Wednesday 20 July 2016

Poetry

I don't think I've written poetry for a long time. I have about 80 poems which vary in quality. I read a lot of good poetry and I've come to the conclusion that most of my poems need work and I would need to learn a lot more to improve significantly. I am not in the league of poets like Plath.

My first book was a poetry anthology titled 'Compliance is Futile'. These poems were largely written to express things which could not be expressed in any other way at the time - to express experiences which were either mountaintop or valley experiences (where even the valley has a crevasse). Or, if you prefer, they were written after metaphorical storms had taken place.

I may return to poetry (when the storms or valleys come (and they will, for most of us)), but for now my focus is on fiction and non-fiction.

At the moment I am working on a non-fiction book and have reached the third draft. I find myself unable to talk about work while I'm engaged with it. All I can say, for now, is that it is original and I hope it will be available by the end of this year.

I also have another novel-length piece of fiction but that is only at first draft. Beyond that I have one novella length non-fiction account or essay and one other ongoing novel-length project.

Basically I do have a lot of work in reserve and I have more ideas than I could shake a spoon at.

I have changed the cover to Compliance is Futile. The original cover showed an altered picture of a statue of Joan of Arc from The Louvre, but I have learned Photoshop since then and the cover badly needed updating.

Here then, is the new cover...




And here is the link to the poetry anthology for those interested.