Another episode in The Natty Hat Competition.

This is the sixth  Literary Giveaway Blog Hop, and the fifth Natty Hat Competition, the idea is to be a contrast to most giveaways which seem to be centred around YA & romance fiction.

The reason my own personal contribution is entitled “ The Natty Hat Competition” is that when I first chose to participate in this Hop, I came to the conclusion that I needed some receptacle to posit the names of all those brave enough to enter my challenge. This meant such a vessel needed to be found, so off I went suitably attired in coat, scarf and hat, despite it being a heat wave (always been a martyr to ones own individual style) in search of such a reticule. After many an hour searching for something that would be commodious enough to be fit for purpose, I came to the conclusion that the effort involved was far beyond the ideal image I had of myself as someone of a laid back disposition, with borderline attitude  of a laggard, much suited to a more decumbent position. At this moment the proverbial bolt of lightening struck, and the resultant shock incurred, allowing this singular idea to form “ Why Not Use My Hat ?????????” After laying in a supine position for a week in an attempt to recover from such a formative response to my dilemma, this is what I did and The Natty Hat Competition” was created.

Now following the tradition of The Natty Hat Competition, I set you a slight challenge and as per usual it is related to poetry. My challenge is also related to my plans for world peace, now before you broadside me with the weapons of logic, yeah I already know that this is my personal delusion, so please allow me this slight chimera, this one legged stance of posturing against this fiction of detente and you’ll gain entrance to this the most wondrous of giveaways. So after the waffle I should state what my plans are….. Name me a favoured poet and/or poem from a nation different to your place of birth. Place in the comments the name of a poet or to gain my undying fondness, a poem (with name, writer etc.) plus your email or contact details and you shall be guaranteed your place within this legendary Valhalla, that is the The Natty Hat. As per tradition I’ll start.

Virus Writing

1.
Writing viruses
And electronic labyrinths
With a blackout and no computer
In a rented house, at seven thousand a month;
Kabul, the Afghan capital!
What silly poem is this?
You ask yourself, is poetry the same lonely words that wander in electronic corridors,
Cut off from their existence,
Thrown away, with no choice but to become a poem?
You watch imagination wandering through paths, over the paths,
You throw the leash at yet another word,
Trying to subdue this wild one,
And if you fail,
You stop functioning,
Like a computer crashed.

2.
There was someone, someone who wrote viruses
Behind a diesel-powered laptop
Looking for URLs and
An anonymous mail would be sent
Connecting you to a site, infected;
“I am from Florida, the USA, and 23 years of age,
Looking for someone to follow the link, and make happy”;
To open the mail and to make someone happy?
First, stop the programs;
Passing through security, typing 97, 98, 99,
Approaching the death of romance between zero and one.
A virus-writer drank half a beer bottle at once;
Then, computer deaths;
First to the east of Paris, a house,
Australia, three minutes more,
A man is waiting out the last minutes of an office shift
Needs to get home;
A party is starting in half an hour;
The Philippines, minutes later,
A 19-year-old girl
In a chat room,
Showing off a used body;
In Egypt, more or less the same time,
And the next morning, Kabul.

3.
You, and you, also you,
Yes, you and also you,
You are all arrested!

4.
They tell me, stop writing!
You write and we’ll show you Guantanamo at home,
You write, we’ll kill you.
Kabul, summer of ’07
Hands in handcuffs, feet tied up;
This is Afghanistan, and this here where it is going,
Dead bodies over dead bodies.
The poem has no choice but to stop writing itself.
This is prison.

5.
They asked a Kabul sparrow
Just what is mankind up to?
The sparrow considered this and died!

 

Kamran Mir Hazar(Afghanistan, 1976) is a prominent Hazara journalist, human rights activist and writer who now lives with his wife and one-year-old daughter in Hønefoss, Norway.

Now that you’ve survived the florid verbosity of my post, thank you for your polite silence. The reason for it was to provide an antithesis to Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s definition that

Prose, words in their best order. Poetry, the best words in the best order.  

And to allow you to fully appreciate the Prize Giveaway -  Definitions by Octavian Paler, this is a fantastic collection of poetry that I described as “beautiful, clever introspective poetry, not merely one individual’s exploration of self, but that it relates to you, us, all of us”. Here is more information on this book.

 

PS. To enter this giveaway You Do Not need to follow my blog or like, or tweet or any other dance steps that may occur to me, but if you do like what you see, please feel free to join & add your own ideas, as a polite introduction to a new idea, whether its a Book, a Poem or your favourite writer is always welcome. Thanks Parrish.

