Everything is in the grasp of where our lines can take us.
How they may run true, fleet-footed, even on cinder track
that’s waterlogged with tears.
How deeper purpose flows through unloosed words
and double meaning is exposed by gentle drollery.
In the space between our stanzas
we hear connections resonate – unsayable, yet solid.
A Brummie by birth (part of the Irish diaspora), I did much of my growing up on the Isle of Wight. Returning to Birmingham to study, I discovered many diversions, notably punk music and politics. I've written poetry intermittently for almost as long as I can remember; much of it best forgotten. But with persistence comes progress: a continuing journey reflected here. A few of these poems have surfaced elsewhere online; others have appeared in various European magazines, among them Dreich, Northwards Now, Poetry Salzburg Review, Pushing Out The Boat, South, Skylight 47 and ROPES. You’ll also find me in the anthologies This Island City: Portsmouth in Poetry, Poems for Grenfell Tower, Poems for the NHS, The Shouting Tories, Dungheap Cockerel, FLORA/FAUNA Volume One and Poetry Is Not Dead.