Böcker utgivna av Poetry Wales Press

'Octopus Mind' plays with an array of rich and original metaphors to explore the intricacies of neurodiversity, perception and the human mind. They observe the nuances of creativity, art, relationships, and self-expression through the lens of neurodiversity, reflecting on the poet's experience of being diagnosed with dyspraxia as an adult.

Viva Bartali! is a biography-in-verse of the iconic Italian cyclist Gino Bartali (1914-2000), two-time winner of the Tour de France. These poems conjure his career, his rivalries and his remarkable secret missions in the saddle during World War 2 carrying forged identity documents that saved the lives of hundreds of Italian Jews.

A Hardy Breed is a collection of 120 black and white photographs celebrating shepherding and sheep farming in mid and north Wales. An important social document, of reportage, portraiture and documentary photography, it records a way of life under pressure for the past couple of centuries, and more than ever today.

1790: Nantucket whalers, invited to found the port of Milford Haven, are preceded by a beached whale. An omen for the local people, but what is its meaning? The line between superstition and faith blurs, the local people become fearful and led by their increasingly insane preacher fashion an hysterical Jonah-like fate for the incomers.

Rachael Clyne's You'll Never Be Anyone Else presents a direct and assured voice, demanding that we think carefully about what it takes to reconcile being different. She advises the reader to 'Stop drinking the poison / labelled "Hate me." / It's that simple. I didn't say easy.' Clyne also has an alter-ego "Girl Golem" reminiscent of a superhero but based on the mythical man made from clay and spells to protect Jewish people from persecution. Through this empowering persona, Clyne opens up an exploration of Jewish and lesbian identity. Surveying attitudes in the present day and in the past, these poems explore migrant heritage, sexual identity, domestic violence and ageing. The stories of this collection are often poignant, like the retired tailor in 'Mr Shopping Trolley', who takes to shearing newspapers, so that his scissor fingers remain busy. Or in 'Leaving Odesa', the speaker revisits the prison where - under Tsarist law - her grandmother (even as an infant) had to serve out the remainder of her father's sentence after he died. Clyne's imagery is razor sharp in its precision, as she deftly weaves different poetic forms and wildly versatile subject matter, even interspersing Yiddish phrases, as part of her own unique poetic idiolect. Take the hilarious poem, 'Jew-a-lingo (Code-switching for Jews 1970 edition)' which emphasizes Jewish humour as a staple survival strategy. You'll Never Be Anyone Else offers a unique story of survival and empowerment told in spite of experiences of violence and prejudice - this from a poet who has spent a lifetime learning self-acceptance and as a psychotherapist helping others to do similar. Treating even dark subjects with playful wit and colourful imagery, Clyne is a distinctive new voice with a powerful message about self-acceptance.

Rooted in everyday communities, the voice of Say It With Me is wry, candid and knowing, offering poems that playfully record the foibles of domestic life. There are curious stories: a parrot flies away but always returns to its master, a school bully becomes their victim's acupuncture patient in adulthood, and a donor finds new kinship with the woman who receives his cells. All these stories are gems full of curious twists and turns. Often the poems represent specific places and people, sometimes nostalgically so, like memories of family beach trips with loved ones now deceased. Others are flights of fancy: imagining a park of one's dreams, an ode to the small pleasures of life, or inventing a new history where a father didn't die young. Most significant however are the poignant and remarkable stories of family life. There are happy portraits as well as thoughtful poems concerning divorce and parenthood, also the body in triumph and decline. Though speakers take up a watchful distance from events, they are also fierce and unafraid to intervene. A middle-aged woman on the beach wades into the sea to chastise some lads playing with an inflatable sex doll. "Say it with me" a line taken from the poem 'Canada' is a phrase that often precedes a rallying cry, or a brave but controversial factual statement. The tales in this collection feel true and honest and its title is a call to unite. This is a collection about the communities in which we live and the interconnectedness of human beings. The likeable speaker of these poems surveys it all with the dry humour and wisdom of an older woman, posing scenarios that we can all recognize as authentic. Ultimately, Vanessa Lampert uses deep and rich storytelling to lay bare truths that are at once funny, moving, and illuminating.

Jon Woolcott is an entertaining and informative guide to Dorset, county of spectacular coast and countryside, historic towns, eco-foodie innovation, Hardy and Fowles. The county of subversion, rebellion and revolt, wealth and poverty, and rich folklore. Its history stretches from the origins of the Cerne Abbas Giant to cutting edge ecology today.

