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Animals Live in My Lungs

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In early 2020 I was invited by the Illuminate Rotherhithe community project to write a poem about migration, specifically inspired by the Mayflower pilgrims, to perform at their community celebration later in the year. That event never took place - it was one of the first I was connected with to be cancelled by the pandemic. This year, Illuminate Rotherhithe came back, and asked me to write and perform a poem about this year's core theme - TREES. I knew I was set to perform the poem at the bandstand of Southwark Park, so took a wander down there to see what trees would be around us. It's almost all London Planes ; suitable for a festival whose core theme is migration since London Planes are not strictly native at all, being a hybrid (deliberate or accidental) of Planes orient- and occidental. They've become such a familiar and welcome part of the urban landscape of our capital that they bear its name. I asked Pat Kingwell - a man with extraordinary knowledge of Southwar...
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Ten Things on Our Wall at Home

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This was written for the Dalston Writers audio anthology. 'Home'; which you can listen to in full, including my own reading of this piece, below: Dalston Writing Group · Dalston Writing Group The Home Project 2021 My reading is introduced by group leader Jon Fortgang at 17:45 (you can get an insight into Jon's own work in his profile on my Wedding Ritual blog ) Ten Things on Our Wall at Home View this post on Instagram A post shared by Wes White (@wave.silo) 1. A promo poster for the B-movie ‘NOT OF THIS EARTH’ - the 1988 one featuring Traci Lords, which has a 33% critics rating on RottenTomatoes; not the 1957 one featuring Paul Birch, which has a 36% critics rating on RottenTomatoes, nor the 1995 one featuring Elizabeth Barondes, which has no rating. The one in the middle. This poster, which I snuck into the four-foot-cubed box of your stuff that we had shipped over from your apartment in the States, has the tagline, ‘TRACI LORDS IS... NOT OF T...
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DUST for BOG

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My piece 'Dust' has been published in 'Bog issue 2 - the Dust issue' 'Bog' is a wonderful e-zine that recaptures the feel of the fin-de-siècle internet, those pioneering late-90s websites that were exploring what was possible online, before so much was so comprehensively homogenised by the social media giants. Bog's editor Eilidh has a passion for archaeology, and the website aims - more successfully than you might think a digital interface could - to replicate the sense of digging around in the mud, encountering what you will and making of it what you may. If you want to dig around in the mud, encounter what you will and make of it what you may [recommended], go here . Or, if you'd prefer to go straight to my own 'dust' for 'Dust', click here . 'Dust' is a true story. 
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Live online reading of 'The Way to Zed' - 7pm tonight for Camberwell Arts Festival

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In 2018 I wrote a poem cycle, 'The Way to Zed', a personal journey through the shapes, sounds and histories of the letters of the alphabet. 'H' - The Fool I was delighted to read the cycle in full for Camberwell Arts Festival 2020 . 'M' - Reflection (Temperance) The reading was accompanied by a presentation of the Tarot designs I've produced based on the poems - these were available in an exclusive online exhibition for the Festival (for a very limited period, so check them while you can ) 'Z' - The Ace of Swords You can see and hear the reading in full here: The surreal quest described in the poems is mapped out by the symbols that our modern letters descended from. The corresponding ancient symbols, and the Tarot cards I've chosen to represent the letters, are as follows: Letter Corresponding ancient symbol In the 'Way to Zed' tarot A Bull's head Ace of Wealth ...
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Southwark Festival of Words

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This month I've be very happy to be featured in Southwark's online Festival of Words , with three past readings and a new one recorded at home specially for the purpose going online as part of the borough's wider celebration of language and literature. Three of the four poems have been recognised in poetry contests in the past. This afternoon the final video is going live, in which I share some of the thoughts that went into the writing. That premieres at 4pm today: All four of the featured readings follow. These will all be available throughout the summer along with readings and talks from many other established and emerging writers . Snowdrop Leopard Wood Have Catwoman
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The Naughtiest Thing - now out as a Glastonbury Broadside Ballad

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"Once upon a time in a place called Wheatley (which means wheat field, and is well named) there was a field of wheat - I tell a lie, there were many..." ' The Naughtiest Thing ' is the timeless tale of a vicar's daughter committing the ultimate transgression in a wheat field. You can read the tale in full on my Substack . This fairytale poem has been published on a centuries-old letterpress as a limited edition broadside of 50 numbered copies, featuring a hand-coloured chaffinch - the namesake of the goblin in the tale. It was (and perhaps a few still are) available exclusively in Glastonbury bookshops. 'The Naughtiest Thing' is a work of fiction and any similarity to any former Prime Ministers or Home Secretaries living or dead is entirely coincidental.
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A Vanished Kingdom

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Edit : regrettably, but understandably, the measures to combat the spread of COVID-19 Coronavirus have forced the cancellation of this event. We and Théâtre Volière hope that it will be possible to stage it in happier times. - Through February and March this year, I have been working as part of a group of writers (including my wife, Erica Viola ) with Théâtre Volière  on a set of poems inspired by the traces left behind by Europe's lost empires and cities. Together, these traces of an imagined 'Vanished Kingdom' will conjure a culture that never was, and which yet feels very familiar. Coins, pottery shards, epic poems, spells, curses, folksongs, monolithic stones - our unreal land had none of these. Still, we will describe their ghosts. On Monday 23 March 2020 we'll be performing ' A Vanished Kingdom ' as part of the 2020 Marchland Festival at Canada Water Theatre . A further performance of 'A Vanished Kingdom' will be taking place at the sam...
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