PPS, A big Thank you & respect to Judith from Leeswammes’ Blog,  for organising and for the original instigation of this  Literary Giveaway.

If you would like some ideas on poems check out my Pomesallsizes page for links or visit poetry international and whilst you’re out and about visiting please pay a call on my fellow conspirators in this, The Sixth Literary Giveaway Blog Hop

  HERE.

Hedgehog’s Home.

Introducing children to literature at an early age is the only way I know to inspire them so that this will become a life long love. When young, children’s tales quite often come in the form of fables, fairy tales and rhyme, I remember reading tales to my daughter and found that if they rhymed they were easier to remember and we could take turns reciting the verse. As she got older she became more confident and could take more of the tale/poem on for her herself, one of my fondest memories is her reciting from heart a poem by Spike Milligan (Ning Nang Nong), which she could do long before she could confidently read it. This brings me to the reason for this post, last year Istros Books published Branko Copic’s children’s tale “Hedgehog’s Home” (Jezeva Kucica), it is a tale written as one long poem and follows Hedgemund the Hunter, who is a brave  and stubborn hedgehog. This is a bit about the book

Welcome to the world of Hedgemond the Hunter, a brave and stubborn little hedgehog. Down in the wild woods he proudly tends his beloved house, but there are some animals who just can’t understand what the fuss is about! Find out just how Hedgemond proves to the grumpy bear and the greedy boar that there truly is no place like home. Hedgehog’s House is a story about caring for your natural habitat. Set in the unspoilt environment of the forest, we find the wild creatures arguing about what home means: is it simply a place we should take for granted, or is it something to be cherished and protected? Despite the persuasions of charming Miss Fox and the jeers of the angry wolf, Hedgemond steadfastly proves that his home is his castle, reminding us all that we each need to care for the places we live.

This poetic children's tale will have instant appeal to children through the strong characterisation of the animals involved and through the natural rhythm of the narrative, allowing it to be perfectly suited for adaptation into a musical format. This was accomplished by Pianist and arranger, Emily Leather, in cooperation with the Creative Director and award-winning soprano Elinor Moran from Operalicious. Hedgehog’s Home was created as an outreach project, intended to benefit the local children of Camden (London) and to this end the children of year 5 (10 years old) from Fitzjohn’s primary school in Hampstead will be involved during the Autumn term 2012.

Members of the production team will be visiting the school, presenting the idea to the class and working with the class and music teachers on the songs for the show. Children would therefore be able to take part in singing and percussion accompaniment to the professional musicians and singers on the stage. There will also be scope for the children to be involved in stage and costume design, with the input of the Creative Director.

It is hoped that this project will be a creative work which, once written and produced, can be taken up by schools, children’s groups and amateur operatic societies and reproduced. It will add to the cannon of children’s opera a story about the importance of caring for one’s home and environment and for standing up for one’s beliefs and defending what one holds dear.

Buy tickets for the UK premiere of Hedgehog's Home Children's Opera

Live at the Conway Hall this November!

Dates for performances of the show:
Friday 9th November 2012 –  two performances a.m. at 12:00 and 2:00pm
Sunday 11th November 2012 – matinee performance at 2:00 pm

For More information contact Istros Books, or to buy tickets

This is not just a fantastic project, but one that will help inspire a love of the written word, not just for the children involved but also all those who go and see it, hopefully yours will be amongst them.

An Introduction To A Poet………………David Lloyd.

One of the wonderful things about writing about poetry is the learning curve I find myself on, sometimes when I’m introducing a specific poet the introduction is not only to those reading the post, but to myself as well. Sometimes, this discovery is a totally new writer with their first collection, and other times it is a poet that has a decent body of work that I’ve become aware of, or a more accurate description would be that I stumble upon a poet, and with head held high tell all and sundry about my latest discovery……… So here I go again.

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David Lloyd was born in the Welsh-American mining community of Utica, New York (1954), as well as being a professor of English, he is the director of the creative writing program at Le Moyne College in Syracuse, New York. David Lloyd is also the author of six books, including a work of fiction Boys: Stories and a Novella, two poetry collection The Everyday Apocalypse, and The Gospel according to Frank and as editor he was behind The Urgency of Identity: Contemporary English-Language Poetry from Wales, an anthology of poems and interviews, presenting the important English-language Welsh poets of the 1980s – 90s. His poems have appeared in numerous journals in the US and Britain, including Double Take, Planet and Poetry Wales. In 2000, he received the Poetry Society of America’s Robert H. Winner Memorial Award, judged by W. D. Snodgrass.

