Matthew Paul and Then Again

And so I'm now back in Extremadura, following an excellent evening at the South Downs Poetry Festival in Chichester. I very much enjoyed my slot as Guest Poet, thanks to an appreciative audience and high-quality Open Mic. What's more, my visit to West Sussex enabled me to pick up several review copies of exciting collections that are due to be featured soon on Rogue Strands.

For the moment, I'd just like to draw your attention to Matthew Paul's poetry blog. Matthew, who also published his first full collection with Eyewear, wrote an excellent post, titled Then Again, a few weeks ago. It's a reflection on the use of that awkward word ("then", I mean), and it complements my own piece on the subject (see here) a few days previously. This is another example of how poetry blogs can bounce off each other, creating explicit and implicit dialogues, developing the sense of an inclusive community of readers and writers.

Reading in Chichester at the South Downs Poetry Festival

I'll be the guest poet in Chichester on 30th May at the New Park Centre as part of the South Downs Poetry Festival. This event's especially important to me as Chichester is my U.K. base and I'll be reading poems from The Knives of Villalejo that span West Sussex and Extremadura. The evening begins at 7.30 p.m. and open mic slots are also available.

South Downs Poetry Festival 2018

On the back of two terrific events in Newcastle and Huddersfield last week, both packed with poetry lovers, book buyers and old and new friends, I'm delighted to report that my next scheduled reading from The Knives of Villalejo will take place at the South Downs Poetry Festival in Chichester on 30th May, when I'll be the guest poet at the New Park Centre.

Part of the 2018 programme is already up on the festival website (see here, even though it still mentions 2017 at the top). Suffice to say, I'm absolutely chuffed to have the chance to read in the city where I'm based when in the U.K..