Home of the modern Olympics

In two recent postings, I mentioned Olympia and the ancient Olympic Games. The September 2008 issue of House & Garden has a feature by Celia Fox entitled Cultural Marathon, about the new Acropolis Museum in Athens, the 'last - and first' city (or should that be polis?) of the modern games. Pieces of original sculpture sit alongside casts of the Elgin Marbles.

• Petrarchan Sonnet by Keats: On seeing the Elgin Marbles

Poetry: the art and craft of writing

Right: the Lighthouse Keeper's Cottage on the tiny island of Eilean Bàn, under the Skye Bridge, where Gavin Maxwell lived and wrote.

Like Sylvia Bardell, I enjoy poems about poetry, but I also recognize that with such masterpieces in mind as In my craft or sullen art by Dylan Thomas, it can be hard to write on this subject with an original and authoritative voice.

It would be interesting to know whether most of us love these 'poetry poems' or whether we would pass over them for others. Is it, perhaps, all down to which individual poems happen to speak to us, regardless of subject? I know Mary Biddinger, for one, is not keen on poems about poems.

I love to visit places associated with writers, and to see their desks and pens. Many modern writers scribble notes on till receipts; but how many of us still prefer to write our drafts in long-hand, thereby allowing our thoughts to flow from brain to arm to hand to paper - without interruption? I use notebooks (and till receipts) and a tiny dictaphone; but when it comes to writing a first draft, I love to sit at my computer. I may not watch for mermaids (which is what the Reverend R.S. Hawker of Morwenstow reputedly did on occasions when there were no shipwrecks); but I love to peer over my screen and to know that the sea is 'out there', with rhythms of its own.

Incidentally and in connection with Eilean Bàn, we remember Maxwell as a prose writer; but his title, Ring of Bright Water originated as a string of words in a poem, The Marriage of Psyche, by Kathleen Raine.


P.S. On the subject of writers' rooms (see comment by Susan Richardson below), how about a poem about a writer's drawer?

Global Poetry Prompt Appreciation Day

It's official: thanks to the folk at the word cage, we can all join in with their prompts and festivities.

The poem to the left is a first draft, taken from one of the prompts given by Mary Biddinger. The given words were: rubric, furrow, torch, balm and orchid.

The text will enlarge if you click on it.

P.S. August 15: I have just left a link to this poem on the 'Pen-me-a-poem' site for the Olympic games prompt.

Norfolk Poets & Writers: Anthology 2008

Left: Poet and Publisher, Wendy Webb
Right: Caroline Gill, 'summer' 2008

Wendy Webb's latest anthology has a colour photograph of the Suffolk village of Lavenham on the cover. The first poem inside is an ekphrastic one, 'Old Sailor's Tale' by Pamela Trudie Hodge, who drew her inspiration from 'The Depths of the Sea' (1886) by Edward Burne-Jones.

The anthology contains more well known names from the small press scene: Bernard Jackson, Norman Bissett, Joan Sheridan Smith, Claire Knight and Brigid Simpson, to name but a few.

There are also a number of poems from invited guests, including Alison Chisholm, Sophie Hannah and Geoff Stevens.

Wendy (and members of her family) met me for coffee at the Dylan Thomas Centre some days ago. In view of our chosen rendez-vous, it seems appropriate to mention the poem, 'Fadeless Light', chosen by Wendy for the anthology as a tribute to Margaret Munro Gibson. This poem (by MMG) was originally published in an earlier edition of Wendy's TIPS: it pays homage to Dylan's villanelle, 'Do not go gentle into that good night'.

I have subscribed to TIPS for some years now. The venture began as a writers' group for those who found it easier, for whatever reason, to belong to a postal group. Wendy still offers the chance to belong to a community of writers. She runs competitions and has devised several successful poetry forms including Magi poems, Echotains and Davidians.

Of bowls and bats

The May/June 2008 issue of Archaeology ran a fascinating feature on a 'Townsend's long-eared bat' bowl (c.1050-1150 AD) in its Artifact column. The bowl was found in the Cameron Creek area of New Mexico in the Mimbres River basin.

Bats feature in literature (Shakespeare ...) and art (Goya ...), but it would be interesting to discover other bat representations on ancient pottery.

Ilhuicamina (aka Thomas Aleto), Professor of Anthropology at St. Louis, Missouri has posted a fine Mayan bat plate on flickr, and also a Zapotec bat bowl from the Saint Louis Art Museum.

The clay face of a bat was found at Taíno, a pre-Columbian ceremonial site in Puerto Rico. Source: an article by Mike Toner in Archaeology, Volume 61 Number 2, March/April 2008.

The Met has a pair of gold bat-nosed pendants. Read more about bat representations in the Met timeline (& here for bat representations in the Panama region c.700).

I have already mentioned on my Bookshelf (bottom right) how much I like the poetry anthology On a Bat's Wing, edited by Michael Rosen and published by Five Leaves Poetry.

• Townsend's Big Eared Bat N.B. It seems to be 'big eared' rather than 'long eared'. Click pdf for an in-depth feature.
  

Ekphrasis - in reverse

I made an earlier post about ekphrasis, thinking in terms of poems inspired by art. Tim Murdoch has posted an interesting piece on his blog, The Truth about Lies, on art arising out of poems. I particularly like the definition of painting and poetry by Simonides of Kos.

• Another take on ekphrasis: I came across an intriguing site Photo Link Love, which matches photographs with poetry.
  

From David Thomas
Caroline. Hi. Thanks for stopping by. You all have got me thinking. All the poetry I have written comes from photos I have taken. But the notion of maybe writing poems or even some short fantasy prose work based on a famous work of art.. Hmm. That might be an interesting exercise. [Davidnotes].

National Poetry Prompt Appreciation Day: tomorrow!

See The Word Cage. How do you plan to celebrate the day?

It seems to me that there is no reason why poets in Olin Hall should have all the fun. The ripples have already reached Wales, UK - so perhaps this can be the Global PPAD!