Very pleased to have my poem On Benbulben in the latest edition of Gutter.
Writing
Two new outlets for my poetry collection, “Good Morning”
If you have not managed to link in with tell it slant, Ellen McAteer’s poetry bookshop, check out the fb page.
You can also now buy the book in Aye Aye Books, based in the wonderful Centre for Contemporary Arts at the top of Sauchiehall Street in Glasgow and run by Martin Vincent.
Poem of the month December 2013: a nod to New Men
The Da
Â
Dinner was cooked by my (fair) hand
then dishes, cutlery, pots, other various bits’n’bobs, left
youthfully expressed as
‘if you end up leaving them, we’ll do them when we get back.â€
Â
Almost gratefully
my hands are immersed in suds
Da
cook, washer-upper, New Man
the father of daughters, unleashed
equal.
Poem of the Month for November
The Poem of the Month for November is wedding, a poem written some years ago when the idea of gay marriage was less fashionable and any ceremonies were not legal and generally hidden.
The poem features in my 2010 collection Good Morning. You can buy the book on-line (PayPal accepted) or at several retailers – ideal Christmas present!!
To Live With What You Are
For any writer, the search for an agent is a hard one. I have recently started and have three rejections to my name to date. I feel confident that the novel To Live With What You Are will fire an agent’s imagination. Till then, I am in good company with the best of novelists facing a similar journey.
So, a positive message taken in the rejection message from Rogers, Coleridge & White of London whose submissions team described the novel thus: “To Live With What You Are is intriguing and original”. Let’s hope the next time it is original, intriguing and spot on for us.
More to follow, folks
The Song of Wandering Aengus
The poem of the month for May is a tiny taste of the work of W B Yeats.
From the expansive poetry on Irishness to the yearning of the love poems to Maud Gonne, Yeats, like all great poets, captures the enormity and the insignificance of the human condition.
The Song of Wandering Aengus was sung beautifully by The Waterboys and equally wonderfully by Christy Moore.
Northwords Now
I have a poem published in the current edition of Northwords Now.
Page eight (In Blanchland again).
Northwords Now is edited by Chris Powici and available on-line as well as in many outlets. The magazine is excellent and well-produced. And free to all. It is always worth a read.
Poem of the month for March
Follow the link to see February on the Moss, the poem for MarchÂ
You can also find out more about West Moss-side, a farm transformed by Kate Sankey to create a high-quality venue for a range of get-togethers, meetings and craft events. Plus the Trossachs Yurts – a low impact, slow get away. Well worth a visit!
It is a place of real beauty, a “vast expanse of all things damp and wonderful.” (NNR site)
February on the Moss is seen in the photo on the wall at West Moss-Side.
Poem of the Month for February
A departure this month. Follow the link to the Red Ensemble video of their interpretation of my poem Right. The ensemble used a recording of my recitation of the poem and Palestinian poet Ghazi Hussein’s recording of his Arabic translation as part of their improvisation. The piece was recorded at Glasgow City Halls.
The accompanying film features dancer Joan Beattie of the Vito Dance Theatre.
Right was originally published in “Chapman†and is in my collection “Good Morning“.
Review of “Good Morning”
A short review of the collection in the latest edition of Northwords Now.
Guest reviewer Lesley Harrison writes:
“Charlie Gracie’s poems aim to capture the clear, tender moments of beauty around us – how rain brings light with it, the warp and weft of a single-track road, Tam o’ Shanter at bedtime. Good Morning (diehard, 2010) is a quiet celebration of life and living:
“and even when the sunshine bakes us / the rain is only hiding / smirring off the surface of the sea /gathering its breath / for the big Heave Hoâ€.”