Launch date for 'Not Only The Dark'

The launch of our anthology in aid of Shelterbox will be on:

Tuesday 6 December 6pm

Keynes College

University of Kent

Canterbury

All welcome for a glass of wine and fantastic evening of poetry.

A sneak peak ... John Siddique

Not Only the Dark will include John Siddique's poem Thirst from his anthology Full Blood. He has kindly allowed us to share this video of him reading it.

Thirst - A Poem For Who We've Become Since 9/11 from John Siddique on Vimeo.

THIRST

Imagine thirst without knowing water.
And you ask me what freedom means.
Imagine love without love.

Some things are unthinkable,
until one day the unthinkable is here.
Imagine thirst without knowing water.

Some things we assume just are as they are,
no action is taken to make or sustain them.
Imagine love without love.

It is fear that eats the heart: fear and
endless talk, and not risking a step.
Imagine thirst without knowing water.

Fold away your beautiful thoughts.
Talk away curiosity, chatter away truth.
Imagine love without love.

Imagine believing in the whispers,
the screams and the gossip. Dancing to a tune
with no song to sing inside you.
Imagine love without love.


© John Siddique 2011
From Full Blood (published by SALT)

Who's who for Shelterbox

Read a full list of contributors to our fantastic new anthology in aid of Shelterbox http://wordaid.blogspot.com/p/contributors.html

Last chance...

to submit poems for our Shelterbox anthology, the deadline is Friday!

'strange fruits' now available

strange fruits is a poetry collection by Kent writer, Maria McCarthy in aid of Macmillan Cancer Support. Maria is a poet of remarkable skill, whose work offers surprising glimpses into our 21st-century lives – the ‘strange fruits’ of our civilisation or lack of it.

Shot through with meditations on the past and her heritage as ‘an Irish girl, an English woman’, it includes poems reflecting on her urban life in a Medway town and as a rural resident in Swale.
She writes, and occasionally teaches creative writing, in a shed at the end of her garden. Her website is www.medwaymaria.co.uk

Visit our publications page for information on how to order.

Anthology in aid of Shelterbox

After the success of last year's Did I Tell You? in aid of Children in Need, WordAid are producing an anthology in aid of Shelterbox who provide 'emergency shelter and lifesaving supplies for families around the world who are affected by disasters at the time when they need it the most.'

WordAid is calling for poems for the anthology on the theme of 'Survival' - emotional, physical, environmental, or any other kind of survival you can think of.

Click on our submissions page for guidelines.

Another poem from 'slantways'

Addiction

He rolled the carpet into a giant cigar and started to smoke it. The shag pile burned well enough and gave him a pleasant high. He defrosted the fridge freezer and melted it down on a teaspoon. The kitchen table and chairs broke up into powder that went straight up his nose. He drank the three-piece suite. The house finally empty, he started to pick at the walls brick by brick.

Kate L Fox