Yes, it has been a long time, folks, but then I’m still enjoying a sabbatical, still sorting this old head out.
I’m not totally inactive, however. I continue to pen the occasional weird poem, and of course to edit the zen space. Speaking of which, the Autumn 2019 Showcase is now published there. Visit, please.
MM.
Nice things people have said to me so far in 2019:
“You’re too brilliant to pin down, Marie. Like trying to pin the tail on the sunlight.”
“In my version of you, more like trying to pin the blame on an exploding supernova.”
“… arrogant bint!”
The third one there was said affectionately, I can assure you.
Not so much a revival, more a recycle:
In 2010 I opened a new website for my Lithopoesis project. I have played around on the edges of experimental poetry more-or-less ever since my stint of writing sonnets came to a close (“I’ve learned how to draw,” I said, “and now I’m entitled to pickle a shark and call it ‘art’.”), and it is now almost a decade since that particular period of work. The last post I made there, adding a forgotten piece of work, rather than constructing something new, was in 2012.
Now, however, I have decided to add another page there, to house the dribs and drabs of what I call ‘Impact Art’. Now, you know me – I don’t like to explain what I’m doing. You read my poetry and my prose, as is, and you make what you can of them. I feel, more often than not, that explanation is a destructive process. You, on the other hand, take over the matter of creation as soon as you see something of mine, as soon as you look at it, give it attention, relate to it, react to it, interpret it. Let that interpretation run to a scholarly thesis if you wish, go nuts, it’s fine by me.
So go and have a look at my ‘Impact Art’. Clicking the image to the right of this post will take you to its threshold; or you can simply click on the ‘Impact Art’ tab at the top of the page, over on the Lithopoesis site. Follow the blog there – I’ll post an update in the blog section whenever I add something new.
Am I still writing poetry?
Yes, over at Kvenna ráð I am. I’m resting my ‘Two hundred and seven words’ prose-poetry at the moment, and dropping an occasional haikuform poem, but yes I’m still dabbling. Go there, follow that too.
Thank you.
M.
I Just got the word today, via Facebook, that the Winter Words festival, which is happening as usual in mid-February in the Scottish Highland town of Pitlochry, has dropped its wonderful Fearie Tales competition! My oh my this is bad news – not simply because I have been one of the most regular finalists and therefore have had a door shut on a platform for my own stories, but because the same door has been shut on short-story-writers in Scotland in general. Boo! Get the message? BOO!
On a positive note, the Winter 2019 Showcase at the zen space is now published, so go and feast your eyes on some haiku, poetry, unusual writings, and strangely contrasting artwork.
M.
Hello. I know I’ve been quiet, but I haven’t actually been inactive. I have been posting my poetry regularly, for example. Also I’ve been keeping the zen space going – that’s the e-zine I edit – where you can read haiku and other short forms of poetry.
The latest Showcase (Autumn 2018) was published a few days ago, and you find a portal to it it here. As well as words it includes picture; featured this time are portraits by Man Ray, the 20c surrealist photographer, like the one of Pablo Picasso, here to the right.
By the way, I’m always on the lookout for new ‘names’ for the zen space, so if you know anyone – yourself even – who can turn their hand to short, vivid, in-the-moment poetry, then direct them to the ‘Submission’ tab at the zen space.
I am still on sabbatical from novel writing. I don’t know when that will change. Certainly not before this mornings cup of Earl Grey, that’s for sure…
In case you missed it elsewhere, the latest (Summer 2017) Showcase at the zen space is now published.
the zen space is an e-zine for haiku and related in-the-moment words, and I have been the editor since it started six years ago. Yes, with this issue the zen space celebrates its sixth birthday! The latest Showcase includes not only haiku and other recognisable Japanese-inspired forms in English, but also some poetry it’s hard to categorise. It also features some beautiful mandalas from our most ‘quoted’ artist Marie Taylor.
Although I say it myself, it’s a good ‘un this time. Check it out for yourselves – click on the Mandala below and follow the links.
MM.
Another quarter of the year has rolled round, and I have been busy putting together the latest offering from the zen space, the e-zine of which I am the editor, publisher, and wot-not. This time there is no set theme, and the illustrations by Vincent van Gogh are totally irrelevant. Or you could say their irrelevance is relevant, and if you wanted to sound really clever, you could say it’s the spaces in between that are relevant. Yer pays yer money and yer takes yer choice, as they say. Except of course the zen space is absolutely free. Click here, or on Vincent’s self portrait to be transported…
… is now on line! This time round, haijin and poets from all over the globe have been taking pot-shots at crows, and the result is murderous. Visit here, and join in the caw-rus…
I have a haiku in Edge, this year’s anthology…
The Autumn 2015 Showcase at the zen space is now published, and this time it’s all to do with fridge magnets! Have a look here or click the pic.
Haiku, haiga, short bursts of poetry, startlingly immediate artwork – these are things I try to incorporate in the quarterly e-zine the zen space. How I come to be editing and publishing this e-zine is an old, old story, but it has something to do with a run-in I had with the editor of a similar enterprise. I, being an arrogant wee beggar, decided I could do better. Well, I don’t know if I’ve actually ‘done better’, but at least I’ve ‘done’.
The current Showcase is number 16, which means – hey! – it has been running now for four years. It contains words, full of colour, from various poets, and also the artwork of Claudia Schoenfeld, an artists whose eye-on-the-world I love.
I would like my readers here to patronise the zen space. It’s free-of-charge, and the latest Showcase can be found here. You might like to look through the previous Showcases too. It’s easy to keep up with what’s happening by following the (front page) blog.
There are plans and ideas bubbling under for the next couple of Showcases, so keep an eye open.
M.
Marie Marshall 