http://www.kevinmccann.co.uk Kevin McCann Wed, 25 Apr 2012 16:25:11 +0000 http://www.kevinmccann.co.uk en http://www.kevinmccann.co.uk/Adult-Poetry http://www.kevinmccann.co.uk/following/kevinmccann.co.uk/Adult-Poetry Wed, 25 Apr 2012 16:25:11 +0000 Kevin McCann 3268903 Adult Poetry _ “Time and space are merely accidental conditions of thought. The imagination can transcend them.” De Profundis : Oscar Wilde _ “...the makers of horror films are more in tune with contemporary anxiety than most of the English poets.” The New Poetry : A. Alvarez _ Beyond Bedlam (Anvil);Blue Cage; Electric Acorn; Erbacce; Flax; Graffiti; Helicon; Highgreen Poets; Hobgoblin; Hubble Bubble (Hodder); In the Red; Irish Pulp; Milk and Martha Proctor; Oxford Magazine; Poetry Seen; Running Away From Bustops (Survivors Press);Seven Beats; Smoke; Tears in the Fence; Under the Asylum Tree; The Contraries (Third Stone Records) _ Earlier versions of many of the poems were included in the following pamphlets : TheBear (Blue Cage Books) In with the Shrink (Driftwood Publications) I Killed George Formby (Erbacce Press) Some of Us (Erbacce Press) A number of these poems have also been broadcast on Radio City; Radio Lancashire, Radio Merseyside and the BBC World Service. _ Along empty paths Across open fields Until I reach a river, Slide down the bank Falling forward Into mud wrist deep To kneel, mouth clamped, Looking down On a strange reflection, Clouds caught on hair, Minnows dart out of eyes I can’t quite meet So look up As a swan Drifts closer Still Moving forward Still Moving forward Until, arched neck Straightening Her head brushes My shoulder Lightly Before she turns Each reflection Back on itself. The sky re Forms around me Slowly I find their voice Some Of Us _ A Lesson Teacher paces out The afternoon. Note this. Note that. Learn by heart For Monday. One child Pounced on explains “Seagulls talk to me.” A controlled burst Of laughter From the class. “Oh yes And what do they say ?” “It’s in seagull,” The child replies Then adding patiently “And it’s no good In English - doesn’t rhyme !” More laughter But less this time. Blue Cage; Under the Asylum Tree; Beyond Bedlam; In with the Shrink; The Contraries; Poetry Seen Blodwen One man claimed “I love you” As triple moons Waxed and waned Into her radiant child Who was stolen away While papers were signed. She’s been kept Close confined As decades crawl by She draws owls On the walls And goes out of her mind. 7 Beats; I Killed George Formby _ The Morning Star For two nights only (Thanks be to God) Booked in here, And on that first morning I see him, The original solitary mister, Who disdains My morning greeting With his graveyard angel’s stare But once, maybe, He appled someone’s eye, Kicking a ball Patterned with stars To send it rolling Across safe worn carpet Like some new born universe Who stands now By the wedged open Fire-escape door Smoking, Coughing, Hawking, Spitting Then goes back to his room With its always damp sheets And a telly That never quite works. 7 Beats; Some of Us _ Easter Week Behind a line of Guinness barrels Stacked head height across O’Connell Street, Young men in khaki Peer through gaps Look to your front Caps pulled low, Scalps itching Find your target Squint away sweat’s needle sting Take aim At Poets and slummies Who pray to Saint Jude Then make every shot count. I Killed George Formby _ Deluded Listen ! It was going dark When they came With, “Come on old pal, It’s all for the best,” So I didn’t resist As they bound me Hand and foot, Mocked my silence And brought me up Before a man Who questioned everything Then washed his hands. Listen ! It was dark When they left me Laid out in this cell, Left me to burn For three days in hell, But the voices came back, Rearing up in my head. Listen ! They told me The weft and weave That binds clay to blood And wood to bone, They told me seven secrets That only magpies know. Listen ! Soon I’ll go to a place