We still have a few places left on our poetry workshops at Hare Hill House on Saturday 28th June.
There are two workshops to choose from both running from 10am to 12noon.
Becky May will be running a Contemporary Poetry session while I will running a Nature poetry session. The workshops cost just £5 per person and you can book by emailing Liz white – lizwhitecreative@gmail.com or myself – seamus@onepoetsvision.co.uk
After the workshops there will be poetry performances and then in the afternoon Yorkshire poet and author Gaia Holmes will be discussing her work, including her recently published collection of short stories “He used to do dangerous things”. The afternoon session is free of charge and all are welcome.
This promises to be an enjoyable and productive day of poetry in the historic Hare Hill House in Littleborough.
Having recovered from the Covid, that kept me away from the first session of this project, I was delighted to be back at Hare Hill House in Littleborough to lead today’s session face to face.
The project will run for 6 weeks to create poetry influenced by the area around the Rochdale Canal and Calderbrook from the former Rock Nook Mill to Summit in Littleborough.
Today we talked about thinking like a poet and among the props used for a writing exercise was my lovely compact Metronome (pictured here).
The poets then used information provided, about the famous Summit Tunnel and Rock Nook Mill, as inspiration to start crafting some new poetry.
At the end of the project we will publish a large print book containing selected poems produced by all of the participants.
Today it was great to meet some new writers and share inspiration and ideas. This is a very friendly and vibrant l group of writers and I’m very confident that there will be some excellent poetry to publish.
This project comes from an idea from Liz White who has worked on planning and secured funding so that we can bring poetry writing opportunities to Littleborough and produce work which is available to local people including those with visual impairments.
Many thanks to all of those who attended our launch today. Extra thanks to Nick from Hare Hill House for making us so welcome and set up to room for us, and I especially admire the upside down Christmas Tree.
With tea and coffee and a table of home made cakes, proving that some of our poets are also excellent bakers, the 40 strong audience settled down to listen to an introduction from Elizabeth White, Chair of Create and Connect who organised the project. Elizabeth spoke about the motivation and aims of our project, the reasons for producing a large print poetry book and thanked our sponsors “Crook Hill Community Benefit Fund”.
The poets and Cllr Janet Elmsley with copies of the anthology
Eileen Earnshaw, a superb local poet, and I shared a couple of poems each to give some idea of the range of styles and subjects that we write about and then each of the other poets who took part in the project read some of their work from the newly published book.
The participating poets are; Denise Greenall, Eileen Earnshaw, Elizabeth White, Graham Haynes, Julie Woodrup, Marilyn Allred, Nic Holliday, Ray Stearn, Sandra Buckley, Susan Benton and myself.
Cllr. Janet Emsley, Deputy Leader of Rochdale Council, always a staunch supporter of the arts and her local community in Littleborough, read a poem on behalf of Elizabeth White and also expressed thanks to the sponsors and her hopes that we will continue to see such community based creative projects in the future.
Cllr Janet Emsley, Seamus Kelly (poet and facilitator), Elizabeth White (Create and Connect)
The book, and the readings, were very well received and copies will be distributed free of charge to people experiencing sight loss, Rotary will include them in Christmas parcels and they will be distributed to care homes etc. and through MeetUp at Hare Hill House.
Next week we will be releasing copies online, freely downloadable, including a version using colours and a specialist font to make it more readable for people with dyslexia.
Elizabeth White said “the launch was really successful, the poets read from their work to a very appreciative audience. Being able to offer a large print poetry book is amazing as there are very few published in this format.”
Some of the audience listening to poems at today’s launch
A great event and project, I have been very impressed by all of the writers and thoroughly enjoyed running the workshops and editing the anthology.
A quick glance inside one of the boxes of books ready for tomorrow’s launch.
It is always exciting opening that box and holding a copy of a brand new book in your hand. This one is a special one being produced as it is a large print anthology helping to make poetry accessible to older people and those with some visual impairment.
The work has been inspired by the workshops that the writers attended at Hare Hill House in Littleborough. I’m really looking forward to the participating poets receiving their copies, seeing their words in print and sharing some of their poems at the launch.
if you can get along to the launch you’ll be very welcome and you will be able to collect a free copy of Poetry in the Park and enjoy light refreshment and drinks.
Over the last couple of weeks I’ve been editing submitted poems, selecting poems for publication, designing the layout and creating the cover for our large print anthology. After all that creative and technical work I now enter the easier, but tense, phase of waiting for copies to arrive through the post.
The book, draft cover shown here, will be launched on Friday 2nd December at 11.00am where some of the twelve contributing poets will read selected poems. There will also be opportunity to meet and speak to the poets.
Refreshments will be provided and copies of Poetry in the Park will be available to take away.
All are welcome to attend at Hare Hill House, in Hare Hill Park, Littleborough.
