One Night Stanzas

I am officially obsessed with the Life In Authoring tumblr. If you click nothing else in this post, click it!

I thought my words were spare and evocative and true
Little ominous blasts bursting from staccato notes.

I was really excited to see that one of my former creative writing students, the lovely Daniel Dowe, had a poem published recently by Bolts of Silk (whose praises I have sung here before)! Such a great poem, love the ending…

…and ONS’s good friend Kevin Cadwallender has a cool poem at Bolts of Silk, too!

I am LOVING Stephen Nelson’s new food-related concrete poems, especially the meat and toast ones!

On the whole poetry/fiction thing: if Olds is fibbing, and this is all a big scam, then she is capable of almost pathological imaginative empathy, and worth spending a lot of time over. Whether this is of the I-feel-your-pain species or the look-at-how-sad-I-might-be-maybe is trivial.

I always love Dave’s reviews, and he reviewed Sharon Olds’ recently-Eliot-Prize-winning collection, which I seriously wanted to read, and now seriously want to read even more. Great review.

My hand reached down her floss and then felt a soft touch of her labia majora while creeping through her pubic symphysis.

You think the Bad Sex Award nominees are bad? Check out this guy!

Ms Magazine have compiled a great list of 2012’s Best Poetry Books By Women. I’m basically making it an instant to-read list.

I tagged Helen McClory in my Next Big Thing post t’other day. Here’s her very intriguing response!

HELLO I WOULD LIKE TO LIVE IN ALL THESE HOUSES.

I hadn’t seen all of the latest lot of mystery Edinburgh book sculptures til now. The Treasure Island one is amazing!

Fuck Yeah Book Arts! has a great DIY section full of book-making tutorials!

Do you — like me — hate it when people misuse the word “literally”? If so, here are some hilarious examples from sports commentators. SO FUNNY/TERRIBLE. (Thanks, Billie!)

Maggi Gibson picked out her top 10 books for young feminists!

So, two things have been boiling my blood recently. The first is the whole Christian Ward plagiarism thing. I now can’t quite believe I gave Christian a platform here at ONS, and have since removed an interview he gave here, which was being quoted by a lot of news outlets covering the story. But there has been some interesting commentary on the issue. Paisley Rekdal’s open letter was furious, moving and wonderful, and I liked The Snarkist’s initially-flippant-but-actually-quite-incisive take.

The other thing that’s been boiling my blood? Suzanne Moore claiming that sane people rightly telling her she’s a transphobe = bullying mob, OMG!, and then just the entire the hot lemon-sucking mess that is Julie Burchill. I’m sure you’ve heard all about it and I sure as hell won’t link to La Burchill’s disgusting display of hate speech (still online in spite of the Observer’s retraction, btw). However, there’ve been some smashing responses. The best, for me, came from the freaking wonderful Laurie Penny, and the awe-inspiring Paris Lees. These are women who deserve your clicks, folks. Not a woman, but no less deserving, is Harry Giles, who also wrote a stellar response.

This slide-show of tattooed women through the ages is bloody excellent.

Did you guys see the Shetland ponies wearing cardigans? YOU MUST CLICK THIS.

Christopher Lee: better than you since 1922.

They’re a bit soap-box-y, and more than a little steely, but I kind of like these Rules To Live By.

Need cheering up? Tons of dog gifs. You’re welcome.

Also from Buzzfeed, the Funniest Autocorrects of 2012 made me howl with laughter.

Some brave folks respond to the Moore/Burchill BS.

Jane McGonigal is a freaking LEGEND.

The utterly wonderful Amanda Oaks made this spectacular video about hooping and healing. I love it.

I am also so loving this song lately.

Have a great weekend!

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You can also visit Read This Press for more poetry (and typewriter paraphernalia!). Alternatively, check out Edinburgh Vintage, our sister site. If you want to get in touch you can follow OneNightStanzas on Twitter, or email claire[at]onenightstanzas.com. I reply as swiftly as I can!

(Photo credit)

Peace One Day in association with Scottish Women’s Aid & Shakti Women’s Aid

Last Friday, I went along to the Edinburgh event for Peace One Day, which had been put together by Scottish Women’s Aid and Shakti Women’s Aid, as this year’s Peace One Day campaign had a focus on domestic violence.
It was absolutely fantastic. I joined a group of wonderful ladies, a few men and more than a few super-cute kids who gathered around the poetry tree in St Andrew’s Square Gardens. The event kicked off with a recording of survivors and allies talking about all the reasons why domestic abuse should stop. As their voices drifted out of the PA and across the garden, a beautiful, bright-pink rainbow appeared over all our heads. Pretty amazing.