Where the moon is made of glass And the stars fall like snow. Milk and Martha Procter, 7 Beats; Some of Us _ Photo Opportunity As the sea-lion Hauls himself up Onto this platform Where he’ll cavort For Two Shows Daily And a bucket of fish, Clever dick similes Swim through my mind : He’s a Slick grey piping bag With Eyes like sultanas, Bewhiskered as A Victorian toff Who swings round like Some loose gantry- While I pose With my new book, He closes the distance Between us, Bares teeth That could pare Flesh From bone, Man-whispering, Slams his face into mine, Blows down my nostrils, Hot salty breath Scouring my throat And in eyes Brown as kelp I helplessly float. Some of Us Crocodile Dreaming I was with this Australian mining company, in the outback, surveying. I’d gone there because there weren’t any jobs here, not after she became Prime Minister. One night some Aborigines walk into camp. The others sent them packing - Aussies were worse than white South Africans - but I followed them back to their campsite, took food and tobacco for sharing. They invited me in and we got to swapping stories. Every time one of theirs tells a tale, another moves close to see if I’m smirking. They told me that it wasn’t stories came out of creation, it was creation came out of stories. Night after night, I keep going back, listening now more than I’m talking until they say there’s a place I should see but they’ll only take me if I agree to be blindfolded. By now, I trust them so let them lead me for hours in tightening spirals. We stop and when they take the blindfold off, we’ve reached a billabong. Above us, a sky like I’ve never seen and because the water’s pitch, it’s reflected perfectly. There’s no up or down, just parallel infinities. An old fella squats down, begins slapping his spearhead onto the water and doing this deep throat singing. Two stars, red glowing embers, detach themselves from a constellation’s cluster. Space wrinkles. Ripples rise then fall away, their edges fraying as they collide, fold in on themselves. One of the Aborigines hands me some meat and putting his hand on my shoulder, walks me down to the water’s edge. He tells me to put the meat on the ground then we both step back a pace or three as a crocodile breaks surface. He’s bone white and sixty feet at least. He emerges, black water rolling off his back, stays low, approaching slowly, he noses the meat, pauses, looks at me, gulps it down and then, when he slides back into the water, sinking without a ripple, it was as if he’d stayed still and water took him back in. They blindfold me without a word and lead me, back just in time, to watch the rising sun. That day I stumbled through my work. Dreaming and waking became the same thing. That night, when I went back to their camp, even their footprints were gone. Flax 26 - Flash Mob _ In 1938, Grey Owl, a Native American environmental activist and popular public speaker died suddenly. Within weeks of his death, it was revealed that he was really Archie Belaney, a white man born in Hastings in 1888... Grey Owl I remember boots. Theirs. High buttoned. Dull. His. Heeled.Tooled leather with shiny toe caps and I grabbed one of them just as he was leaving and they prised my fingers away and scolded me. He turned away then turned back and threw down his hat and said - Wear that when your head’s big enough and remember me. Then he was gone. I never saw him again. My name is Wa-Sha-Quon-Asin, Grey Owl and I come in peace. They’d say I had his eyes and even when I won the Composition Prize at school, I was still my worthless father’s son. And there was this woman used to watch me sometimes from a distance. I’d be alone, tracking buffalo through the park or hunting bears in our back garden and see her spying through the gaps between the trees. A small dark skinned woman. My mother. Apparently. But the two Aunts, my father’s sisters, kept her separate. She was The Other and not to be spoken