New Irish Writing Archives

A woman in a pink coat holds a red umbrella while she bends down to talk to someone through a car window. The image is from the 70s and looks like a older archival photograph.

Image by Jim Pickerell / Documerica
Dear writers, readers and friends,

Welcome to the July issue of Visual Verse in which we celebrate the art of conversing with strangers. I have returned from a visit to Ireland where – despite the ever-invasive presence of technology in our lives – a vibrant culture of simple human interactions remains intact. I couldn’t walk two steps without a stranger making chit-chat. One woman was so keen to engage that, after eavesdropping on a conversation between my son and I as we stood at traffic lights, she insisted on walking us to “the best museum”. Only, she didn’t know where it was. We spent twenty minutes marching in the wrong direction while receiving an unsolicited historical walking tour of Dublin. The things you get for free, eh? Who needs Google maps when you’ve got the kindness of strangers. I’ve left Ireland with a resolve to engage more with random people to see what ideas and inspirations it might bring. Will you join me?

It’s not hard to see where the impetus for this month’s image selection came from. Hidden in this street scene from the archives of Documerica (https://www.documerica.org/) is a conversation. What do you hear? An interaction between strangers? A chance meeting of old friends? Something sweet or something more sinister? The image is the starting point, the text is up to you.

We are hugely grateful to our four talented leads this month for their unique ekphrastic interpretations. First up we present Lynn White (https://lynnwhitepoetry.blogspot.com/) , writing from her home in north Wales. Lynn’s poetry is influenced by issues of social justice and events, places and people she has known or imagined. She is especially interested in exploring the boundaries of dream, fantasy and reality. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net and a Rhysling Award. Find her at lynnwhitepoetry.blogspot.com or on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/Lynn-White-Poetry-1603675983213077/) .

On page 2 we present Tamanna Abdul-karim (https://twitter.com/TamKarim) . Born in Bangladesh and raised in the UK, Tamanna is a woman after my own heart: she always dreamed of empowering young people to achieve their fullest potential. She is a passionate English teacher who has been in service within Birmingham for sixteen years. She enjoys the raw and authentic experience of writing and sharing poetry. You can follow her work on Twitter (https://twitter.com/TamKarim) or Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/versesbyTam/) .

Róisín Leggett Bohan (https://twitter.com/LeggettBohan) joins us on page 3. Róisín was chosen for Poetry Ireland’s Introduction Series 2022. Her work can be found in Magma Poetry, New Irish Writing, Southword, Poetry Ireland’s ePub, Amsterdam Quarterly and elsewhere. Her poems have been commended/shortlisted for awards including the Allingham, Cúirt and MLC Fool for Poetry Chapbook Competition. In 2022 she was the winner of Flash Fiction with Southword and the winner of CNF with Atlantic Currents II. She holds an MA in Creative Writing from UCC and is co-editor of HOWL New Irish Writing. You can find her at inkstainedwings.com (https://www.inkstainedwings.com) .

And on page 4, we welcome Sam Buchan-Watts (https://www.ncl.ac.uk/sacs/people/profile/sambuchan-watts.html) , author of the pamphlet Faber New Poets 15 and collection Path Through Wood (Prototype, 2021). Sam is a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at Newcastle University and he is currently working on a book about skateboarding, masculinity and queer culture.

Now, over to you, dear writers. You know what to do. Submissions close 15th July, midnight UK time.

Kristen
with Preti, Isabel, Lucie, Ashish, Zaynab and Wes

Find the VV crew on socials:
Visual Verse (https://twitter.com/pretitaneja/)
Kristen Harrison (https://www.instagram.com/kittyharrison/)
Preti Taneja (https://twitter.com/PretiTaneja)
Lucie Stevens (https://twitter.com/LucieStevens_)
Ashish Kumar (https://twitter.com/Ashish_stJude) Singh (https://twitter.com/Ashish_stJude)
Zaynab Bobi (https://twitter.com/ZainabBobi)
Wes White (https://twitter.com/archaeologyBoy)

A cat poses in the sunlight against two regal looking portraits of other cats

Image by Erica Marsland Huynh
Dear writers, readers and friends,

This month’s issue is dedicated to community. Community and connection have many benefits for us humans and this is particularly true for artists and writers. Somehow, amid the noise, we find ways to build communities that enable us to share our work safely and grow with our fellow artists. Whether it be a writing group with friends, a Friday night book launch or a summer retreat in a remote castle, artist-led events build vital networks and help us all to keep momentum.

When Preti, Pete and I started Visual Verse almost ten years ago, we could not have imagined the community we have today. It is diverse in every way, it is global and it is boundlessly generous. This is how I came to choose our three leads for June. All three writers are involved in running and/or attending writing groups, facilitating poetry workshops and giving their time to other community-based activities. I have seen them support each other with shout-outs on Twitter, encouraging both exploration and celebration of each other’s work. It is heartwarming and it reflects the essence of Visual Verse.

Being the month of the Gemini, we must also acknowledge the other side of the artist’s community-building efforts. Artists also seek solitude. Sometimes it’s physical solitude (a writing retreat, for example) and sometimes mental solitude (wearing headphones in a cafe). However we find it, we manage to be in the world and with ourselves at the same time. Your prompt this month, a portrait of a rather sanguine feline captured by photographer Erica Marsland Huynh, seems the perfect visual for this artistic dichotomy. Cats have a way of needing company and needing only themselves simultaneously. Somehow it works.

Kicking off our written responses is the fabulous Cáit O’Neill McCullagh (https://twitter.com/kittyjmac) , an archaeologist, ethnologist, and educator in higher education and community settings. Cáit started writing poems at home in the Highlands just a few years ago and over fifty of these are published in print and online, including in Northwords Now, Poetry Scotland, The Storms, Howl: New Irish Writing, Ink Sweat & Tears and here at Visual Verse. In 2022, she was a co-winner of Dreich’s Classic Chapbook Competition for ‘The songs I sing are sisters’ co-authored with Sinead McClure. Her first full collection will be published by Drunk Muse Press in early 2024. She continues to outrun her diagnosis of cancer identified in February 2022. You can find out more about her via her Linktree (https://linktr.ee/caitjomac) .

Andrew Stickland (https://twitter.com/AndrewStickland) lives in Cambridge, UK, where he writes poetry and fiction and also helps to run the Angles Writing Group (https://twitter.com/AnglesWriters) (more on that below). His work has appeared in numerous anthologies and journals, and he has three previously published poetry collections. His first novel, The Arcadian Incident, was published earlier this year and two follow-ups, Escape to Midas and War Between Worlds, are due out in September, and then early next year, all from Lightning Books.

And on page 3 we present Kate Coghlan (https://twitter.com/Kate_Cogs) , a freelance writer/editor with an MA in Creative and Life Writing from Goldsmiths. Her work has been published by Mslexia, Loft Books, the Dulwich Festival, Spillwords and the Personal Bests Journal. This is her third appearance in Visual Verse and she is also a member of the Angles Writing Group with Andrew Stickland.

The Angles Writing Group (https://twitter.com/AnglesWriters) , based in Cambridge, has a mission to get as many of their members as possible into print, as often as possible, and we are very grateful that they regularly encourage members to try our challenge. At last count we had a dozen or so Angles members published with us. A lovely example of the tentacles of writing communities reaching far and wide.

There you have it, dear writers. The image is the starting point, the text is up to you.

Kristen
with Preti, Isabel, Lucie, Ashish, Zaynab and Wes

Volume 10, Chapter 09 | July 2023

Volume 10, Chapter 08 | June 2023