Black, White and Red: Volume 1 - Tapa blanda

An anthology of Art, Photography and Poetry from many contributors from all over the UK.

This is a little bit about myself in relation to poetry, I originally wrote poetry back in the mid 1990’s for about three years. I showed this early poetry to very few people, perhaps one or two of my friends, I was however encouraged by those people around me at the time to concentrate on my Art. Which worked for a little while, but a few attempts art education as an adult where abortive although I met some wonderful people, it wasn’t for me. I drifted away from Pure Art and from writing and spent a couple of years developing comic book ideas. Increasing pressures to work for a living seemed to mount and much was boxed up. A couple of years ago, Something seemed to stir within me, much forgotten and a seed of need to write again was born in me. I wrote for a few weeks but unfortunately Ill health seemed to nip this in the bud. At the end of summer 2013 I woke up from a dream, I wrote the poem 4am (included at the back of this book) and had a cry about it. Thinking that was that, but it wasn’t and I then went on to write almost constantly for the next three months. I produced in this time the body of my own work that went into my first Black, White and Red volume. As well as wanting to showcase my own work I also wanted to include the work of people I was introduced to, bumped into and helped me along the way. In hearing other creative voices in poetry and rhyme I have always been inspired, the lyrics of Jarvis Cocker having inspired me as a teenager to accept myself, are perhaps a guideline that I follow. It is the recreation of a moment, a feeling or a place that I perhaps find most rewarding about poetry, for like a memory a good poem will float about in corners of the mind illuminating parts of ourselves forgotten or misplaced.