Tom Wiggins, Letter Carver & Writer

As I said in my last post, YouTube is an amazing place to discover poetry.  I feel very privileged to live in an age in which these online resources exist.  Playing a poetry reading on YouTube will never replace going to a live reading, but it does allow you to watch both historic readings and readings in other countries.  Plus, it does allow you to skip any boring bits or move onto another reading completely.  I've watched many readings by the former U.S. Poet Laureate Billy Collins, whose popularity prior and subsequent to that post speaks for itself.  In one of many engaging talks uploaded to YouTube, he says that when he's flicking through a book of poetry, he always reads the short poems first, just so he can get a flavour of what the book is like as a whole.  It seems right to do this, because trying to getting into the zone in a bookshop is hard thing to do.  To my mind, poetry is an ascension, then a descension -  or is it the other way ...

The white space simmers around its poem.  "Make me make you profound," it hisses to the ink.  "Otherwise, stick with prose and fill me from margin to margin." The blank page is the poet's most severe judge.  When it comes to writing a poem - especially a short poem - one must justify the space in which the poem is captured.  The poet should ask, "Am I serving the page well as its single representative?"  A great weight of expectation rides on the short poem.   Here are some of my favourite short poems that entirely justify the space around them: Mrs Darwin By Carol Ann Duffy 7 April 1852 Went to the Zoo. I said to Him— Something about that Chimpanzee over there reminds me of you. non-creation vs. creation By Kat  Obsessed with creation - the idea of it.  So quick to define, title and sculpt. But, what if you waited. Don't create.  Just wait. See what emerges. Haiku  By Billy Collins Mid-winter evening, a...

Among the bills, the court orders, a "threat" and a fine, Rests a little white letter that is simply devine. It has my attention where the others have failed, (Having disputed my defaults, I refuse to be jailed). Unseeling excitement and shredding the rest, Much to my judge, the bank and BT's behest. A little white letter I got through the post, Contained a perfectly unperforated passage of hosts. Escorted along by three national treasures, I’m fleeing to Cheltenham for some literary pleasures.