Poem

A poem written for, and read at the wedding of two great friends of mine, in August 2006. The poem was first performed in the entrance hall at Storrs Hall in Windermere.

Of love and friendship
for James and Clare

This is your time
this is your place

allow yourself space and silence

red ribbon marking the start
a roof light leaf
seen through morning light

expectation through
watery eyes

just listen to the birdsong!
just look at the wildflowers!

a bouquet arcs through the air
do you remember driftwood in the fireplace
and drinking tea in the Egg café with the news?

Now go and tell the world
what the valleys already know

Sharing time on winter nights
pub back rooms mutual tales
of life its stresses and strains
unified through creativity

collective sounds beach walks
through spring sunshine
communication via technology
office blocks in Woking

to houses in Waterloo
helping with sanity
bringing Liverpool nearer
and back to life

such sweet piano chords
the melody weaves a quiet voice

across design studios friendships form
her excitement results in sleep deprivation!

Love is a splendid thing
it spreads like the supple dawn
across a Rothko horizon and a pebble
skimmed across Windermere

Love is a wonderful thing
it is a shaft of light
through stained glass it is walking
hand in hand along the shores of the lake

Love is a glorious thing
it's contained in the fabric
of memories etched in mind and
among the desk bound photographs

Love is a flower in the city
it is colour amongst the grey
it is the end of the rainbow
after walking through the dappled valley

Love is sheltering under trees
arm in arm
becalmed after a storm has passed
watching existence stirring itself

Bravery already exists in elegiac stanzas

stay proud amidst the sun
these salad days of summer
carry a blueberry breeze
stay sweet on the martini cloud

the sea at times may get rough
think of the lighthouse solid and sure
concentrate! the beam is spelling out
both your names

watching fireworks horizons ablaze
in the vineyard the grape is
reaching its ripeness

may the bluebird of happiness
be upon you both
always

(c) Andrew Taylor 2006.

erbacce # 8

erbacce #8 is out now. Available from the usual retailers. This edition features the great poetry from Ward Abel alongside an interview by Alan Corkish.
See the website for further details.

Reading

Andrew Taylor will be reading at Edge Hill University TONIGHT at the Learning Resource Centre, in celebration of the revamped library. Also appearing will be fellow members of the Edge Hill Poetry and Poetics Research Group.

erbacce # 7

erbacce # 7, editor's choice contains poetry selected by Alan Corkish and Andrew Taylor. Poets featured include:
Matt Fallaize
Dee McMahon
Ursula Hurley
Ashley Welch
Rupert M Lloydell
Tamara Fulcher
et al
Available to buy at News From Nowhere, Bold Street Liverpool and Linghams Booksellers, Banks Road West Kirby for £2.00
For mail order enquiries and contributors copies please visit the website http://www.erbacce.com for further details.

Poetry Reading

Andrew Taylor will be reading at the OWLS Writer's Group in Ormskirk, West Lancashire on 6th June. This is a public event and all are welcome. Andrew will be reading poetry from his previous collections of work and will be speaking about co-editing one of Liverpool's most successful poetry magazines, erbacce. More details to follow.

On-line Picture

Andrew Taylor pictured with Robert Sheppard and Cliff Yates here

GESQUOI PART II

GESQUOI PART II published in Mercy #26 link here

Cathedral Poems

Is out now

Cathedral Poems

Cathedral Poems will be published by Paula Brown Publishing in August.

Englyn

Summer's Arc of Sun

Red brick lit from light summer's arc – of sun
rook sat on chimney stack
peaceful gaze shattered by swallow's
fighter plane attack, rook shifts



(c) Andrew Taylor 2005

Haiku Scotland

I have had some of my englyns accepted by Haiku Scotland for # 2 of this new magazine

Poem

Chicken Pig

Location locked firm
writing machines hedge
view to fields beyond

green and white desk
chopped firewood an
Autumn testament

first publication tea at five
comfort of audience
harmony of routine

*

Positioned licensed a new
order metropolis of
possibility

needled incomprehension
horizon signifiers
comfort through summer madness

Public art station walks Palanzana
Unknown Landscape # 3
The Tango Ray and Julie Sea Circle

*

Air-conditioned basement
monitors surround
postcards shelf stacked

encased metallic blue freed
hotel furniture resting
place reflections on rye

Greenness of canal bandstand
rendezvous isolation
jet watching double glazing

*


Year of death and disease
cabin walls drip
behind blinds of Winter


Copse lifeless nature redolent
shut down magnetic voices
recording tape rattled railings

Car park light cast glow
empty space years end
lock the cabin door



*

Dreams of Winter Hill
A Certain Ratio
red letters on the dashboard

flash neon satellite navigation
time zones a freeway
and city midnight junk

Orange support through fog
bay lights glimmer
Star Room Dancing a hotel view


(c) Andrew Taylor 2005

Proofs

I have had the proofs for four poems to be published in Fire magazine in the Autumn. Cathedral Poems is still proving difficult to proof. We have had the second proof back and it is unacceptable. We are going to a third proof.