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His latest collection, and the first I’ve read of his, is Warrior.  It is divided into five parts entitled The Great Khan, Lords Of The Jungle, Father And Son, Bedtime Stories and Lessons In Geography.

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This collection ranges far and wide drawing on characters from the past, whether historical or mythological and uses them to address issues that being timeless in nature are just as valid now. In this book Genghis Khan, Sitting Bull, and St Peter share space with characters from popular culture such as John Wayne and Tarzan, all raising their heads above the parapet and questioning everything from love, whether of family or Eros, to questions of politics, whether international or domestic.

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Miracle. (Lords Of The Jungle)

It was St peter wasn’t it.

who walked on water, if only

for a few seconds

before water became itself again

and his feet recalled

their human limitations?

*********************************

But what a glorious moment -

to be absent in the amnesia of miracle,

unable to know the difference

between earth and sea, fire and air,

between the promises our bodies make

and the ones they keep,

**********************************

stepping light years distant

from the beating heart, from friends

spellbound in the boat,

from fish in nets,

from even the simplest fact.

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What I found really thrilling in this collection was the urgency of the writing, several of the poems particularly in the section titled Genghis Khan, reminded me of Crow, by Ted Hughes, there was a force that had that same confrontational nature, that had an almost suppressed  violence, almost. Yet, at the same time some of these poems have a delicate intimacy, a sweetness that comes from close ties, for example the poems in Father And Son, were beautiful and as a father myself brought a lump to my throat.

II.  First Bruise. ( Father And Son)

Why, the son asked his father, did you let go?

Why, he asked next, did the floor rise

**************************************************

to bruise my head? and why,

he further enquired, did the air not resist

***********************************************

Why did the blood congeal without my consent?

Why did the skin prolong the agony?

*******************************

Why did the moment

then lodge itself in memory

*************************************

like a nipple between lips

or a tongue in a mouth without words?

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An introduction is the act of starting something for the first time, and it is in that moment that something new is created, something fresh, something that could be startling, that with a little effort can become so much more. Although this is not this writers first work, it is the first I was aware of, making it my introduction to this poet, my first experience, but not my last.

David Lloyd(Website)

Salt Publishing

Winning Writers(David Lloyd)

NEW WELSH REVIEW

The Summer My Father Died ~ Yudit Kiss.

We often often focus on the big picture, attracted to that large screen cinematic experience. A nation’s rise and fall will be written in bold letters, large enough to be seen by generations yet  to be born, its major players absorbing all the light, leaving the rest of us finding our way, our own individual path in the shadows of those whom history remembers. This book, although a memoir, charts the history of Budapest through the twentieth century, from just before the second world war, through the rise of communism and its subsequent fall, and yet it does so through a finer lens, through the life of one individual, Fűlöp Holló, a fierce supporter & defender of communism and Yudit s Father.

Fűlöp Holló’s story starts in Prague, where he lived a golden existence in the warmth of an extended family. His folks had moved there from Hungary, some years earlier  to escape the strict anti-Jewish laws that had no longer allowed his grandfather to practice medicine. Prague (Czechoslovakia) at this time was a true European capital with highly developed industry and enjoying a period of peace and stability, thereby allowing his family to flourish within its old-fashioned bourgeois democracy. This was not to last, by the spring of 1939 this period of freedom would disappear as the Nazi jackboot marched into the country and, on the 16th of March, Hitler went to Czechoslovakia and from Prague Castle proclaimed the German protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia.

For some reason it was decided by the family to go back to the homeland,  back to Hungary and to Budapest. It seems a bit stupid to say that Fűlöp, was one of the lucky ones because he survived what happened next; that a mothers love saved him from the extermination camps, but how ever I put it seems hollow & doesn’t convey what he went through, for example, between 20% and 40% of Greater Budapest's 250,000 Jewish inhabitants died through Nazi and Arrow Cross Party genocide during 1944 and early 1945.

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In 1949, Hungary was declared a Communist People’s Republic & Fűlöp Holló, would be one of its most  vehement supporters & would remain so for the rest of his life.

Yudit Kiss’s book focuses on the the final years of her fathers life, attempting to pierce through the barriers that have made a puzzle of her fathers past and have left her with a catalogue of unanswered questions. Questions such as..

