Category Archives: Poetry

3 Poems for Christmas 2018

Blog, Media, Poetry, Print

CHRISTMAS

The smallest words mean the most

            Joy

            Hope

            Love

These things

Not things

May you receive them all

            A star              of particular promise

            A light             that has sought and found you

            The child         of your heart

Arrived

Waiting beyond the door.      

NADOLIG

Nos

Seren

Addewid

Cyflawniad

Twyllwch yn llawn lleisiau

Diwedd unigrwydd.

                        Christmas

Night

A star

A promise

A fulfilment

Darkness full of voices

An end to loneliness

CHRISTMAS STARS

The stars, a rowdy, cheerful crowd,

Ran to their places, prompt to the call,

And how they sing! since then,

A nightly choir.

Only the comets − their slow tears −

Betray the sorrow underneath that steadfastness,

For haven’t they seen it all?

− what we do down here,

Warping the darkness that they love

Into sly coverts for our filthiness.

Poor stars. Don’t grudge them their reprieve

Each year, when their paragon,

Their Star of stars, leader of kings,

Sets out once more and triumphs,

Finds his place, finding the child,

Perfect as every new-born.

Here! the Star declares to each of us,

Surely you see – surely – that you

Are a Child Awaited, you

Arrived − naked and loved − and you,

Gift-bearer of nothing,

Can stoop under this lintel,

Step clean through the needle’s eye.

3 poems by Angela Graham 2018

Eborakon: Gwyneth Lewis – Henaint/Old Age

Blog, Poetry, PortfolioPrint, Writing

Gwyneth Lewis – Henaint / Old Age, a double pleasure in Welsh and English.

Pleasure despite excruciating pain. I find myself recommending a tormenting thrill. Gwyneth Lewis’s Welsh poem Henaint and her translation of it into English, Old Age are excellent examples of the wonderful double enjoyment that a poet working in two languages can offer. Continue reading Eborakon: Gwyneth Lewis – Henaint/Old Age →

Poem in ‘Spring’s Bride’

Poetry, Portfolio, PortfolioPrint, Print

Easter edition Bangor Literary Journal. Download here

Easter

A rent in the year

Through which the cold news comes:

Even the best of us

Will be consumed by pain,

Abandoned undeservedly

And not know why

And asked to say to all this,

Yes,

Though he destroy me

Yet I trust in him.

Each of us shivers

In this gap,

Choosing to assent

Or not

To love’s defiance

Of anything other than itself.

Victory or vindication –

These it lets fall

(Aborted fruits),

Facing into the wind,

Arms wide.

Artistry & Poetry on the Jamie Owen Show

Blog, Guest, Poetry, Portfolio, PortfolioRadio, Radio

I first worked in radio for the BBC in Wales in 1981. I’m still learning. On the 2nd July 2017 on the Jamie Owen Show I learned: always have your opening prepared, no matter how informal the programme.  The right blend of spontaneity and clarity flows more easily after that.

This show mixes recorded music, live performance, two guest commentators and two interviewees. The brief is weird and wonderful angles on the week’s news so, along with fellow commentator, comedian, Frank Honeybone, I enjoyed sharing some ‘couldn’t-make-it-up’ stories with listeners.

Sarah Brown

Continue reading Artistry & Poetry on the Jamie Owen Show →

Seamus Heaney – Walk on Air

Blog, Poetry

I want to end 2015 by writing about something that connects death and life.  On August 12th I went with my husband and our friends, Anne and Huw to the large village of Bellaghy in County Derry, Northern Ireland. I’d been there before to visit Bellaghy Bawn, a substantial house dating from the early seventeenth century, from the days of the Plantation  of Ulster. It has for some time housed memorabilia connected with the poet, Seamus Heaney who grew up not far away.

But it’s not so much the Bawn that has stayed with me from this visit. It’s the graveyard.

photo Belfast Telegraph
photo Belfast Telegraph

Continue reading Seamus Heaney – Walk on Air →