Poems published

Two poems have been published in Orbis # 132. They are edited versions of two poems from Poetry & Skin Cream: Little Be Cold and Like It Knows Exactly

erbacce # 3

erbacce # 3 edited by Alan Corkish and Andrew Taylor, features poetry by Scott Thurston, AD Winans, Mario Susko, Sam Smith, Ursula Hurley and more. erbacce is stocked by News From Nowhere in Bold Street, Liverpool and Linghams, Banks Road, West Kirby. Also available by visiting erbacce.com

Poem in Progress completed

The poem posted a few days ago is finished and is posted at www.andrewtaylorpoetry.com

Readings

Andrew Taylor is reading at the following venues:
Linghams Booksellers, 248 Telegraph Road, Heswall, Wirral, Thursday 7th April 7.30pm £3.00
Walker Art Gallery, William Brown Street, Liverpool, Sunday 10th April 2.30-4.00pm FREE

A Poem In Progress

After reading other interesting blogs, I thought it might be fun to post a poem in progress on my blog. Of course, this work-in-progress is (c) copyright.

It starts in Melling
runs via Liverpool
Amsterdam
New York
Barcelona
Paris
San Francisco
does it end here?


Knowsley


Lemsip Max can of Screen-Clene 32 Mandanol branded Paracetemol copy of Mercy magazine Issue 24 March 2005 Bill Viola Observance Exhibition Guide National Museums Liverpool Apple iPod 20GB Various Royal Mail receipts Various photographs Advent 6000 laptop computer Toshiba HDD & DVD Video Recorder RD- XS30 Logitech Wireless Mouse Scan View TFT Broadcast Monitor Copy of Fire # 24 Maxtor One Touch external Hard Drive Nokia 6610i mobile telephone Parker ballpoint pen Lett's 2005 A5 Diary Free Compact Disc from The Guardian Newspaper including music from British Sea Power Bloc Party and Mercury Rev an Anchor Steam Beer bottle top Explorer 4200 DVB set-top box Staedler Mars 777 0.5 pencil a Penguin Francoise Sagan Bonjour Tristesse mug

Other

Photograph of Liverpool Cathedral by Tom Cox a 2005 Cats Calendar by Andy Warhol Liverpool Skyline Painting by John Jennings copy of the Bran Van 3000 logo various compact discs including UNKLE 'Psyence Fiction' Mogwai 'Happy Songs For Happy People' Ryan Adams 'Love Is Hell' Parts One and Two a BBC Royalty Payment Cheque un-cashed framed with a photograph by Karl Gielinck 'Billy' bookcases an uncharged Psion Revo Adrian Henri's 'Collected Poems' BT telephone upside down hotel room newspaper cutting a porcelain dog a copper windmill an angle-poise lamp Body Shop Hemp cream last few copies of 'Poetry and Skin Cream' boxed stacked printer paper rolled up British Sea Power tour poster used aeroplane tickets London A-Z bought at King's Cross station Parisian map


deerstalker driven walk
map upside
down canals lead
to docks

breakfast first thing
coffee and eggs
staying above San Remo
unaware


caged birds after Le
Tourist Nou Camp
spectacular falafal
and sunlit squares

neighbourhood bar
candlelit winter
night cryptic messages
on newspaper front-page

artists chess players
cab drivers
seamen
propelled by Anchor and Sierra



Farrell to Vernon St
measured electric glide
city centre morning bustle
landmarks remain

Vernon St to Jordan St
via St James' Mount
Monday coolness heated
refectory fodder


A solitary daffodil stands on a motorway verge in recognition of the first day of spring

Catharine Street front room painted dream spiral lunchtime after office curry phone-calls from Laura back bedroom down into the kitchen football in the corridor

Moving days boxed memories poetry an odd bedfellow to New Deal galleries set in derelict warehouses Wolstenholme Square anarchist artists squatter's rights

Poetry in members clubs how about crypt of The Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King? Art galleries on December nights steamed up windows and Off Licences

Buddleia Warehouse roof shots envisaging a penthouse view to the Cathedral cellar visiting arch low-light hard hat a licence to roam explore streets become familiar

Fox Street a friary meeting place hill walking to the tower fence climbing city a map below in the haze of daybreak

Consolation red arms gathering a soul bereft anticipation of survival journeys along coastal tracks marshland birds stagnant leaded public art leading to Oriel Mostyn

Snowdon Buffet Bar Bangor Station meeting place after trekking armed with poetry and skin cream study centre first editions and Thomas's typewriter letters and notes

Amnesiac Red Stripe beer a desk-top computer floppy discs poetry carried in pockets transposed through Revo paper and memory

A vase of daffodils on a bedside table in recognition of a birthday


Woking a different air lunch-time foot court madness newspaper too large for tables hotels a writing machine entertainment system photographs postcards home reminders

Day war broke out watching Heathrow jets spring flowers baskets swinging loosely in a warmed breeze news updates satellites free newspapers in reception feeling far from

Nature and integration wood where signal dies foxes run in straight lines petrol station odd giver of life

Other blogs of interest

http://www.robertsheppard.blogspot.com/
http://www.iandavidson.blogspot.com/

Untitled Autumn Collection

A new collection is being assembled, to be published by Paula Brown Publishing. This collection will gather poetry from the MA years at Edge Hill College, the LADT Poems (while poet-in-residence at Liverpool Architecture and Design Trust) and the poems written since.
Running alongside this, I am editing the poems for possible inclusion in my PhD thesis.