Ginge Reads

Photo by Plush Design Studio from Pexels Last night I tore out all the poems that I wrote about you and made them into paperchains. Hours of the night threaded together with your name to decorate the blues. Hanging from the chandelier twisting around table legs collecting on the sill. P apery memories gone soggy with salt water. Your face, so many times in black and white, skipping through the rhythm and humming indifference. In the morning the pages were clear, shaken from the shackles with glue that could not hold N ow the broken chains fall at my feet .

Simon Armitage (2009) photo by Alexander Williamson via Wikimedia Commons After 10 years writing poetry for her country, Carol Ann Duffy has finally passed the baton over to Simon Armitage as he is elected to be Britain’s new Poet Laureate. A truly deserved selection. Yet with the recent hand-over, it is fair to say that there has been controversy in the poetic world of late. The origins of the laureateship stem way back to 1616, when Ben Johnson was afforded a pension by the state, but the first official holder of the title was John Dryden, appointed by Charles II in 1668. The elected poet has no statutory duties but must create verse to mark significant events in Britain, such as royal weddings or memorial celebrations (although over recent decades the role has moved much more to promote poetry itself). The prestigious title also affords them a cask of sherry and an annual fee of £5,750. Until Duffy’s predecessor, Andrew Motion, limited his tenure to 10 years, the positio...