Lemonade Anemone

I've published a new collection of poems, so I thought I'd share one from the book here.  This poem is called  Only twelve men have ever walked on the moon and one of them was allergic to moondust  - probably my longest ever poem title (so far). The poem is about societal expectations, the adversarial nature of hetrosexual intimacy, and the ways billionaires seem to be trying to go to the moon rather than seeking to forge connections with the people around them.  I wrote it in response to a prompt from my poetry writing group, and the theme was the haibun, a type of poetic form that uses haiku and prose poetry to create something with a conversational tone between the lyrical and the prosaic.   You can buy a copy of my book, Ophelia of the Bathtub, here .  Only twelve men have ever walked on the moon and one of them was allergic to moondust Imagine striving skyward, only for your destination to so thoroughly reject you. Imagine seeing it as a challenge...

 I'm currently working as artist in residence at the National Civil War Centre , a lovely little museum in Newark-on-Trent in Nottinghamshire.  I'm in the studio at the museum for three days a week, chatting with members of the public, leading creative activities, and writing poems and stories about the museum's collection. One of the first things that struck me about my new workspace was how beautiful the view from the window was! I can see out over the rooftops all the way to the church and across the treetops in the park. It's gorgeous. So, I decided to ask museum visitors to help me write a poem all about the view. I asked everyone who came to the studio to write down three words to describe what they saw from the window, then used those words to build a poem.  Here's my first draft. The words in bold (including the title) are the ones suggested by visitors.  Chim-chiminey From these heights,  everything looks different: squat square chimneys share space...

I'm so lucky that I get to work with children and young people as part of my day job. I teach creative writing, which is the best subject, and I won't hear a word said against it!  And I'm good at it, too.  But, I'm often reluctant to do anything too tricky or "formal" with my young writers, because  A. I want them to really enjoy the sessions, and  B. the contemporary poetry scene is not that enthusiastic about formal poetry structures.  That being said, I've been working with a particular group of teenagers for a while now, through my freelance contract with Writing East Midlands and, a few months' ago, we got to talking about constrained writing techniques.  They seemed keen, so I thought I'd set them a challenge!  So, I brought in an Abecedarian poem called Hummingbird Abecedarian by Aimee Nezhukumatathil .  An Abecedarian is a type of poem where each line starts with a different letter of the alphabet: the first line starts with the letter ...

I’ve been trying to find more time for my writing. Being a full-time freelancer means I have to prioritise work that pays the bills – teaching, project management, commissions and performances. The actual WRITING of the poems often gets pushed to the bottom of the list. But, writing poems is my favourite part of what I do, so I’ve been trying to re-prioritise it over the last few weeks.  Last month, I conducted an experiment.  I was going on a walk anyway. I love a nice, long walk, and I LOVE an urban walk too.  Most people I talk to prefer a walk in the woods, or in the Peaks or on the beach – and don’t get me wrong, I love those kinds of walks too – but my inherent nosiness is always delighted to go poke around in the city.  If I’m going into Nottingham, and I don’t have a time limit, I like to walk the four miles from my house to the city centre. Walking is my favourite self-soothing activity, and the only sport I’m really, truly great at! So, this random Wednesda...

 A silly little poem about trying to get fit: Personal Trainer  I’m getting to an age where I  should focus on my health, and so, I booked an expert who would help me push myself. She didn’t speak much English but she led by precedent, and she had a score on Yelp reviews of two-hundred percent! I’d never met a trainer  quite so flexible and bendy; she knew her way ‘round Yoga and Pilates – very trendy!   Her emphasis on stretching was a skill I mastered fast: she taught me how to curl up so my nose was by my arse. She had to change the timing  and adapt to fit my body. I told her I had two legs and she stared at me quite oddly… And she was keen on running through the fields, not wearing shoes. I kept my Puma Kicks laced up, but still, my feet were bruised. She often used small rodents as a way to set the pace. A run can be enhanced, she thought, if it involves a chase.  And, speaking of nutrition,  she endorsed a raw food diet: poultry, game ...

I’ve performed at my fair share of festivals in the past. I’ve done smaller local festivals like Strawberry Fair in Cambridge, Folk East in Lowestoft, and Gate to Southwell in Nottinghamshire, as well as bigger festivals like WOMAD and Bestival on the Isle of Wight.  It’s always a really nice atmosphere performing at a festival – everyone’s having a good time, and the vibes are (usually) immaculate. Naturally, most people go to music festivals for the music, but I’ve been to festivals that have had morning yoga workshops, space science lectures, vegan cooking demonstrations and even line dancing classes! And, of course, a little bit of spoken word.  Shambala festival started life in the 1990s, when five friends met at uni and decided to put on weekend music events for their mates. By the early 2000s, the events were attracting a couple of hundred likeminded people each year, and by 2007, the festival was a full-time job for its organisers.  The name Shambala derives from ...