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• Where does his unshakeable belief in Communism stem from?
• Why do others refer to her and her family as Jewish, when they are strict atheists?
• Why does her father have no relatives? 
• How could her father, who’s great belief was the the betterment of mankind, turn a blind eye to the atrocities done under its banner.

It’s these and other related questions that she attempts to find some answer for and in the process, has to reappraise her own ideology as an individual and as someone growing up immersed in the philosophy of her fathers world, this becomes more apparent the more aware she is of the world beyond the confines of her nations palisades, whether these were internal or external. Making this book as much about Yudit and her life as it does her fathers.

This book surprised me, at first glance it’s a book about an academic and dyed in the wool communist which didn’t really appeal and yet this is merely one of its facets. It is also about a family’s sacrifice and an individuals survival under conditions that could easily go in the Oxford English dictionary’s as the definition of hell, about a rejection of a past and its rediscovery, its about all the contradictions and half truths people use to get by. But most of all it is about love, family love, which makes this a warm beautiful tale full of poetic insight, written by someone with a love of the written word.

 

Yudit Kiss was born in Budapest in 1956. After having worked in Hungary, Mexico and the UK, she moved to Switzerland in the early 1990s, where she currently lives. Yudit is a Hungarian economist, based in Geneva, and the author of several academic publications dealing with the post-Cold War economic transformations of Central Europe. Her articles of wider interest have been published by the Guardian, Lettre International, El Nacional, Nexos, Gazeta Wyborcza & Eurozine. This is her first literary work.

Telegram books(Yudit Kiss)

Yudit Kiss (open Democracy)

 

This book is also full of writers, poets and their works, and has a set of author’s notes, containing anthologies where you can find English translations of the Hungarian poetry contained within the pages of the book, a resource I shall be mining for years. This note also states that:

“Unlike geographical Hungary (93,030 Square Kilometres, 10 million inhabitants), Hungarian literature is a vast, extremely rich country that is mostly inaccessible to non-Hungarian speakers. There are however, some excellent translations available in English, thanks to a few committed and gifted translators”

George Szirtes is one of these “committed and gifted translators”, a Hungarian-born British poet, writing in English, as well as a translator from the Hungarian language into English. He has lived in the United Kingdom for most of his life. He has won a variety of prizes for his work, including the 2004 T. S. Eliot Prize, for his collection Reel and the Bess Hokin Prize for poems in Poetry magazine, 2008. His translations from Hungarian poetry, fiction and drama have also won numerous awards.

George Szirtes(Wiki)

George Szirtes.co.uk

Literature(British Council)

This book was published by Telegram, an independent publisher committed to publishing the best in new and classic international writing, from debut novelists to established literary heavyweights. Telegram has published literary fiction from thirteen languages, ranging from Korean, Chinese, Arabic and Farsi to French, Croatian, Hungarian and Icelandic. In 2010 Three Sisters by Bi Feiyu won the Man Asian Literary Prize and Sabra Zoo by Mischa Hiller won the Commonwealth Writers' Prize Best First Book Award.

For a more in-depth  review of this book visit, A Common Reader & say hello from me.

Guided by Angels – Haunted by Gaki.

 

SOUL of a WARRIOR

by CLASH OF WEAPONS.

The first thing you’ll notice about this book is the art work, which if you are anything like me, you’ll find yourself turning the pages and imbibing the images. Only after soaking up the their beauty, will you turn to the words and realise with this beauty comes horror, because Soul of a Warrior is a collection of war stories describing conflict in all it’s forms; whether this is the blood and guts physicality of battle, or whether the engagement is internal, the strife dealing with instabilities of the mind or soul.

The tale is told as a series of poems written by S.G. Renee, and are interpretations of the artwork of Konaa, for example this is the poem for this picture.

Warrior Monk

The smouldering sun

burning devotion

of an endless war

*******

Clouded dusk,

remains of once

a lively village

*********

Choking heat

the hate and fear

still rages deep

*********

Grass soaked

of morning dew;

sword drenched

of human life

*********

The ant fights

Grasshopper’s rule

A warrior of life;

a warrior of gods.

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Another of the  poems cleverly uses Miyamoto Musashi’s *The Book of Five Rings (五輪書 Go Rin No Sho ) as it’s way of interpreting the artwork, using each of the five books (The Book of Earth,The Book of Water, The Book of Fire, The Book of Wind,The Book of the Void) as a verse in this poem, this idea really appealed and fits wonderfully with the theme of battles, whether they were old wars or those still being fought.