of. So I’d stain my paleface skin with cold tea, stick seagull feathers in my hair, sit on the hillside above the old town dreaming buckskin, beadwork, braided hair and tragedy. I left first chance I got. Nineteen-o-six. Travelled west. Landed up in Canada. I was supposed to be farming. Ended up at Bear Island, met and married Angele, moved in on what was left of the Anishinabe. Old Lady cat, my new Grandmother, told me their stories. White Bear taught me how to hunt and track. Go for days on chokecherries and pemmican. I grew my hair. Peppered my speech with phrases from their language. Walked toe-heel and leaning forward slightly as if the trump line was pressed against my head and I was pulling the weight of a laden sled. Summers, I guided hunters (white men) and Wintered with the Indians. They gave me my real name. . Nineteen-fourteen, I volunteered. In France I was stone, dark light, a shattered tree, silent, hours unmoving, waiting for first light and the carelessness it brings. A yawning stretch above the dig-out’s lip...a head shot...one less Fritz. I remember every face I was Belaney. A. , Honourably Discharged Wounded Great War Veteran, Sniper First Class, bigamist who married a nurse from the Army Hospital then skipped off first chance he got. Bear Island was more or less deserted. Trees hacked down. Rivers trapped out. Streams choked and dying so one night, drunk on home made wine that had been brewed a full three weeks, burned my discharge papers, smeared the ashes on my white skin and headed back out again. I killed beaver wherever I could find them. Spent a lot of time alone in my cabin. _ And then she came along. Anahero. A diner waitress sneered at, groped by drunken white men. Together we left and every day, she watched me silently. Watched me track and trap and every time I killed, she would turn her face away as my axe fell on some half dead animal, leg gnawed through by my trap and its own desperation until one day until one day I was about to finish off two beaver kits, deep in the Winter, way out of season and she murmured one word - No! I never killed again. Now, from back to backs, from under skies where yellow smoke curls in on itself, they fill every Lecture Hall from Southport to Hastings. I stand on platform after platform, raise my right hand (I am Grey Owl, Shadow-Who-Flies-By-Night, Wa-Sha-Quon-Asin) and : One fine morning (I begin) crow noticed a shadow hooked to his foot so he tried to circle it. Stalking. (actions here, arms bent behind my back, elbows hooked out, palms touching) But it stalked him. (switch roles and in the spotlight, my feet lifting high and slowly like Chaplin) So to shake it he’d take off suddenly and row halfway across the sky (flapping my arms frantically and them laughing, some applause) but wherever he landed, it was waiting for him. Finally, at sunset, enraged, he pecked and clawed and caw-caw-cawed at the thing. (more laughter, more applause, now they’re convinced) But then the shadow came to life and simply swallowed him. (laughter dies, the faint applause is scattered, echoing) I am your shadow (they’re silent now, listening) and when you come to me for sustenance, all I have to offer you is one green leaf. I fill every Lecture Hall from Southport to Hastings and they come needing the buckskin, the beadwork that’s exquisite, my braided hair, my people’s inspiring tragedy. I stand on platform after platform, white skin (the mark of Cain) stained with walnut juice, raise my right hand to repeat My name is Wa-Sha-Quon-Asin, Grey Owl, and I come in peace... I Killed George Formby; The Good Ear Review _ http://www.kevinmccann.co.uk/Childrens-Poetry http://www.kevinmccann.co.uk/following/kevinmccann.co.uk/Childrens-Poetry Tue, 24 Apr 2012 22:05:18 +0000 Kevin McCann 3268952 Childrens Poetry _ It is always the same dream... He’s with them, Driving late at night, Alone. Very tired. Very lost. There’s a light Above the treetops