This collection of lyric essays by award-winning poet Kim Moore explore the dynamics of performing poetry as a female poet âEUR" confronting the implications of being a female on public display, with the connotations of sexual objectification, in a context that traditionally disregards the body. Kim states âEURœWith the strides and gains made through the #MeToo movement, I believe the time is right for a book like this to make an impact. As a female poet, I know there is a need for such a book to examine the intersection between writing, performing, feminism and sexism.âEUR¯I wish this book had been written when I first started working as a freelance writer and IâEUR(TM)ve had many conversations with other female poets who have also confirmed my thinking âEUR" that female poets are navigating these things regularly, and yet nobody is really writing or talking about them.âEUR?âEUR¯âEUR¯ The book draws on her experiences of writing and performing the poems in her second collection All the Men I Never Married. It is a balance of memoir, academic treatise and poetry, though the authorâEUR(TM)s emphasis is on writing in a popular way and making the subject accessible to a wide audience. To achieve this her models have been Maggie NelsonâEUR(TM)sâEUR¯Bluets, Claudia RankineâEUR(TM)sâEUR¯CitizenâEUR¯and Sarah AhmedâEUR(TM)sâEUR¯Living a Feminist Life.âEUR¯âEUR¯ The bookâEUR(TM)s subjects include heckling at poetry readings and other interactions; problems with the âEUR¿male gazeâEUR(TM) and what the âEUR¿female gazeâEUR(TM) might look like in poetry; âEUR¿guilty for being a manâEUR(TM): how guilt can be useful if it can bring about change; how writing poetry about sexism can shed add meaning to the term; the objectification of men and women, and âEUR¿bad faithâEUR(TM) arguments.

The title of this Mslexia Prize-winning Pamphlet for 2022 is Angola, America, the name of a prison in Louisiana in the southern United Sates. In these strikingly original, thoroughly contemporary, and deeply moving poems by poet Sammy Weater, we are immersed in the world the inmates must endure. From the first poem, when we witness a home-made tattoo and understand that this scarring and incision is a "map in the connective tissue of pain and loss", we are drawn into this world in a way that is carefully observed and beautifully empathetic. What is particularly convincing about these poems is the moral fervor that accompanies an ear that delights in the complexities of language and the music of syntax. It is an emphatic voice, observant to the smallest details and yet steps back from an intrusive 'authorial' presence to let these prisoners and landscapes breathe and be. We observe with the author the society that builds these institutions in which the protagonists survive under extraordinary pressures. We come to acknowledge that we are responsible for the contemporary establishment and continuance of these places. The 'Prison Industrial Complex' is excoriated through artful conceits. There are poems about handcuffs, the Louisiana State Flag, the electric chair. Throughout, the fate of the body is aligned with the fate of the landscape, we see Louisiana's famously endangered coastline, prone to hurricanes and oil-spills. As many of the prisoners are African American, there are some poems that pull historical and cultural references to bear upon themes of whiteness and blackness. Formally, the work is adept, with many 14-line proto-sonnets and then longer-lined free verse poems that are nevertheless, wonderfully compact. it conveys anger without hysteria, empathy without condescension, and pulls us through its compelling narratives with style and flair.

Nerys Williams' new collection questions what makes a Republic? Machinations of power? The speeches of politicians? The broad sweep of official histories? This sequence of 80 prose-poems, each constructed in 20 sentences, has arisen from the author's need to tell a more intimate history, to commit an untold oral history to paper. Williams returns to the meaning of "republic" in its Latin origins which meant "wealth of the people". The poems tell the story of a young Welsh woman growing up and coming of age in the 1980s and 90s, a time that culminated with new devolutionary powers in Wales. The explosion of the arts and culture looms large, through bands from New Order to my bloody valentine, but it is explored specifically through Cwl Cymru', and the power of Welsh-language bands like Datblygu. This story is also about class, as we explore a family history of hard work in jobs from retail to caregiving. The poems introduce us to family influences, from a father who urges the narrator as a child to 'own the stage' in an early school Eisteddfod, to a grandmother who worked long hours in her rural shop, and a mother who was the local midwife. There are stories told, overheard, handed down, sometimes translated from Welsh. Together, they create an expansive portrait of the era, including the challenges for women, Welsh-speakers, and other marginalized groups. Ferocious remarks about the Welsh in the popular media are dissected with satirical humour and appalled fascination, while other poems describe being a token woman and political outsider on a TV current affairs show panel, tolerated but ostracized. From her more recent home, the republic of Ireland, Williams poses the possibilities of a nation looking at itself and its history from afar. Wales has not been allowed to be a republic, but is subject to a state that has military claims on its landscape and a second home explosion which has a severe impact on its communities. There is rebellion to be found in the older meaning of "republic": since the wealth of the people is a wealth of sounded stories, culture, art, and history.

