WHAT ANNOYS – DELIGHTS – AND IS OFTEN UNEXPLAINED.
What is ANNOYING me this week?
Fully able drivers who park in disabled parking spots because it is more convenient for them.
What is DELIGHTING me this week?
The successes of GCSE and A’Level students that I know – Well done to them all.
LISTENING TO:
Rainbow Dome Music – Steve Hillage.
SOME OF MY DOINGS:
A shorter blog this week as I published my reviews of Cork and Limerick earlier in the week.
Polesworth Poets Trail.
Things are moving forward on the Polesworth Poets trail, with the designs and production of the installations. A sample lectern has been produced in MDF, there are some slight adjustments to the design but the final lecterns will look really good in Oak with a leaf inlay.
The poems are with the designer to produce the layouts for the installations on to stainless steel, leather and slate.
Plus designs using appropriate fonts have been produced for the laser cut installations where the letters will be cut into sheet steel.
So things are moving on and I will hopefully be able to let you know when the installations start fairly soon.
September is upon us, where does the year go? Another Fizz will take place on 20th September when we have the Coventry Poet – Antony Owen reading from his second collection The Dreaded Boy, plus an open mic. All are welcome; it is free entry at Polesworth Abbey.
My lost poet this week is Bub Bridger (1924 – 2009).
Bub was suggested by a writer friend of mine from New Zealand, Kirstie Brooks. Following my blog on the Australian Poet Banjo Patterson, Kirstie suggested that I might be interested in featuring a Kiwi poet and passed on Bub’s details.
The story goes that Bub was born into a very large family who rather than think up a name for her, called her Bub, she was stuck with it for the rest of her life.
Bub was born in 1924 and grew up in Hawkes Bay. She was married and had four children, but the relationship broke down and she raised them on her own.
She didn’t start writing until she was 50 and drew on her English, Irish and Maori (Ngäti Kahungunu) ancestry for inspiration. Her work is full of wit and idiosyncratic fantasy that makes it easily accessible. She is also noted as a performer and was a member of the Women’s comedy group Hen Teeth. She also wrote short stories and plays, writing for both radio and television.
Her work mostly appeared in anthologies but her collection Up Here on the Hill was published in 1989.
She was a great promoter of women writers especially those from New Zealand and it is reported that on a visit to London as a guest of the International Feminist Bookfair that she brought a suitcase full of books of New Zealand Women writers to show that their was an active group of writers who needed a wider readership than their native country.
She died in Westport, New Zealand in December 2009.
Poems of Note.
Wild Daisies – thematically similar to Brian Patton’s Blade of Grass, but with a variance as Patten tries to give a single blade of grass to show his love, whereas Bub as the recipient of a love gift only wants Wild Daisies that the giver has risked his life to get them. It is a wonderful snippet of life that says the simplest of things mean the most and should be the real treasures that we seek.
It amused me that their was a link to Interflora New Zealand under the version on this web version below, especially as the poem is an anti-flower shop poem, it makes me wonder if some business’ actually read and understand the poems they link their business too, well it is about flowers so it must be appropriate for a flower shop business, I suggest that they read it again.
Wild Daisies – Bub Bridger.
http://maaori.com/misc/flowers.htm
A Blade of Grass. – Brian Patten.
http://www.poetryarchive.org/poetryarchive/singlePoem.do?poemId=5923
Another poem Blatant Resistance follows the themes of Warning by Jenny Joseph. Bub with her scarlet coat wandering around like a fire engine resisting the onset of old age. If Joseph had not written Warning then this would be the delightful poem on the theme of growing old. However, I think Joseph does it better and although Warning is a bit of a cliché these days and is perhaps the only poetry book to be found in most garden centres – I suspect that this is in the hope that most customers of garden centres are likely to relate to it.
Blatant Resistance – Bub Bridger.
http://www.vcoy67.org.nz/blatant.htm
Warning – Jenny Joseph.
http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/warning/
SOME OF MY COMING SOON DOINGS
September Readings
6th Sept – Night Blue Fruit – Taylor John’s in Coventry.
16th Sept – SPOKEN WORLDS – Burton on Trent.
20th Sept – THE FIZZ at Polesworth
24th Sept – 100000 Poets for Change – venue TBA
Like ‘Wild Daisies’. Simplicity sits well with well understood universal truths but can feel immature with other themes. Here it works very well.
Hi Hench – I quite agree it – these poems really resonated with me, there simplicity really works well, she clearly understood how to deal with the universal truths. Regards Mal.
Is there a 100 Thousand Poets for Change in Cork?