Singing Red And Yellow And Pink And Green Any colour You’d care To imagine. The engine fades. Headlights die. And they’re two hours Down the road. Five miles missing. Unzip Your Lips Again Ed. Paul Cookson (Macmillan, 1999) _ Counting Song 1 is a sword 2 is a swan 3 a fried worm 4 a full sail and 5 is the hook I hang my coat on... (Read Me Out Loud, Macmillan 2007) _ Last Year’s Beach... Was shoals of fish Rainbow snaking through A sunken hull’s outline And manta-rays that Flap-glide their shadows Across the sea-bed And above it all A glass-bottomed boat Just drifting But this year’s beach Is shoals of fish Belly up and shedding scales Into engine-oil Pumped and dumped Feather clogging gullet gagging Rainbows that smear the shingle And no boats drift And there’s no-one singing. Literacy Time, 2009 _ Listen... In the middle of the city There’s an estate, In the middle of the estate There’s a park, In the middle of the park There’s a pond, Empty crisp bags Lily its surface, In the middle of the pond There’s an island, In the middle of the island There’s a standing stone And carved in the stone Is a forest And carved in the forest Is a pond With an island And a black-tailed deer Drinking The reflection of A black-tailed deer Drinking From a pond and in the Middle Of the pond there’s An island And in the middle Of the island Is a standing stone And carved in the stone Is a forest And carved in the forest Is a pond With an island And a black-tailed deer Drinking Literacy Time _ The River Little-trickler, Moss-tickler, Snow-swallower, Slope-follower, Hill-tumbler, Falling-thunderer, Valley-maker, Plain-snaker, Soft-gurgler, Soil-burglar, Thirst-quencher, Splashing-drencher, Rain-gulper, Tree-pulper, Flood-bringer, Mud-slinger, Sea-feeder, Cloud-breeder : Reborn as rain, Begin again... Elements of Water (Evans, 2007) Back at School... The kids all call me Four Eyes So my Dad says Just ignore them And my Mum says Never mind babe, Have some more cake... So the kids all call me Fat Guts So my Dad says Ah belt them one And my Mum says Never mind babe, Have some more cake... So now The kids all call me Spotty So my Dad says Oh fight your own battles And my Mum says Never mind babe, Stay off if you like... But I say No thanks cos tomorrow We’ve got English And I might be fat And I might be spotty And I do wear glasses But I can make up poems And stories And I’m sick of eating cake ! Published in Out of Order (Evans 2002) _ Diary of a Shape Shifter On Monday I was a garden gate, On Tuesday patchy fog, On Wednesday I was a Piece-of-Eight And on Thursday a Yuletide Log, On Friday I went swimming As a river into the sea, On Saturday and Sunday I was a flower awaiting a bee. But this week I’ll just be myself, Shift back to my usual form Of a darkening cloud in an empty sky, The rumour of a storm. Kevin McCann Loony Letters and Daft Diaries (Macmillan,2003) _ One Day in the Art Room “...and when you’ve measured your horizon find the vanishing point are you listening lad ?” His voice ricochets shrapnel Down their ears, “...then join your four corners put in the telegraph poles a road get rid of your guidelines thus and now you’ve got perspective any questions ?” And from the back a voice Drops splashing into the silence : “Eh Sir, did you rob them shoes Off a tramp ?” Published in Out of Order Ed. (Evans 2002) _ Selchie i. On a sand bank Left high and drying By the ebb tide A woman sleeps And a man’s shadow Brushes The tongued-out halves Of shellfish. Strands of nibbled kelp. He’s reaching out Slowly Carefully To snatch A folded Soft grey skin. His to keep. ii. A hasty wedding. Two sets of vows. “I do...” And “After seven years I’ll set you free...” And every day While he takes The boat out She’s searching Frantically. iii. A woman running And children look For their mother A woman running And her husband Stares down At his sea-chest Clawed open And a soft skin, Its colour drifting With the tides, Missing. Gulls