Last year, I started puttng together my first ever play, KINGMAKER, and I documented the research and development process here .  It was a really fun project, and despite some trepidation about working in a new medium, I really enjoyed the creative process of working with a director, actors and a producer to develop the show. Sadly, our second Arts Council bid didn't get funding, so we decided to put our plans for touring the show on hold until later this year.  The play is a quirky little comedy about village life, friendship, and ellaborate archeological hoaxes, and we originally conceived it as a piece to tour rural venues in the Midlands.  So, while we were waiting for autumn to roll around, we were invited to showcase the play at the National Rural Touring Forum , a conference specifically set up to support theatre in rural places.  We were given a five-minute slot at the conference to showcase the play, in the hopes of connecting with other touring schemes and ...

My grandad died earlier this month, and it’s been a really sad time for our family. But I was very fortunate to get the opportunity to say goodbye to him by sharing a poem at his funeral service. This is the poem I wrote. I hope that, if he heard the service at all, he liked it. Bird Box Love  for Grandad Ged  You fixed a bird box to a shaky branch, and welcomed all the sparrows there to nest. You gave us baby birds a fighting chance; your garden was the one we liked the best. We sparrows sung your praises in our songs because you loved us all, and love abounds. This garden feels so empty, now you've gone; a feather floating gently to the ground. The sun has set on all your summer days, but though your presence fades, we hold you dear. For death is just a parting of the ways, and grief is simply love that perseveres. The garden feels so empty, now you're gone, but we can still remember you in song. Image via Unsplash.com  

In ' The Theory of Everything Else: A Voyage into the World of the Weird ' by Dan Schreiber, he has a section where he talks about endangered species. We all know about the beautiful animals that are endangered - the tigers and elephants and so on - but no one really talks about the ugly, irritating or gross animals that are also on the brink of extinction.  In the book, Schreiber spoke directly to a natural history museum in the Netherlands that was trying to save one such beast from oblivion, and that part of the book inspired me to write this incredibly silly poem (perhaps with a serious message at its heart).  I hope you like it! Endangered Species    When we campaign to save our fleeting beasts,  we focus on the creatures who are nice. The ugly and the gross are thought of least —  does no one care about the pubic lice?!  You might be filled with pure contempt, and scoff  at having a rapport with parasites,  but you’ve been quite annoyi...

I’m part of a group of called DIY Poets , and since 2016, the women of DIY have been hosting an annual event celebrating International Women’s Day .  This year Women Say Stuff hosted its tenth open mic, and it was a really gorgeous evening, where we had the pleasure of uplifting the voices of local women and raising money for Nottingham-based domestic abuse charity JUNO Women’s Aid .  We sold over 100 tickets to the event, secured local sponsorship to pay our staff and performers, and raised over £600 for our chosen charity! Plus, our lovely audience also donated three bags of period products for women in need, which we donated to Nottingham Women’s Centre .  On the night we had twenty-three women on the open mic, plus two fantastic headline sets from Derby-based poet Aoife O’Connor, and WSS co-founder Clare Stewart! (I especially loved Aoife’s award-winning poem “ A Series of Unrelated Small Things .”) On the open mic, we had a real range of topics from maths and to medu...

I’ve been a full-time freelance writer and educator since March 2022, and it’s a great job. No two days are the same, and I get to work on multiple projects across multiple organisations, with very few strings attached.  Of course, there are downsides. No sick pay or pension, having to do my own taxes, and having periods where I’m not sure where the next job is coming from. But all in all, I think the freelance life suits me pretty well.  But I often speak to people who don’t understand what freelancer life is like. They think it’s a doss, or a holiday, or they think I’m just swanning about, like some sort of poetic lady of leisure. And, while I do my fair share of swanning, my freelancing life is a pretty busy one. So, today I thought I’d share an example of what I get up to in a typical week, to give you an idea of what it’s really like!  Saturday: This week, I’m supporting a poetry open mic night and event for International Women’s Day. We have 120 people booked to att...

