I’ve loved poetry since I was at secondary school but don’t pursue it as my primary work. Sometimes it has been a release, other times a mode for thinking things through or meditating on an idea. The train is always a productive place for me, as I watch the countryside I love, or the sea, both prompting phrases or challenging me to wrap something atmospheric in words. Out of that might come a piece of blank verse or a structured stanza or two. I’m not much of a reviser.
I wrote Enduring Conquest in 2012 while collaborating with my close friend David Ibbett. It’s a short epic in blank verse telling the story of Ernest Shackleton’s boat voyage.
Shingle is largely a collection of verse I wrote in early 2013, when a lot about my life seemed to change together.
Most of my other poems are Uncollected.