I’m delighted to have won 2nd prize in the Grey Hen Press Poetry Competition with my poem, Autun Cathedral, Magi
I haven’t got a picture of a grey hen so I’ve headed this post with a shot of my favourite cocktail bar, Ora, in Berlin. Continue reading 2nd Prize Grey Hen Press Poetry Competition 2020
Responding through Collaboration – 2nd Blog for Creative COVID-19 blog
This is the second of my blogs for this University of Wales site at the Centre for the Study of Media and Culture in Small Nations.
I’m delighted to have 2 poems in the new anthology: ‘North Star: short stories and poetry by female Northern Irish writers’ released on 4th June 2020.
With 45 contributors, the book’s six sections reflect the counties of Northern Ireland. It is currently number 1 in new and hot releases coming soon on Amazon within anthologies and number 5 in Women’s short stories out of 1,000 titles listed in that genre.
In the Tyrone section is my poem ‘Ballycastle Granny: her husband, Thomas Graham of Gortin’. This won Joint 3rd Prize in the Almost Dancing Poetry Competition and Heather Newcombe Award 2019 organised by Ballycastle Writers’ Group.
My grandfather lived in Gortin where he worked with his brother, John Graham in their saddlery business. John’s his wife, Letitia ran the Post Office.
My poem in the Antrim section is ‘The Scottish Referendum: A View from Carraig Uisneach’. This is set on Ballycastle Beach. It’s about the relationship between this north-eastern area of Ireland with Scotland.
This anthology is unique among collections by Northern Irish women in its dynamically wide embrace of writing talent.
Conceived and produced during lockdown, the North Star anthology comes from women’s writing collective, Women Aloud NI.
Chairwoman, Angeline King Kelly, whose idea it was, says: “The submission process for North Star was open to WANI’s 165 members, without selection. Every woman has a story to tell. Many of the most fascinating stories from Northern Ireland are locked within the minds of people who do not perceive themselves as storytellers or writers. I believe we have opened a door to those people, in addition to nurturing the talent of some of the most respected writers in the country.”
‘North Star’ is available to buy in hardback, paperback, and kindle edition on Amazon. The Collection is also available to buy in local bookshops such as No Alibis and The Secret Bookshelf.
Nedim Türfent, Kurdish-Turkish, journalist
Nedim Türfent is serving an eight-year-and-nine- month prison sentence on trumped-up terrorism charges following an unfair trial, during which scores of witnesses said they had been tortured into testifying against him. He spent almost two years in solitary confinement in harrowing detention conditions. Determined to keep writing, he started composing poetry while detained. (PEN International) Continue reading Poem for Nedim Türfent – PEN International on Poetry Day
A GARDENER IMAGINES DEATH DURING THE PANDEMIC, 2020
Is this what I will see:
against a haze of blue a yellow iris
− spear among green blades −
calling me upwards from my final stumble;
no time to name them, each one
and everything I’ve loved, but a yellow
that is all that yellow is
assuming me? Or
eyes behind a visor, summoning me
towards all that human is?
http://pendemic.ie/a-gardener-imagine-death-during-the-pandemic-2020-a-poem-by-angela-graham/
Pendemic.ie is a great platform for sharing work during the pandemic.
Once again the dynamic group of women writers, Women Aloud Northern Ireland have demonstrated their vitality and commitment by using the global lockdown to fuel a powerhouse of literary creativity.
The writers of WANI are publishing North Star – an Anthology of Literature by Northern Irish Women.
I’m delighted to have 2 poems in the book.
Not content with merely print, they are also staging an online literary festival, bringing their sparkling storytelling to audiences they would usually be entertaining through workshops, readings and other events, were it not for the worldwide restrictions on their movements.
The Facebook Live Weekend Festival takes place on Saturday and Sunday, April 25 and 26th, using the social media platform’s live facility to bring a diverse programme of fiction, prose and poetry to audiences in their homes with members reading live at 11am, 3pm and 8.30pm on both days. Continue reading Online Festival promos NORTH STAR by N. Irish Women Writers
I was delighted to take part on Sunday 29th March in
Poetry In The Arcades is a project which puts poetry onto the walls in one of the busiest areas in Wales’s capital city – its network of Victorian and Edwardian shopping arcades which are a distinctive feature of Cardiff, the ‘City of Arcades‘.
The project commissioned several poets to write poems and later launched a competition to elicit more poems on the theme. The winning poem will be put on display. Continue reading Poem in Wales Arts Review Digithon
For #IWD2020, the writers of Wales Arts Review have nominated 100 women of Wales who we think you should be following on Twitter (if you’re not already). Here is a list of women who will keep you informed, entertained and inspired on social media’s premier platform.
I’m delighted to be included in this list, although it’s immediately evident how many more ‘followable’ women there are than such a list can contain! But, for me, this is one way of encountering some women outside my own field of activity and I find it a broadening and enriching read.
I am very pleased that two of my poems will be published in issue 12 of
They are from a series of poems on iconoclasm, the destruction of expressions of ideology other than one’s own. Thanks to Madeleine Gray for the photograph from Llanfair, Yr Wyddgrug/Mold.
One of the poems appears in ‘Heartland’, the anthology of the PENfro Festival Competition published by Parthian Books.