circle A shawl A dress Shoes Footprints And further Further Further out A seal Ram-raids an incoming wave Vanishes... Published in Hubble Bubble (Hodder, 2003) At Sunset Men leave The empty sepulchre, Bewildered. An owl hoots As crosses, Stakes And mallets Are gladly Packed away. Laughter. Relief But In the undergrowth A hand - skin like marble, Nails like glass - Pushes up Through the soil Fingers uncoiled And flexing... Published in Hubble Bubble (Hodder 2003) _ Rain ! Rain ! Sings the frog To an empty sky Rain ! Rain ! Sings the frog Because the land is dry. Rain ! Rain ! Sings the frog And the West Wind starts to blow Rain ! Rain ! Sings the frog As pouting storm clouds grow. Rain ! Rain ! Sings the frog Dancing on webbed feet Rain ! Rain ! Sings the frog As thunder drums a beat Rain ! Rain ! Sings the frog And others join his call Rain ! Rain ! Sings the frog As at last the raindrops fall (Read Me Out Loud, Macmillan 2007) _ Lost Lost, lost, Round the shop, Round the shop I run, Lost, lost, Round the shop Looking for my Mum. Lost, lost, Round the shop, By the bread and eggs, Lost, lost, Round the shop Bumping into legs. Lost, lost, Round the shop But then I see my Mum Found, found In the shop Into her arms I run, Safe, safe In the shop And be careful from now on. Literacy Time _ Questions ...why does ice always feel cold And why does anyone have to get old And why are deserts always bone dry And how do clouds stay up in the sky And how do you know the earth is round And how do worms breathe underground And what do fishes drink And why are snails so slow And what do babies think And where do shadows go And how many drops in the ocean And why’s the horizon so far And if atoms make up a person Can people make up a star And... (The Works 6; Read Me Out Loud - Macmillan) _ http://www.kevinmccann.co.uk/Links http://www.kevinmccann.co.uk/following/kevinmccann.co.uk/Links Wed, 14 Dec 2011 17:04:45 +0000 Kevin McCann 2458731 Links _ To read my brand new blog please visit theconsultingpoet.wordpress.com _ For details of my writing career to date, visit www.writersguild.org.uk & www.writeoutloud.net _ For more details on my writing for children www.astonhilleditorial.co.uk _ To buy my latest book of ghost stories 'It's Gone Dark' please visit feedaread.com & Amazon UK _ <img src="http://payload7.cargocollective.com/1/4/149699/2458731/51NZ2BXDUVJL.png" width="313" height="500" width_o="313" height_o="500" src_o="http://payload7.cargocollective.com/1/4/149699/2458731/51NZ2BXDUVJL_o.png" data-mid="16763339" border="0" align="left"/> To view samples of my other poems please go to erbacce-press.com _ For my Ghost Stories featured on the Pete Price Show visit www.radiocity.co.uk and to download go to the Radio City Shop _ To contact the designer of my website please visit www.james-mcgregor.co.uk _ http://www.kevinmccann.co.uk/Contact http://www.kevinmccann.co.uk/following/kevinmccann.co.uk/Contact Wed, 07 Dec 2011 19:49:01 +0000 Kevin McCann 2423994 Contact _ E : hello@kevinmccann.co.uk T : 0151 722 9409 _ http://www.kevinmccann.co.uk/Biography http://www.kevinmccann.co.uk/following/kevinmccann.co.uk/Biography Wed, 07 Dec 2011 14:17:51 +0000 Kevin McCann 2422446 Biography _ <img src="http://payload6.cargocollective.com/1/4/149699/2422446/11_960.png" width="960" height="494" width_o="960" height_o="494" src_o="http://payload6.cargocollective.com/1/4/149699/2422446/11_o.png" data-mid="16806870" border="0" align="left"/> “One of the best poets in the country...” - Jimmy McGovern. “Kevin provides that extra wow factor." Times Educational Supplement I have worked extensively with schools and youth groups throughout the whole of the country. I was Writer-in-Residence in H.M.P. Birmingham (for the Arts Council of England) and H.M.P. Wymott (for both the Poetry Society and the Gulbenkian Foundation), appeared as a character in a novel and had a poem included in “The Lakes” by Jimmy McGovern. I