On receiving news of a beloved teacher's death, a man struggles with the loss of a relationship sustained by deep admiration. Memories of their shared trajectory are separated in three orbits where the man's past, present, and future seem to be punctuated by the same intense grief. Narrated by the man through his grieving process, In Orbit uses a variety of innovative forms to explore loss, from traditional stanzas to prose poems to shaped poems in the form of birds, circuits, or hands. The narrative shifts in time, moving from his teen years to the present day when he himself has become a teacher. Observations from the classroom as student and teacher illuminate the deep and compassionate work that educators can do, as well as the moving nature of student-teacher relationships. This book does not ignore that teaching is hard work, and in grieving over the death of his own mentor, the narrator finds himself rudderless. The book not only grieves the loss of the teacher, but also toxic standards for boys and men. In Orbit demands that young people to be given space to explore their feelings without judgement, to be free to love others, and to love themselves. Beyond human communities, however, sustenance is found in the moon, the stars, the sky, and nature. The discovery of a badger's track or the treasure of a bird egg reminds us how small our trajectories are in the context of the more-than-human: an answer perhaps to the grieving process. Ultimately, Glyn Edwards' collection is a deeply moving account of losing a person you love, but not shying away from remembering them. In Orbit is a sustained narrative of love, loss, and longing.

Peter Finch and John Briggs build on the success of their book Walking Cardiff and venture outside the capital and into the very different world of the Valleys. Over the past two centuries the Valleys have gone from idyllic rural landscape to the engine room of the British Empire to post industrial decline. As centres of coal mining and iron and steel-making, the Valleys saw over a hundred thousand people crammed between their steep sides. Their industry produced not only fuel and products exported around the world, but also archetypal working class communities, with their chapels, union militancy, self-funded workersâEUR(TM) institutes, and seemingly unbreakable identities. Fuelled by massive immigration, they were also a social experiment in assimilation and radical politics. Now the pits and foundries have become heritage sites, the chapels are retail centres or housing, and Finch and Briggs explore how the Valleys have changed, and what they have become. Their forward-looking book is also one of record, as the towns and villages evolve into the twenty-first centuries. This is their take on Abercynon, Aberdare, Aberfan, Bargoed, Caerphilly, Gelli, Gelligaer, Merthyr Tydfil, Pontypridd, Porth, Rhymney, Taffs Well, Tonypandy, Treherbert and Ystrad Mynach. The informative texts can be used as both a route finder and a literary entertainment in themselves. Armchair walkers will find the book as interesting and as useful as those actually pull on their boots. And natives and visitors alike will find a new discovery around every corner. Each walk is illustrated with a map and photographs by John Briggs.

The stories in Scar Tissue appear under the enigmatic headings of Space, Home, Away, Nowhere, Somewhere. Through a wide variety of characters and situations, Clare MorganâEUR(TM)s subjects include sex, death, relationships, the individual, the impossibility of relationships, parents and children, the passing on (or not) of things between generations. Many are informed by a sense of loss. The stories also explore contemporary themes of displacement, belonging, and identity, while Nietzsche and his philosophies also appear. The stories, and the structure of the collection, relates âEUR¿placeâEUR(TM) (or estrangement) to a kind of existential discomfort. This resonates in the locations of the stories. The Space, Home and Somewhere sections are all set in Wales/the Marches; the Away and Nowhere sections are set in India, Paris, New England, Scandinavia, Spain and a transatlantic flight.âEUR¯Additionally, many of the stories are set in the uncertain, fluctuating realm where individual consciousness meets the hard materials of the world.âEUR¯The collection ends with a piece of autobiographical writing about the haunting of MorganâEUR(TM)s Welsh home, an ancient mill, which in turn provokes the reader to re-address the eleven stories which precede it. Scar Tissue is a fascinating collection of well-crafted and engaging short stories by a writer who knows exactly what she is about. Readers will be reminded of the fiction of authors like Sally Rooney and Maggie OâEUR(TM)Farrell.

The third volume of the Inspector Chard series takes Chard back to his native Shrewsbury and reveals the circumstances under which he left for south Wales so abruptly. Now Chard finds himself under arrest for the murder of his estranged wife and her lover. Imprisoned in the notorious Shrewsbury gaol, he must fight to clear his name of charges which will result in execution. The page-turning plot includes a missing woman, human trafficking, trade-offs, foul play, scheming and brutal Victorian gentlemen, civic corruption, and the Peaky Blinders. Against a vividly drawn and atmospheric background of Victorian Shrewsbury âEUR" the town is almost a character in the novel âEUR" the tension is ratchetted up as Chard fights for his freedom with the help of his faithful Constable Idris Morgan, and May Roper. Together they must save Chard and search for the answer to the riddle of the fabulous sapphire which is SabrinaâEUR(TM)s Teardrop, at the centre of events. Once again Leslie Scase takes the reader back to a time and place where, despite the pretensions of Victorian society, life is cheap and passions strong. His research brings Shrewsbury vividly to life, and historical events drive along the plot. Atmospheric, authentic, Chard and the reader are left guessing until the final pages

Darkly suggestive of animal dens, shelter and secretive havens, Lairs is inspired by mathematics, the poem becoming a kind of nest, a beautiful accumulation of dense detail. The poems are complex, introspective, reminiscent of fervid lockdowns as well as offering a subtle strand on post-Brexit life, a mocking of establishment conservatism.

