I arrived at the Poetry Bookshop a bit late, but managed to find a stool near the door (which was being guarded by a very friendly big brown dog). The weather was so lovely that even after 7pm it was warm and sunny enough to have the door open.
Susan Richardson is an extremely good performer of her poetry, which she has all by heart, and between the poems she talked about the different creatures she had written about, all of which are endangered in some way. The list goes from Critically Endangered (like the European sturgeon, which once swam in the Wye and is now found only in the River Garonne in France) to Least Concern. One unpleasant surprise was that Puffins are now considered to be Vulnerable, partly because of climate change. Another unpleasant surprise was the number of blue sharks that are killed every year - twenty million! They're on the list as Near Threatened.
She wrote the poems while she was poet in residence to the Marine Conservation Society. She's also poet in residence for World Animal Day and the British Animal Studies Network.
As part of the launch of this book, and to raise awareness, she is holding 30 readings, one for each of the creatures she has written about (sharks, whales, puffins, and more), mostly in coastal towns, but a few inland ones as well. Her website is at www.susanrichardsonwriter.co.uk.
The pictures that go alongside the text are by pat Gregory, who is based in Cardiff. She also has a website, at www.patgregoryart.co.uk
And Cinnamon Press have brought them together in a book that contains essays as well as the poetry and art, an unusual format that Susan Richardson said would have been very difficult to place with a large publishing company. Cinnamon Press is small, and based in North Wales. They publish fiction and non-fiction as well as poetry, including Welsh writing. They also run Envoi poetry magazine. Their website is at www.cinnamonpress.com
I bought the book, and although I suspect there will be a lot more unpleasant surprises like the 20 million blue sharks, I'm looking forward to reading it.
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So the litter season is with us once again! After three fine days, what does a walk to the Warren turn up? Beer bottles strewn about along with cans, crisp and biscuit packets, the remains of portable barbecues on the beach. But it's not just on the beach. The whole meadow yielded more and more rubbish. The awful thing is, we can do nothing about it, short of having a 24/7 patrol willing to face, no doubt, all sorts of abuse! So it's down to a few of us to take bin bags whenever we walk the Warren in fine weather and clear up after the selfish, totally inconsiderate litter louts.
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