Category: Poetry

Cuba Press Book Gig

THURSDAY 12 FEBRUARY, 6PM
HAVELOCK NORTH LIBRARY

I’ve had a great run with publishers Cuba Press — Mary and Paul and all the other dedicated workers who have supported their efforts to publish local books, beautifully. It was Mary’s very cool idea to get some of their authors metaphorically on a bus tour for a gig in Hawke’s Bay.

THURSDAY 12 FEBRUARY, 6PM
HAVELOCK NORTH LIBRARY
Free event. Refreshments. Books for sale.
RSVP: books@wardini.co.nz

Poets Michael Fitzsimons and Simon Sweetman (well known music reviewer) will be there, and Andrew Wright channelling the extraordinary Shirley Bagnall Metcalfe and her life in the early days between two rivers, Tracy Farr with the brilliant novel Wonderland which has left me star-struck and championing her for the Ockhams this year (obvious choice, I know), me talking history and murder and colonialism, and all tied up in a bow by Mary McCallum, novelist and publisher of Cuba Press… but also on this night wearing her poet’s hat and tackling the hens with her collection of read-out-loud poems.

That’s a lot of writers gathered together for an evening, and all keen to yabber about poetry, novels, writing, publishing, life. Come along and join us for a hell of a night.

The Wonderful Wardini Books will have books for sale.

Featuring:

Michael Fitzsimons, High Wire: author of Michael, I Thought You Were Dead.

Simon Sweetman, The Richard Poems: author of The Death of Music Journalism.

Andrew Wright, My Three Rivers: the unpredictable waters of rural life.

Tracy Farr, Wonderland: Marie Curie and an early Wellington circus family. What? Yes!

Cristina Sanders, Ōkiwi Brown, colonial Wellington and its degenerates.

Mary McCallum, Tackling the Hens. Both the name of her fab book of poems and also an apt description of what she’ll be doing on the night, probably.

Bring your chickens along for a bok bok bok.

Ash – book review

Ash, by Louise Wallace

I saw a cartoon recently of a woman at the sink with a mop in one hand, a baby in the other, two tugging at her skirts and her man behind saying something like, “You’re not the fun loving woman I married.” Had me chortling with the laughter of ironic truth. In the same vein of misunderstanding, you may think Wallace’s book, Ash, is about the ash that has spewed from the volcano to cover everything and how the townspeople cope with this disaster. But it’s not. It’s about being a mother. And it’s bloody good.

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Under a Big Sky–book review

Under a Big Sky, by Tim Saunders

I’ve been back with Tim and his family for another farm holiday and it’s been great. I spent about a week in the book this time, not much has changed since I met them all in This Farming Life, but I think I will always enjoy the shepherds dragging astonished sheep from their pens for a morning shear and the way the magpies gargle with laughter when his dad tells a joke, and the big bird, Kāhu, who clutches the new day in rust coloured talons. These are the author’s expressions, of course. Who else could write so evocatively about daily life on a farm?

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small bodies of water –book review

small bodies of water by nina mingya powles

Straight away this book indicates poetry, from the lack of capitalisation on the cover to the beautiful title. Small bodies of water. That’s us. I thought about this when I was swimming recently and think I have never been described so beautifully.

“I never told you anything important about myself but if you had asked, if you had paused to listen, I would have said: my dreams take place in the rainy season.“

Poetry or very poetic prose. Every sentence carries a lyricism, a hint of a wider, more exotic world, and hits a feeling that builds on this central emotion of being awash.

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Hurt Upon The Sea

Poetry in law

Where any Person,
being feloniously stricken,
poisoned,
or otherwise hurt upon the Sea,
or at any Place out of England or Ireland,
shall die of such Stroke,
Poisoning,
or Hurt
in England or Ireland, or,
being feloniously stricken,
poisoned,
or otherwise hurt
at any Place in England or Ireland,
shall die of such Stroke,
Poisoning,
or Hurt upon the Sea,
or at any Place out of England or Ireland,
every Offence committed in respect of any such Case,
whether the same shall amount to the Offence of Murder or of Manslaughter,
or of being accessory to Murder or Manslaughter,
may be dealt with,
inquired of,
tried,
determined,
and punished in the County or Place in England or Ireland in which such
Death,
Stroke,
Poisoning,
or Hurt shall happen,
in the same Manner in all respects as if such Offence
had been wholly committed
in that County or Place.

__________________________
The Offences Against the Person Act 1861