Escape Room is the startling debut collection from Bryony Littlefair, following her award-winning pamphlet Giraffe. Littlefair combines clear-eyed observation with wry, surreal humour. Everyday life, work, therapy, graduation and lapsed Christianity are transformed into the comedic and absurd, with warmth, humanity and a deadpan delivery.

An intelligent and beautiful book, Goliat offers absorbing stories of a precarious world on the brink of climate emergency. Employing startling imagery and a deep sense of history, these poems explore the irreplaceable beauty of a wild world, and the terrible damage that humans might do to each other and the earth.

Sanctuary is - urgent. The pandemic has made people crave it; political crises are denying it to millions; the earth is no longer our haven. Even our minds & bodies are not refuges we can rely on. Angela Graham & 5 other poets from Wales & Northern Ireland explore Sanctuary from the inside, asking how we can save the earth, ourselves and others?

The power of song, to sustain the human spirit, resonates through As if to Sing. A trapped caver crawls back through songs to the sea; Welsh soldiers pack their hearts into a song on the eve of battle, âEUR¿for safe-keepingâEUR(TM); a child crossing a bridge sings âEUR¿a song with no beginning or endâEUR(TM).... Blurring past and present, a âEUR¿torchsongâEUR(TM) of music and light intensifies in âEUR¿The Boys in the BranchesâEUR(TM), a moving sequence to the poetâEUR(TM)s sons where three boys scale a tree to manhood, to âEURœcarve their names on the late sunâEUR?. The collectionâEUR(TM)s closing cadence includes the long poem âEUR¿The Key to PenllainâEUR(TM). Set on the Ceredigion coastline in the summer of 1969, its apocalyptic dream stages a search for a key which could save the planet. This tenth collection is rich in the musical lyricism admired by readers and fellow poets, As if to Sing is an essential addition to this poetâEUR(TM)s compelling body of work. Henry has honed his technique still further; he uses traditional and local elements which hymn Wales and gives them to the reader freshly seen.

Fargo Hawkins is 20, he's Harry Swaine's gardener. One day, after he sees a fight between Harry and his wife Anne, Fargo steals a car and he, Anne and a dog called Radar go on the run. They are chased across England by Harry, a firm of detectives and their emotions. Eventually, at a caravan site in Wales, the climax between Fargo and Harry unfolds.

In 1994 two girls are pen-pals. Then Victoria's letters from Rwanda stop; in Paris Iris can only wonder why. Twenty years later journalist Iris pitches a story to her editor: haunted, to look for Victoria. As she researches, questions about Rwanda & about her father emerge & she is forced to revisit her childhood memories. Can she find Victoria?

New and Selected Poems is a landmark volume which collects key poems from the career of Hilary Llewellyn-Williams, one of the outstanding poets of her generation in Wales. In addition to the classic sequences 'The Tree Calendar' and 'Book of Shadows', the book also includes new work, such as a cycle of poems devoted to the Benedictine hours.

Cardiff-lover Peter Finch spent the first lockdown walking the edge of the city in which he was confined by the restrictions. He thought he knew Cardiff, but it was a revelation. Here are new discoveries about the capital's places and history, drawn from Finch's walks, knowledge and his personal history, and an exploration of the nature of borders.

The Visitations is the follow-up to Kathryn Simmonds' Forward Prize-winning debut, Sunday at the Skin Launderette. The poems are entertaining, amusing and accessible, but unafraid to bring in darker themes and worlds unseen. The tone shifts throughout between the elegiac and the sharply satirical, lit up with life's moments of sudden illumination: a life coach finds an old passport, an infant teeters on the brink of speech."This playful and knowing first collection is fuelled throughout by a strong sense of lyricism." - The Guardian on Sunday at the Skin LaunderetteKathryn Simmonds' first book of poems, Sunday at the Skin Launderette (Seren, 2008; ISBN 9781854114617), won the Forward Prize for Best First Collection and the Felix Dennis Prize, and was shortlisted for the Costa Poetry Award and longlisted for the Guardian First Book Award. Her pamphlet of poems Snug was a winner in the Poetry Business competition in 2004 and subsequently published by Smith/Doorstop (ISBN 9781902382678). She lives in London and works as a freelance writer, editor and teacher.