have run poetry workshops and given readings in schools, prisons, community centres, libraries, hospitals, universities, cafes and pubs and am able to run workshops for people of any age or ability. EDUCATIONAL EXPERIENCE : English and Drama teacher for sixteen years + Lecturer in Creative Writing (Liverpool University, Dept. Of Continuing Education for ten years. Have also worked as a writer in Schools for, amongst others, the Poetry Society, Sefton EAZ and Top of the Tree as well as assorted community arts projects, local libraries etc. Currently completing a project working with looked after children for Whitewood and Fleming. MOST RECENT PROJECTS : Nano Diaries (Whitewood and Fleming) Working with looked after children aiding them to write poetry and scripts for short films. Gig in the Garden (Whitewood and Fleming) Again, working with looked after children aiding with the writing of song lyrics. Behind the Front (Blackpool Heritage, Blackpool Central Library, Lancashire Archives) Ran writing sessions, one-to-one surgeries with writers + edited final book. Writer-in-Residence for Anxious Times (www.anxietyuk.org.uk) Contact Catherine O’Neill (catherine.oneill@anxietyuk.org.uk) for details. PUBLISHING CREDITS: The Trouble with Wings (Toulouse Press, 1982) The Waiting Game (Poetry Minibooks, 1985) Mirror, Mirror (Other Publications, 1993) The Bear (Blue Cage Books, 1995) In with the Shrink (Driftwood Publications 2003) I Killed George Formby (Erbacce Press, 2008) Some of Us (Erbacce Press, 2011) I also write for children and has had work included in 30 anthologies, the most recent being : Love, Hate and my Best Mate (Wayland, 2004); The Works 5 (Macmillan, 2006); The Poetry Store (Hodder, 2006); Scary Poems to make you Shiver (OUP, 2006); The Works 6 (Macmillan, 2006); Poems About Water (Evans, 2007) The World at Our Feet (Macmillan, 2010) Puppy Poems (Macmillan, 2011 As Editor : Beautify the Nation (Toulouse Press, 1992); Perfectly Acceptable (Liverpool Libraries,1992); The Isle is Full of Noises (Caliban Books, 2002); Script editor of From Dawn to Dusk by Kevin Paton – premiered at the Bluecoat Chambers, Liverpool, Oct 17, 1997. Commissioned by Macmillan to provide a detailed review of translations from the Armenian of poems by Razmik Davoyan Other : Articles for Anxious Times (www.anxietyuk.org.uk) The Literacy Club (Aston Hill Publications); Literacy Time (Scholastic); UK Writer (The Writers’ Guild) Devised a series of On-line interactive writing frames for Scholastic Broadcasting : Poems and short stories on Radio City, Radio Four, Radio Five, Radio Merseyside, Red Rose Radio, World Service, B.B.C TV; Nothing Rhymes with Poets (Liverpool Big Screen, 2005) Video : The Lakes by Jimmy McGovern (B.B.C. Videos, 1998). Recording : The Contraries (Third Stone Records, 1996); Poetry Now (Sampler C.D. 1996) Performance: Readings in both England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland and the United States. Awards : Joint winner of the Booktrust’s Writing Together Teacher Writer Award, 2006. Professional Bodies : Full Member of the Writers Guild of Great Britain; Artists Licensing and Collection Society http://www.kevinmccann.co.uk/Kevin-McCann-Consulting-Poet http://www.kevinmccann.co.uk/following/kevinmccann.co.uk/Kevin-McCann-Consulting-Poet Wed, 07 Dec 2011 13:02:30 +0000 Kevin McCann 2205276 Kevin McCann: Consulting Poet© _ I can offer a detailed critique of your poems - including suggestions for redrafting - and a programme to help you develop your work. I am also available to assist editing of either individual collections or anthologies, work with writing groups and offer one-to-one poetry surgeries in libraries... in fact any project that involves poetry interests me. My fee for individual detailed critiques is £40-00 for up to 100 lines of poetry (max). All other fees are negotiable. _ Please contact me via email hello@kevinmccann.co.uk for further details.