Asking For It is a series of images, created by photographer Jayne Jackson , representing people from different eras. In each image, the person is photographed as if in a mugshot, with a board which lists their “crime” or the “reason” they were sexually harassed or assaulted. Viewers are then invited to question the motivations of individuals and societies that would consider these “crimes” provocation enough to justify assault. The exhibition highlights the historic and contemporary attitudes to victim-blaming, especially in cases of sexual and gender-based violence.  Image's from Jayne Jackson's Asking For It series The exhibition is due to go on display at the National Justice Museum in Nottingham in March 2025. As part of the project, I was asked to support some writing workshops, working with Jayne and a small group of women from Broxtowe Women's Project to write letters of support to women experiencing domestic abuse.  We also looked at Mrs Pace's letters , whic...

In my day job, I work with organisations across the arts and charity sectors, supporting people to find their creativity through writing. So, I’m always on the hunt for poems, images and music to use as inspiration for poetry.   And this short film, directed by André Musgrove and choreographed and performed by Ariadna Hafez, really caught my eye.  It’s called The Deepest Dance, and shows Hafez dancing around shipwrecks under the ocean off the coast of Barbados. The film is glorious and the behind the scenes making of video is also well worth a watch!  Here's my poem, inspired by the film:  The Deepest Dance  Waterlogged,  she haunts the wreck. A lithe-limbed phantom  of sea salt circumstance. Slick ocean swirls like a spell, suspended  between surface and sea floor,  twisting through coral-covered ruins;  ships brought low by tide and time.  Submerged metal roughness, red with rust,  this bride of barnacles, gentle as gos...

 In 2022, the folks at Inspire Culture, Learning and Libraries asked Paper Crane Poets to write a commissioned poem for their annual general meeting. We spent two months working together on the poem, which includes contributions from nineteen poets from the collective.  The poem was inspired by our individual experiences in local libraries, and all the brilliant projects that Inspire provides to our communities too. This finished piece includes contributions from nineteen poets from the Paper Cranes Collective: Sue Allen; Sonia Burns; Edwina Crowder; Sarah Dale; Laura Grevel; Rose Harvey; David Hunter; William Kummer; Phil Langran; Katey Logan; Andrea Lucy-Hirst; Sue McFarlane; Tara Singh; Leanne Moden; Jade Moore; Rachel Jackson; Gail Webb; and Dave Woods, with additional editing support from Ann Parker. It was a joy to work on this project, and we’re really proud of the finished piece! Beyond the library door In the beginning, there was the word, and the word was  Shhh...

Univocalisms were first devised by the Oulipo , a group of writers, artists and thinkers based in Paris in the mid-twentieth century. The Univocalism is one of their most famous inventions: a piece of writing that excludes four out of the five vowel sounds.  Let me explain. For example, if you write an O univocalism, you're not allowed to use any words that include the letters A, E, I, or U, and if you do an E univocalism, you're not allowed to use  any words that include  the letters A, I, O, or U.  It sounds hard (because it is) but it's a fascinating challenge, and I really love it because it can get out of a writing rut, and help you create pieces that you'd never write otherwise! This is my favourite univocalism that I've ever written, and I think I really like it because it's so deeply, unrelentingly silly, and because it breaks the rule that it follows. I'm dead rebellious, me.    Merbles   Yer ersk mer ter explern merserlf  Bert mer rerply...

We did it!  In case this is your first time here (Hello!) my name’s Leanne, and normally, I’m a poet. But this year, I’ve been working with a team of creative people on a Research and Development programme for a play that I’ve written.  It’s called Kingmaker and it’s a comedy about good intentions, bad ideas, and finding a place to belong. Our story follows a tour guide in a sleepy rural village, and the problems that arise when an internationally important archaeological specimen is discovered in the local churchyard!  You can read more about my journey through the R&D process in the previous three blogposts .  Last Friday, we invited a selection of cool people to come to see a work in progress version of the show. The audience watched four scenes from the play, and heard from the creative team speak about their ambitions for next steps. Then, we facilitated a Q&A where audience members could give feedback on what they’d seen.  It was a really useful ...

I’ve just sent two weeks thinking, writing, re-thinking and re-writing. A couple of weeks’ ago, our creative team did a week of research and development , working on the script for a new play that I wrote earlier this year.  By the end of the first week of R&D, we’d removed the interactive elements, improved the narrative pacing, moved the interval, added five new scenes, and completely re-imagined the ending!  All in a week's work!  The next stage of the project is a sharing of the show with industry professionals and invited guests on Friday 6th September. So, I had two weeks to do all the re-writes, before rehearsals started up again.  Given how many notes I’d made, and how many changes we'd initiated, it seemed like a Herculean task. So, I did what I always do when faced with a monumental writing commission. I procrastinated.  One clean bathroom, two mowed lawns, and email inbox clear-out, and a fully-hoovered house later, I figured I’d really better ge...