‘Still’. One small word. One diverse collection of many words – Chelley McLear, Poetry in Motion Co-ordinator.
This is the tag-line to the second poetry anthology – entitled Still, and inspired by the same theme – which has just been published by the Community Arts Partnership (CAP) and funded by the Arts Council Northern Ireland. It is a collection that I am delighted to be a part of, having been selected as one of the poets included in the book, launched earlier today at the Black Box in Belfast.
Over the past year, inspired by the various writing events and workshops and courses I have attended, I have steadily developed and concentrated upon my creative writing and indeed, come round to the fact that, yes – I am a writer and a bit of a poet and there’s no reason not to admit it. You certainly don’t have to be published to be as such, but it is really rather nice when it does happen. What’s more – it’s different from seeing your name in print on a journalism piece – just as brilliant, but different. 
A poem or a story you have created and aren’t simply reporting, means that much more and particularly then, when someone deems it good enough to be printed – it means a lot.
So, today, I declined and then promptly changed my mind about reading my poem to the assembled audience of fellow poets (I may never get this chance again!). Everyone was there to support one another, I was the fourth up (which helped) and, well, once on stage, you really couldn’t see anything, thanks to the great bright lights and the darkened space of the er, Black Box.
I read it, I enjoyed it and I fear I have developed a taste for it…
River stars
Liquid light, scattered
each iridescent pin-prick of space
in space drowning.
Winks of dying fire,
celestial performance poets
caught half-alive in reflected refraction.
A depth of possibility.
Death re-played on a window of water
blackened by a bashful moon.
Diamonds in the air
hung softly in sleepy, silent dark
and still,
no ripples to swallow their dance,
or dull the romance of a river
dressed in stars.