There is a sense of transport and movement in Gareth Writer-Davies’ poetry collection, Cry Baby. The pamphlet opens with the title poem which reveals a sense of disappointment that pervades the writing from start to finish:

I was not the imagined girl
ready for gingham ribbons and ankle socks
I was something else … a fist of a child
who bit my mother’s breast
and kicked out at rainbows.

In ‘Milko’:

the milk van delivered
dairy goods
for breakfast and pud
like a carnival float
the bouncing cargo
of gold and silver tops
danced in the crate
as if the party ends at the child’s front door.

These are very sparse poems, not weighted down with adjectives and adverbs; punctuation is rarely present and upper case letters are reserved for proper nouns. The poems are all short, the detail pared back to the bone. It creates a no-fuss remembrance of childhood from the adult’s perspective; a truth that invites no argument:

and when the little train stopped for breath
I came up for air
in Kentish Town
alone and inexact
my parents
two hundred feet below
lost in the puzzle of the map
(from ‘The Train Is Coming’)

The effect is not dissimilar to standing in front of Munch’s painting, The Scream, suspecting there is an immense story lurking in the unspoken words underneath the visible anguish. The poem ‘Child’ suggests that the feeling has persisted into adulthood:

I have grown used to the idea
and set a trap
using the window as a mirror

I am startled
by my own silhouette

Short as they are, there are some intriguing tales in this pamphlet. How the mother tries to escape by swimming the estuary to Ynyslas (in ‘Swimming At Aberdovey’), and how the child’s sister is kicked out of home for having sex with her boyfriend (in ‘Lilac Ladies’). There are moments of humour, such as in ‘Pyjamas’:

when once I saw a yellowhammer
and confusing it for a tennis ball
hammered it for six […] sometimes
there was a knock on the door
then I’d dream
I was walking the streets in my pyjamas.

When you read this pamphlet from start to finish, you really do get to experience the child growing to adulthood like you are part of the family.

Cry Baby by Gareth Writer-Davies is published by Indigo Dreams Publishing.

A.K. Hepburn’s poetry pamphlet, Survivalism, leaves you in no doubt that these poems are deliciously dangerous. The very first lines of the first poem alert the reader to the inescapable intrusion of shadows under the trees:

Lauren was a pianist.
I could tell that from the way
her fingers played the protrusion
of my hip bone, sprawling on the
hillside,
ignoring something threatening
brewing just below the horizon.

Poets have always battled with matters of life and death. In the poetry of Ted Hughes, crows are symbolic of creation. In ‘The Crow People’ Hepburn gives us her take on crows:

The crow people
Walk upright,
Smudgy charcoal outlines
On grey concrete

To me this reads like a picture of a city full of commuters who:

Leer and gape,
Gaudy faces open
In mockery

evoking a scene similar to that in part 1 of T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land:

A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many,

I had not thought death had undone so many.

By the third poem, ‘Coracle’, we have images of dead animals and dead trees:

He drifted up the spine
of the Pennines.
Peaks jutted from the water
like the vertebrae
of a long-dead whale
breaching the surface
[…]
an English sea,
breaking over the
skeletons of old oaks
littering the sea floor.

A few poems further on and we find pianistic Lauren again. This time it is ‘On the Coldest Night of the Year’, with the:

electricity off, fractals
forming inside the glass.
Outside, it’s eighteen below

and:

Lauren’s fingers glide
through a Nocturne, until
they’re too blue, too numb
to wring out another tune

the last notes of this poem bringing with them further death.

As we get to the title poem, Survivalism, we have almost become accustomed to the world being none-too hospitable. I was reminded of The Hunger Games books by Suzanne Collins. In that book, Katniss Eberdeen risks her life to salvage a bright orange backpack which contains a ‘half-gallon plastic bottle with a cap for carrying water that’s bone dry’ amongst other things. In this poem our survivor also has a knapsack and a:

Water bottle, leaching
chemicals, probably

There are, appropriately enough, 13 poems in this pamphlet, beginning with ‘Before’ and ending with ‘Apocalypse, Then’. If you enjoy your worlds dystopian, as I do, you will love them — it may be wise to wear thimbles on your fingertips whilst reading, lest turning the pages slices them clean off.

Get your copy of Survivalism

Testing the Delicates is a collection of poetry to raise awareness about the stigma surrounding mental health, ignorance about it and prejudice towards it, identity, isolation, memories, and understanding the past through photographs.

