In the wreckage of a house clearance,a face distorts in a fractured glass eye.Painted on gesso and northern white pine,old acrylic eyelashes flash a recognition. Stippled like a stormy summer,worn and battered flanks shiver in the dust.A torn rosette from a forgotten fetehangs by a mane, shabby and faded. Familiar sounds echo in the room:the…
Category: Video Poem
Incoming … World Curlew Day 2022
Incoming I am not your enemy dear messenger,but still your intent feels murderous. And though your reckless, adrenalinefuelled passes and dopplered cries have sent these old instincts into fullflight mode, my head disappearing into my shoulders, my sixty year oldbody separated from my bicycle to lie expediently on this damp grassy bank,I cannot help but…
Fledge
Dandelion Sun A child’s sun finds a dream in young eyes.In blinks of dandelion eclipses,refracted light reflects on retinasholding warmth in ragged leavesbelow a flower standing up and out. Ryegrass and foxtail for company,a golden head of petals,swaying and slight,is there and gone and there again. The wings of friends unfold to test the airwith…
Goodwill to all Men and Mice
I am a soft clart. Situations requiring cold, reasoned logic and swift decisive action are often dealt with ineptly when they involve wildlife infestations. Let me paint a picture … In Cumbria where I live, my house is situated next to a field. Along with the help of neighbours, the field is run as a…
FilmPoem
The opening poem in the collection ‘Fledge‘ has been made into a film by Em Humble. ‘Dandelion Sun‘ looks at how children’s dreams and ambitions can sometimes get trampled in the process of growing up. A child holding onto their dream, who refuses to submit to the many pressures of childhood and adolescence, where conformity…
Fledge Live Launch
Film from earlier in the evening at Northern Towers with a laptop and a webcam instead of the preferred occasion (sadly cancelled/postponed, who knows?) with wine, beer, music and little bits of cheese on sticks … Video ends abruptly (one poem from the end) when the 50p runs out in the meter and the internet…
The Poetry Archive
Sitting in a Semi (after David Bowie) is now up on The Poetry Archive … if you have the time, why not pop over and have a listen, maybe leave a comment and have a look at the other wonderful stuff that’s available? The Poetry Archive “is a not-for-profit organisation that produces, acquires and preserves…
Mouse
Schrödinger’s Mouse Your love of my raspberries has resulted in this late evening walk in headtorch, to hedges of hazel and blackthorn, far enough from home to foil ideas of return. Aware of owls ripping through moonlight, I kneel in damp fescue and sedge, clutching this tilt trap of quantum uncertainty; mouse or no mouse?…
Poem of the Week
So very pleased and excited that ‘Incoming’ was published as ‘Poem of the Week’ on the Yorkshire Times website, especially as it nestles among some work by folk I consider to be poetry gods (have a look to see what I mean … 🙂 ) Incoming I am not your enemy dear messenger, but still…
Here
So where is it, this ‘Here’? ‘Here’ is where I am letting go of thirty years of working within establishments in which, by and large, the individuals strive to help kids learn and grow because of a shared vocation, but are occasionally restricted/thwarted by the system if/when they refuse to adhere to politically inspired initiatives…
Hiroshima, 1961 by Holly Singlehurst
My favourite poem from the National Poetry Competition in 2016 … Hiroshima,1961(after Yves Klein) from Roseanne Watt on Vimeo. … wonderful stuff 🙂
Jonathan Humble 