Turquoise Monster

So tomorrow I am going to Oxford to read at The Not The Oxford Literary Festival, here is the Facebook events page. I have been working on a collection called Political Converse and the theme for the reading is Socio-Politics-Protest in literature so I will be reading poems from that such as Recipe For Riot and No Wage Slave.

I will also be singing my new song Shit Creek.

Then Saturday I shall be at Centre Arts taking part in their vocal worshop which looks so much fun I can hardly wait 🙂

Sunday I am reading once more at Art Tournament – this is No Hoax and looks to be as good as ever 🙂 I haven’t decided wait I am reading yet. Here is the facebook events page.

And that is just this weekend! Now Sunday is also the first of April and April to me means another month of poetry writing challenges for which I am going to be concentrating on Visual Poetry and it also means – The Cheltenham Poetry Festival!!!

Which not only has some fantastic events but also has kids workshops run by – Oh ME!

🙂 Yes that is right The Monster Writing Game the Poetry Edition is going to be there on Saturday 21st april at The Brewery 1.00pm – 2.00pm and it is Free 🙂

Then there is The Poetry Bees and Their Tree! on Sunday 22nd april again at The Brewery 12midday – 1.00pm and again it is Free 🙂

I am also doing the Poetry Showcase at The Muffin Man on Friday the 20th of April 11-12 it cost £5 for this event but it is poets from all over Gloucestershire.

Oh and I nearly forgot that I am also reading in the Waterston’s in Cheltenham on the 7th of April, this is my children’s poetry and I will also be selling copies of my The Little Book of Easter Poetry audio book to raise money for my little girls school who are in need of books. Not sure what time yet.

I don’t normally do more than one blog post a week on here but I felt that this was something that deserved the extra effort and push. Mab Jones who I first saw at the 2010 Wychwood Festival, is currently in Japan sharing welsh culture in the form of poetry. She is being funded for part of the trip but not all so there is an attempt to crowd source the rest and we don’t have that long to do it in!

So if you love poetry and international cooperation then why not bung a tenner in the kitty 🙂 In other words go here and sponsor her.

There is something else – which though I love Wales and the welsh language (hence trying to learn it), is probably the most important bit for me at least. She is also high lighting and talking in schools about a condition called Selective Mutism (used to be known as elective mutism). This is were someone who can speak just sort of stops either completely or in certain situations.

As I think I may have mentioned in previous blog posts about music and the like, I had lots of problems with communication as a child – having hearing problems and other issues including a lisp and the dyslexia. Part of what happened is around the time I had the operation on my ears I stopped talking, became reclusive and excessively shy. I would only look at people through my eye lashes. Then when I did start talking again I had a stutter – the stutter which still sometimes appears always got worse when I was stressed.

It took speech therapists and an brilliant teachers who encouraged me to explore poetry and stage which with the dyslexia was a tricky thing. One of the reasons I started reading my poetry out at open mics after my baby was born was that I feared I would slip back into forgetting how to talk. I am excessively shy (which no one ever believes!) – it is a form of social anxiety. I struggle going to events at venues I’ve never been to before and the like.

People see the word shy and they think it is a little thing – which it probably is for most people but not for me. I don’t know if selective mutism is always connected to shyness. Lots of things happened around the time I stopped talking and stopped looking at people – the ability to hear when I hadn’t been able too I think did not help at all. Sound was a wall and I could not extract peoples voices and what they were saying from the malee.

As always having thought about this and having a conversation with my husband I came up with a poem.

Shy

Shy sits silently
Shrouded by curtains of curly hair
Staring scared from below lashes
Squashed firmly into shadows
Watching with secret hopes
Crowds dancing
Loud is the sound
Such a slender slight form Shy retreats
Shy’s voice is lost
Scared away today
No one notices anymore
The scintillating scene streams past
Shy slips away into self consciousness
Screaming in silent agonies
Shy’s words are broken
When the word’s voice speaks – they stutter
Shattering the sounds of thoughts that should be shared
Shy used to speak but no one listened
So the word stream stopped
Clogged with What’s the Point?s and Silly Childs
But now barbed words are stinging
Struggling for escape
Ripping the throat
Sitting still Shy thinks
One day the song will come
And then Shy will sing!
Sing on Stage!
Staggering the audience
But for now Shy hides in the shadows
Silent and grave

This week is National Science and Engineering Week 2012 here in the UK – it is a week of events and out reach to show just how much we need science, and how much fun it can be along with just what is still out there to discover!

I am of course the Scientific-Artist or Artistic-Scientist and I have been collecting together science poems and things I have written and as part of the sharing science with the public I thought I would release a poetic album of ten poems, one story and one song. It is called Ballads of the Scientifica and is free to down load until the end of the week.