We also heard from a speaker from Shakti who read one survivor’s testimony; a policewoman who regularly deals with domestic violence call-outs, and a representative of Scottish Women’s Aid. Finally, the evening was wrapped up with music from the truly brilliant Commotion Samba.
It was fantastic to be among a group of wonderful, like-minded folk, getting together to celebrate survivors and bear witness to those still suffering. A really poignant and empowering event — well done to all involved in organising, and hooray to all those who came along.

Nights drawing in

I always forget how much I love the autumn. For me, it’s Edinburgh’s best season by far. I am loving the dusk, all the shop windows steamy and lit up; the smoke from people’s fires; getting to swish through the first fallen leaves; digging out my super-cozy, massive chunky boots, wearing them to work and getting snarky comments from my students (WHATEVER, my feet are so cozy!); taking lots and lots of photos of cool stuff out and about; Lovely Boyfriend and I wearing our matching fingerless gloves because we are goofy (his are blue, mine are pink — double goofy. NB: we both bought these gloves before we’d met, it’s merely coincidence); doing more baking (see below) because baking is totally an autumn/winter thing; starting to buy Christmas presents (I know, I am mega organised); getting excited about Halloween; plotting a trip to beautiful, autumnal Paris in a few weeks. I love this time of year… why do I always forget?

Vegan baking!

So, having got vegan chocolate brownies and vegan cinnamon rolls down to a fine art, a few weeks ago I decided to try scones. I used Isa Chandra Moskowitz’s recipe from her brilliant book Vegan Brunch, but modified it to add raspberries and blackberries. The resulting scones were pretty delicious, but kind of squidgy thanks to the extra moisture added by the fruit. I felt like I was just a whisker away, though, so this past weekend, I gave it another go.
This time I took Isa’s suggestion and used blueberries. As these don’t disintegrate while mixing, they worked out much better. I made the scones US style — super huge and not shaped at all, so I didn’t have to worry too much about them rising. Needless to say, they were awesome. Hooray!

Amazing stuff in the post!

& finally, I am extremely grateful to the lovely Lewis Young, poet of my long-time acquaintance and the brains behind The Adult Teeth Recording Company. Lewis started Adult Teeth a little while back, with a view to “put[ting] records out there that aren’t already out there, providing those who truly consider themselves fans of music with interesting, vibrant, delicious, exciting and mind-altering sounds and words - in a format that is as close to art as it can be.” That means awesome, unique sounds; it means poetry fused with those sounds; best of all, it means vinyl.
I opened up my wee package from Adult Teeth and instantly “squealed is that green vinyl?!” I love my records, and I especially love coloured vinyl. My copy of Fleetwood Mac on limited edition white vinyl is one of the first things I’d save if the flat was on fire, closely followed by my cloudy-blue copy of We May Be Skinny and Wirey by the Crocketts. Coloured vinyl is so the way to my heart.
And what’s on the coloured vinyl is pretty fantastic, too. It’s described as ‘art-rock’, but it’s a kind of fusion of mellow new-wave-y sounding tunes (I thought of Elvis Costello at times) crossed with pin-sharp spoken word. You get work by two artists (unless they’re pseudonyms?) on one 7″ single, so there’s plenty of bang for your buck. Buy the record right here!
I also got some Adult Teeth info via a very colourful flyer; a cute pin badge; stickers (now adorning my turntable); and perhaps best of all, a copy of Lewis’ own experimental poetry pamphlet — a series of alternative readings of The Owl and the Pussycat. This includes concrete, musical and oulipo versions of the classic poem I loved from childhood. You can buy it at the Adult Teeth store, too!
A huge thanks to Lewis for sharing his handiwork with me. Please go and support this very deserving little indie label!

What are you loving this week?

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You can also visit Read This Press for more poetry (and typewriter paraphernalia!). Alternatively, check out Edinburgh Vintage, our sister site. If you want to get in touch you can follow OneNightStanzas on Twitter, or email claire[at]onenightstanzas.com. I reply as swiftly as I can!