I slip a record on. Setting the scene. A ...
642; Blue Thing
March 1, 2020The instruction is to write about someone holding something blue and what they may be thinking. My instincts in this introduction are to be puerile and pun along the lines of; in the proud oral tradition of Jim Morrison's Lament to My Cock but there are ...
Liz Bentley and giardia while waiting for the Tesco Delivery Woman
February 24, 2020How exciting it was when the delivery man was a woman, and what a lovely large cucumber she bought me, well in its sell by date. This weeks shopping was hard for me to do because I had nausea. I'm too old to be pregnant and ...
Signs; Not Shutting Up
February 13, 2020I can’t remember the film poster I cribbed these lines from. It was there in my local tube station. At the bottom of the stairs. When I stole the slogan I’m sure it had another resonance for me than the lyrics formed today. Might have ...
Juice; Hit Head Bang Wall
February 6, 2020Yoko’s Wall Piece to Orchestra says only; ‘Hit a wall with your head’. How many times have we done that. How many times have we said the same thing over and over again. There are two voices in this piece. The ones like me, like ...
Introduction; To A Break Down
February 4, 2020An unusual thing for me…. I’m starting to have kittens. Where is that nerveless self when needed. Consequently, my stammer is re-appearing. Consequently, I think back to when all this was supposed to have started. The school nativity play. Play up to expectations is a piece of ...
observations i & ii
January 17, 2020i for many years i was unable even to try to write a cv as this task made me so sad i don’t think such feelings are uncommon ii one day i folded myself into a form - trimmed my edges, or everything they didn't want - flavoured myself to an unreal ...
Initial; A Father’s Gifts
January 15, 2020The book of instructions I use for this series suggests I should remember the first gift I bought for Father’s Day. Its strange to think I can barely remember a gift I gave my dad. On my next birthday I’ll be one year short of ...
Declaration 18, Joshua losing the battle, he goes
January 13, 2020Another article from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which I focus on in order to create poetry for a conservation project here in deep dark Crouch End, London. Article 18. Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to ...
Liz Bentley wishes you a happy newish year while waiting for the Tesco Delivery man
January 8, 2020Happy newish year. Fenton was my first Tesco delivery man of 2010. In the photo I am holding my 2020 diary. I always buy a Redstone diary and this year, the theme is 'Dreams of Europe'. The cover photo is a semi-naked Bridget Bardot sunbathing, ...
The Challenge; Message To A Son
January 2, 2020November’s Challenge from the Highgate Society’s Poetry Group, which meets on the first monday of the month, was to respond to two themes; 1) who do you think you are and 2) in praise of vandals. Traveling by train from Pallant House, Chicester, where I ...
The Challenge; Festivities
December 24, 2019December’s challenge from the Highgate Society’s Poetry Group was to do a poem on the festivities. I looked back through the prism of time and remembered my time involved in the first DPAC action on the Housing Emergency. The Challenge; Festivities A nativity scene A Norwegian tree Trafalgar Square DPAC ...
I Cannot Capitulate, I Can Only Create
December 17, 2019The Senses In the final years of lies, Only the birds will remember the truth But will we listen? In the final years of hate, Only the trees will remember love But will we touch it? In the final years of desperateness Only the stars will remember our hope But will we see it? In ...
Acorn; My Sound Pieces
December 11, 2019Yoko’s final sky piece in her book of Acorns makes me think of lines from Laurie Anderson’s Walking and Falling. Whilst Laurie falls, Yoko flies. Then sounds from what we used to call albums start to fill my head. I am transported back to the ...
642; Roomie
December 9, 2019642 things to write about instructs the writer to give testimony to a favourite room mate. I never had one. I considered giving the names and status of all those roomies who never became a favourite. DAO have recently discussed whether we are in a ...
642; Magpies
December 3, 2019‘642 Things To Write About’ instructs; ‘Write about something that was stolen from you’, not knowing about the history lesson that awaits. This is something of my time going back to special school. Tell me about your time? Say what was stolen? 642; Magpies Mopey Matilda moans ...
Liz Bentley’s thoughts about her time working in the NHS while waiting for the Tesco Delivery Man
November 27, 2019I worked for over 10 years as a psychotherapist in the NHS, managing a counselling service at a Bermondsey GP surgery. My job consisted of giving all patients who were referred for counselling as much support as they needed. We had good links with the ...
Signs; Sick Man’s Close
November 14, 2019This street does not exist in Devon. Though it nearly did. It only exists now because I blanked some letters out. It took a little time. Not a difficult task. Then it just hung around, waiting to be given verse. I tried once. I tried again. ...
Thoughts on how would I ‘pick myself up’ now? While waiting for the Tesco Delivery Man (or occasionally Woman)
November 11, 2019I love Ken Loach, I really, really love him. I’ve seen ‘Sorry We Missed You’ and ‘I Daniel Blake’ and last week I saw him on a chat show talking with a council tenant about the squalid accommodation and homelessness in our country. A man ...
Love a guide poem for a festival
November 2, 2019I was due a return to the Arts Camp at Cambridge's Strawberry Fayre. The theme for the year was love. Love is not my most concentrated theme. I needed to start putting things together. I decided to write a guide poem as a means to ...
Time for Media
October 28, 2019It’s been a very busy few months for me and I have been meaning to write a blog for the last 3 months. What have I been doing over the last few months? Well, I must say that it’s been overwhelming. In between being a full-time ...
Juice; Mysteries
October 28, 2019The latest read Piece for Orchestra by the indomitable Yoko seeks music from windows and stars. Strangely the instruction invokes a memory of heavy drug use. Please tell me what you think about the pic or poem below. Juice; Mysteries In summertime He opens the windows Plays Oye Como ...
