‘Waiting for a Change’ by Sara Butler

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I was privileged to attend a beautiful evening of poetry in the city of Wells a few weeks back, namely the launch of Sara Butler’s collection, ‘Waiting for a Change’.


The evening was hosted by Ama Bolton and Morag Kiziewicz, two members of the highly respected Wells Fountain Poets, in which Sara was also a regular participant until ill health stopped her. It was Ama and Mo who gathered together Sara’s poems, arranged them and produced this book.

I have a personal stake in this collection, because Sara was also a valued member of one of The Leaping Word’s poetry groups, and I’ve longed to hold a book of her poems in my hands for years. Now, thanks to Ama and Mo, that dream has come true. This book really is an act of love.

‘Waiting for a Change’ is available from bookshops, or – if you must – Amazon; ISBN 978-1-914398-15-5. Someone called Deborah Harvey has this to say about it:

‘A love for nature infuses these poems, though it’s never romanticised, Sara having both an eye and an ear for the dark and the all-too-human. And there’s always the laughing ‘yes’, and sexiness, and a desire for something better, which is found and made real in these poems.’

The Return of Silver Street Poetry

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Beautiful Poets of Bristol and the Surrounding Metropolises!

We’re thrilled to announce the return of Bristol’s long-established and much missed poetry open mic, following an extended hiatus caused by Covid and then the search for a more spacious venue. 

Silver Street Poetry will now be held on the last Friday of the month, from 12.30 – 2.00pm, at St Stephen’s Church, which is just off Bristol City Centre. We shall be returning in our usual format – two open mic sessions, to which everyone who wishes is invited to read a single poem, separated by two 10-minute sets from a guest poet, in the middle of which there will be a break, where attendees can avail themselves of the facilities, which include a café! The proceedings will be organised and overseen by Deborah Harvey of the Leaping Word, along with Rosalie Alston, Dominic Fisher and Pat Simmons.

Our first gathering will be held on 30th September 2022, when guest poet Deborah Harvey will be reading from her most recent collection of poems, ‘Learning Finity’. Upcoming guests include two more well-known local poets, Dominic Fisher (October) and Helen Sheppard (November).

A contribution of £4 is suggested, or whatever you can afford, to cover room hire costs and the guest poet’s expenses. Our ethos is very much one of support and encouragement, care and mutual respect, and all are welcome.

Entrance to the church is from St Stephen’s Avenue, through the dark blue doors in the porch at the base of the tower. The building is accessible to wheelchair users; please see St Stephen’s website for further details: https://www.saint-stephens.com/your-visit

We’d be grateful if you would spread the word, especially to poets who might not use social media or email and so are less likely to hear that our sessions are resuming.

Many thanks

ANTICIPATING ‘A CUSTOMISED SELECTION OF FIREWORKS’ BY DOMINIC FISHER

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Congratulations to Dominic Fisher, long-time Leaping Word poet, whose second collection, ‘A Customised Selection of Fireworks’ (Shoestring Press) is on the brink of publication.

Dominic will be launching his book at Bristol Folk House on Thursday 16th June at 7.30pm, with guest readings from fellow-IsamBards, Pameli Benham, David Johnson and Deborah Harvey. If you’re in the locality, do come along and help the evening go with a bang.

Only connect

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One of the best things about running an open mic is when people who have never read in public before arrive with a poem and, after a little encouragement, walk to the front of the room and launch it for the first time. The look on their faces as they get to the last couple of lines and realise they’ve not only done it, they’ve nailed it, is marvellous; a mixture of delight and relief that spreads to everyone present, if the explosion of applause that follows is anything to go by.

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It’s a long time since I first got to my feet in Bristol Central Library, the then home of Silver Street predecessor, Can Openers, to read a poem about my great-great-grandmother, Mary Block of Christmas Steps. I was so nervous I managed to flick the black Bic I was holding (I’ve no idea why) right across the floor and into the listeners. Yet when I reached the end, I was amazed by how much I’d enjoyed the experience.

Since then I’ve learnt various techniques to improve my performance. (All page poets who read their poems in public are also performance poets.) Chief amongst these is preparation of my set – I time everything so I never have to ask ‘Am I doing all right for time?’ and I rehearse not just the poems but how I plan to introduce them too. I leave nothing to chance.

Until last Thursday evening, that is, when I read at Lyrical at Trowbridge Town Hall, along with Dawn Gorman, Anna-May Laugher, Shauna Darling Robertson, Chaucer Cameron and Helen Dewbery. Together with Pey Oh (who wasn’t able to be there on this occasion) we’ve formed a group called Strange Cargo, and have recently been discussing the possibility of improvised readings – ie taking poems on a loose theme to a poetry guest slot and then riffing off each other’s work, with no running order, no introductions, no safety net. Letting the poems echo and connect with each other, which is altogether scarier than a planned reading.

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Our theme on Thursday was walls and windows, and nerves were slightly calmed when we saw that our poems would have the perfect setting. And once we’d started, we realised it was nowhere near as terrifying an experience as we’d anticipated. We found ourselves tuning in to each other’s body language, so that the poems flowed well and there were no awkward pauses. If anything, perhaps we followed each other a little too eagerly.

The aspect that struck me most was the enhanced quality of listening this format requires. Usually at open mics or in more planned group readings, I find it quite hard to focus on the readings that come before my turn because half my mind is worrying away at my poem, intent on getting it right. We had no such luxury on Thursday; we had to concentrate on the other poems as they were being read so that we could find the best responses to them.

By the end we were brimming with ideas for improving the experience: for instance, managing the pauses better, so that they act in the same way the space around a poem on the page enhances the poem; and looking at whether even poem titles are necessary. What interested me the most, however, was the possibility of including the audience in the actual reading itself, rather than having separate open mic sessions. I would love the other poets present to be part of the process, and to take that involvement away with them so that they too can experience a different way of reading and listening to poetry.

Tracy K Smith at the Bristol Festival of Ideas

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In these days of sweeping funding cuts, the chance to see top poets reading locally come along only a couple of times a year, yet I can think of no more valuable a way for poets to learn and be inspired than to listen to the best of their peers reading their work in person. So when I learnt that Tracy K Smith, the US poet laureate, was coming to Waterstones in Bristol as part of the Festival of Ideas, I seized the opportunity of seeing her.

Tracy K Smith

Most poets tend to write about a corner of their own experience or a particular interest – for example, you might think of yourself as  an eco-poet, or someone who is especially good at capturing what it means to be a survivor, or a poet suited to political declamation. Smith herself is known for poems about the body, focusing on intimacy, love, and sexuality, but her work also encompasses, apparently effortlessly, political poems of enormous sensibility and empathy, such as the sequence she read from her second collection, ‘Duende’, which gives voice to Ugandan women kidnapped by rebel commanders, and such vast subjects as … well, the universe.

‘I don’t have a great brain for science,’ she claimed, to a frankly disbelieving audience during her reading of her sequence ‘My God, it’s full of stars’ from her 2011 Pulitzer-prize winning collection, ‘Life on Mars’. But in case you’re starting to think her work might be altogether too rarified, the quote about stars is from Arthur C Clarke’s novel, ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’, proving that Tracy isn’t afraid to tangle with pop culture either. She even writes affectingly about that ultimate starman, David Bowie.

And as you wing out across the universe of Tracy’s poems, you are being lifted on the most perfectly pitched reading of them. I would urge any poet who wants to improve their delivery of their work to listen to her read. There are lots of videos on line, or you can buy a CD of Duende. Better still, go and hear her read in the flesh … though now her book tour has ended, you might have to fly to America for that.