In February I ran a couple of workshops at Rowan Field Junior school – I had stuff for them to write poems for the dragons body, a poem about writing the poems for the dragons body, the Muse Monsters telling them things they should think about when writing poetry and stuff to make little dragons they could take home with them. They were also subjected to some of my children’s poems.

Fortunately I got them after assembly where they had had an encounter with the Dreadlock Alien – I could hear the enthusiasm for this poety beat dude reverberating around the school and by the time I got them, the kids where jumping up and down to write poetry.

Once again the event made it into the local newspaper though it’s only my name mentioned this time 🙂

For those of who don’t know I’m Sarah Snell-Pym, TheMonsterBlogs and Saffy on twitter.

I really enjoyed this event and am very pleased that Cheltenham Poetry Festival asked me to participate 🙂

This Sunday the 4th of March at Gloucester New Inn there is the monthly arty chill which I have been attending to read my works poetic. This Sunday however is slightly different as they are running a competition for Gloucestershires Poet Laureate. The first phase of which is audience votes so I would like some people to come and vote for me – please.

Yep that’s right I am going for this – I doubt I will get it as there are going to be like well know poetry types there – I am hoping for a few votes though so that I can continue to show my face in the arty circles of Gloucestershire and in fact the UK!

It costs £5 on the door to get in for non-performers and starts 3pm and ends at 9pm. There are lots of musicians and comedians and things there too and it’s a really good event and I wont sulk if you vote for someone else (honest!).

I have about 40 poems based on science subjects and images plus a few political ones to throw into the mix. So that is more editing but I found that just out of poems that are already in existence I have enough to release a booklet of 10 Space specific poems and once this lot is edited I have got enough to do 100 space and tech poems.

I am therefore very happy with this 🙂

On top of that my little girl made her own poetry book this year as part of her taking part 🙂

I was just going to post the science poems I’d written this month but then I read these news articals:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/nov/16/young-jobseekers-work-pay-unemployment

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/feb/18/tesco-branch-hit-pay-protest

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/feb/16/disabled-unpaid-work-benefit-cuts?newsfeed=true

No Wage Slave
Bayed go down the commercial drain
Human rights u-bend
Send wraith of pain
Terminally ill aint catching
Government snatching
Chiold’s under the poverty line
Finned for not being on time
Crime swine on the rise
Cries in the night of destitution
Prostitution of limb and maw
Leaving lives stretched and raw
Time sinking backwards
Reeling
Hear the keening
Ghosts that fought for freedom
In and out of this United Kingdom
Sever hand that feeds jowled
Gluttonous banker
Ignored by Political

But who steps to the fore
Who gives the ROAR!
Stop think!
This policy stinks

Don’t blame the other
For running for cover
Your hand’s are stained no better
And suicide teens don’t get much deader
Youth terror
Masked error
As this economic storm is weathered

Sink swim
desperation cling
Shame filled
Pill killed

Work for no wage
The government say

I say
Stand up and be counted
Attrition is mounting

Write that damn letter to your MP
Do it electronically
Again I remind you of
They Work For You and My Society

Cos the word be mightier than the turd
Scream and rant
21st C slavery should be banned
Think you can’t change that with words
At least try
Please tell me you didn’t just ask why?

Jupiter
Sitting there
Protector
Shielding us from rocky storms
Or
Sinister betrayer
Sling-shoting armageddon
Towards us
A Projectile wraith
For your rocky brethren
Nestled near the sun
What will the maths show Which way will the simulation swing
Gaseous Giants – Benevolent gods
Or Destroyers of Worlds
Wrapped in jealousy
That their own embryonic systems
Lay aborted, half formed in decaying rings

How I have started – I have dug out all the science/nature mags I can find – this is harder than it sounds as I have just moved house. But I now have a big stack – I am now attempting to read as many as I can – after day five I shall start writing with my brain swimming in ideas and concepts.

This technic worked well for me before when I used to go to Cheltenham once a week but often had no money so I would sit in the library and read their National Geographic and stuff. I was then writing poetry and short stories for the rest of the week until it was time to go and read something else.

February is here again and that means it is a month of poetry writing – I’m afraid I am locked into writing stuff for kids at the moment and the odd adult performance piece. Last year I focused on my childrens’ rhymes and then in April did song writing – I feel like doing something different this year but don’t want to just follow the hints on the website.

I was thinking more along the lines of looking through my National Geographic and New Scientist and Astronomy Now magazines and allowing the stories, concepts and images within to stir my poetic muse.