The voyage of this short (but perfectly formed) book plots the course of personal thoughts, emotions and memories of its author, Deborah Edgeley, as she retraces many poignant steps of her life, particularly in relation to her early years, and the connection to her mother.

Initial, cursory glances at Testing the Delicates reveal unto the reader a cocktail of emotional depth, portrayed within the forty-three pages of poetry, and prepare us for the literary voyage ahead.

As with all personal journeys, the largest challenges for the author involve:

a) including us readers as enthralled passengers for the duration of the journey.

b) providing us with relevant sources of information and education and

c) allowing us to gain a sense of empathy from our voyage into often-choppy, emotional waters that may easily infringe into whirlpool eddies formed from mental illness and depression.

For this, we naturally require a competent captain at the helm to guide us safely through these waters. Thankfully, for the reader, Captain Deborah Edgeley’s literary skills enhance our journey in two main aspects.

Firstly, the writing is beautifully expressed. This allows all passengers to relax and ease into the words, without fear of any misunderstanding, or vagueness, about the importance of the emotional messages being relayed to us.

An excellent example of this lies within the poem, ‘Thought Pictures’, which focuses on the particular aspect of depression, and how isolating this can make us feel, meaning that expressing our feelings to others becomes much more difficult. The severity of the mental downsides of watching a beloved soul dealing with mental/emotional difficulties is balanced beautifully with lighter, more comforting tones, especially when dealing with ‘imagined’ conversations with the self, at such difficult times. If the beauty and skill of wordsmithing is to conjure up relevant and powerful images via literal expression, then this nails it for me personally, as each line conjured up images of my late mother in a very similar state. Through Deborah’s words, I was able to return to my thoughts from a decade previous; each description supremely apt and meaningful.

…’See your stare, your blink
your unkempt eyebrow raise…
your tongue poke
through your wetted lip

I taste your imagined words
as you jigsaw another shade
to my thought pictures
that float in my head.

Secondly, our understanding is greatly increased, as the author has provided us with a detailed map of our journey with the inspired addition of nine full pages of notes, relating to every given poem.

This is genius, and I sincerely wish that more writers employed this option, especially within the expression of personal poetry. As passengers, we instantly know exactly where we’re going, as we are in possession of a skilled ‘tour guide’, providing us with precise information about every valuable sight along the way.

On a personal level, as someone who can easily empathise with various aspects of the subject matter, so beautifully relayed via Deborah’s words, this ‘map’ addition increases both the closeness and power of the poetry, allowing me to nod along throughout the verses, and relate them to my own personal experiences.

Criticisms? I have two:

Firstly, I got to the end of this book and eagerly wanted to hear more. The writing is so ‘spot on’ that I didn’t want the voyage to end, and became disappointed to return to the home port and disembark back on shore.

Secondly, Deborah is clearly a very skilled writer, and the prose contained within her ‘Notes’ section is relayed both simply and effectively.

As such, if there is to be a follow up book (hint hint) I would personally love to see this aspect expanded into some sections of ‘life writing’.

Like Deborah, I gave up my job to care for my ailing mother. One poem leapt out at me, ‘Act One, Scenes 1-12’, because it so beautifully emphasises those days when emotional closeness is eclipsed by the dark difficulties of basic communication, both within everyday, mundane topics, and those covering more difficult scenarios.

Shall I take you to Daddy’s grave,
tulips or sweet peas?
Talk to him or stay silent?
Trace the gold letters
with your hand or mine?

From the heart, exemplifying intelligent, thoughtful, caring words which stretch both the mind and soul, aided perfectly by illustrations from the talented artist, Mark Sheeky.

Encore please!

Whose Apple Thou Art? 

In Greenwood, studded with crab and perry,
out of tempest mind tumbled Caliban.
So say yeomen of sixteenth century,
‘Bring thee where the crabs grow,’ said the madman.

Drinking proverbial acidity,
Gossip’s Bowl was spice sipped by Bidford folk
in restaurants of ancient forestry
acid draughts intoxicate shallow jokes.

But three crabbed months had soured themselves to death.
‘He’ll never have Miranda,’ they concurred.
The Bidford souls muttered under their breath
‘Goddess and a madman?’ with spoon they stirred.

‘Whose apple thou art, gem grown from deep root?’
‘Yours, but I will never bear sweet fruit.’

Testing The Delicates from Amazon

Deborah Edgeley on Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud

Mark Sheeky Art, Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud