P is for Poetry

I love poetry. 122 times say the tags. This little pile is what I dug out from beside my bed. I like to dip in and out. I love simple accessible poetry and I love obtuse esoteric poetry. I renewed my enthusiasm for poetry through my volunteering at the Manchester Literature Festival that has given me the chance to experience all kinds of poets. You cannot beat listening to poetry performed, it is a whole different experience to just reading it on a page. I find new poets by reading book reviews, and the Poem of the Week feature in the Guardian. You can start here with Simon Armitage, and read through my poetry A to Z from 2015.

Julie sent me this over WhatsApp the other day (by Mikko Harvey), because poetry is always about sharing:

But I also remembered what I said at the start of my A to Z, that it was inspired by Ross Gay's Book of Delights so I will give you one from his poetry book (that I have not read much of yet) 'Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude':

ode to drinking water from my hands

which today, in the garden,

I'd forgotten

I'd known and more

forgotten

I'd learned and was taught this

by my grandfather

who, in the midst of arranging

and watering

the small bouquets

on mostly the freshest graves

saw my thirst

and cranked the rusty red pump

bringing forth

from what sounded like the gravelly throat

of an animal

a frigid torrent

and with his hands made a lagoon

from which he drank

and then I drank

before he cranked again

making of my hands, now,

a fountain in which I can see

the silty bottom

drifting while I drink

and drink and

my grandfather waters the flowers

on the graves

among which are his

and his wife's

unfinished and patient, glistening

after he rinses the bird shit

from his wife's

and the pump exhales

and I drink

to the bottom of my fountain

and join him

in his work.

Stay safe. Be kind. Listen to a poem (start here, move on).