I love making as well as writing. I offer occasional handmade editions of poetry.

Garden Seasons is a collection of poems, written over many years, all about the gardening year. It’s made in a ‘seed packet’ format. The poems are printed on separate sheets, contained in a handmade ‘seed packet’ complete with instructions for reading on the back! The covers and poems are printed by Old Forest Arts in Hay on Wye, and they are selling them in their shop. The packets are made by me, in my shed in the garden!

There are 100 in this edition. 

The packets are numbered and signed, and cost £5.50.

They are available direct from me

Here are three poems from the collection;


Primroses
No,
not prim at all
but
prolific,
flowering recklessly
in the early spring
as cold rain falls,

exuberant,
even frost fails to stop them,
spilling over from the borders
into the gravel,
between paving stones
and bricks,

great mounds of pale yellow flowers
scented and
profligate,
celebrating the winter’s passing.

I would always choose
The primrose path.


First frost
Now is the time when
the day slides in on
bright morning sun,

slipping along the
silver drops on spider’s webs
and
gleaming blades of grass,
breathing deep the cold air,
feeling the change of leaves
and light,

Beginning to forget the summer,
and accepting
the promise
of the
first frost


december
the garden has
closed the door
drawn the curtains and
shut me out

I have to wait

An earlier edition, containing the first few of these poems, was called A Tapestry of Flowers, and was written for my composer friend Mervyn Burtch. He set them to music.

A new seed packet edition, Francesca Kay's Mythical Beasts, is being printed and I will enjoy making that. I am also preparing two more handmade editions, taking a little longer as they are created using my Adana letterpress machine.