 

This book has me intrigued, the blending of art & poetry has a long history, in fact I posted on it recently concerning haiku & haiga, although that was normally one individual, what intrigues me here is that this is a collaboration by two individuals, that have yet to physically meet. This could facilitate a freedom from constraint in interpreting the subject matter that two individuals in a room would not have, and would allow for new ideas that the original artist did not see. This method seems to work for Clash of Weapons, as they have several projects on the go & I’m curious to see how this collaboration, experiment and adventure goes forward from here.

                          

 

                                             Bio

Clash of Weapons is a collaborative project between Konaa, the artist, and S.G.Renee, the writer.

S.G.Renee met Konaa on an art website, but they have not yet met in person. They started working on a project based on the "Death of the Author" theory: Konaa would create artwork based on her interpretation of the poems and S.G.Renee would create poems from the interpretation of Konaa's artwork. Four books were created from this concept.

S.G.Renee lives in Maryland working as a Technical Writer at an Engineering Incorporation while working with Konaa on the side.

Konaa lives in Michigan putting a lot of energy in Clash of Weapons as well as teaching art classes for children.

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Now see through opponent

use the ground, the soil

Move with the rain.

Know like the wind.

Attack as fire.

Leave mind,

empty,

clear.

Finish your

Art.

From The Five Rings

 

*Miyamoto Musashi (宮本 武蔵 1584 – 1645), also known as Shinmen Takezō, Miyamoto Bennosuke or, by his Buddhist name, Niten Dōraku, was a Japanese swordsman and rōnin. Musashi, as he was often simply known, became renowned through stories of his excellent swordsmanship in numerous duels, even from a very young age. He was the founder of the Hyōhō Niten Ichi-ryū or Niten-ryū style of swordsmanship and the author of The Book of Five Rings (五輪の書 Go Rin No Sho^?), a book on strategy, tactics, and philosophy that is still studied today. Miyamoto Musashi is widely considered a Kensei and one of the greatest warriors of all time.

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Clash of Weapons

S.G Renee

Konaa

Soul of a Warrior

 

Clash of Weapons have new books, Buried and Oichie Shamhna

(the Celtic Halloween) out on October 26th.

04-10-2012 - A Celebration

National Poetry  Day. 

Today is the Uk’s National poetry day, which has the aim of promoting poetry beyond those already hooked on it, by trying to make it a part of everyone's life, every day. All those who regularly visit The Parrish Lantern, or it’s anthology on Twitter (@pomesallsizes) will realise that this chimes in fantastically with my interest in poetry and in spreading the word about its wonder. Although the theme of this years National poetry is stars, I’m going to take that in a tangential way and place a poem from currently one of my favourite poets, because what he does makes him a star. Chris Emery, apart from being a wonderful poet, is the publishing director at Salt Publishing, an independent literary press based in Cromer, England - whose catalogue of works just need to be perused to see the quality (including one Shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2012).

He has published two previous collections of poetry, Dr Mephisto & Radio Nostalgia, as well as a writer’s guide and edited editions of Emily Bronte, Keats and Rossetti. His work has been widely published in magazines and anthologised, most recently in Identity Parade: New British and Irish Poets. He is a contributor to The Cambridge Companion to Creative Writing, edited by David Morley and Philip Neilsen. In 2006, he was awarded an American Book Award for his services to American literature.

More than enough reasons in my book to place one of his poems here as part of National Poetry Day.

On Leaving Wale Obelisk ( for Jen)

*******

Did we shuck our suits that leaf-dense noon,

leaving serious careers in lemon light?

The high clouds, early swallows, the day moon

weakened, nothing farmed, nothing tight

*******

above the summer marriage of grasses,

and all that luscious time receding in

the corporate years’ climbing excesses,

just a vacancy before children?

*******

We made our love pledge there. It leaves you

in chromatic episodes like this,

doesn’t it? Not quite nostalgia, but who

could have imagined ageing like this?

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We Had climbed up to lie on the pile hay,

the tow-coloured earth all nice and neat

and with everything to come our way,

lovers of the smashed- up wheat.

Chris Emery from his new collection Departures

 

 

National Poetry Day

Poems

Events

Education

Resources

NPD Blog

For more Pomes & stuff, check out the links here

 

Back to this years theme of stars, here is my effort, placed earlier today on Twitter & based on 140 characters.

From dark places

& dull comfort

from humdrum

side streets, they dance

sing scream

Notice me just enough

to light up a star.

********************Me