In January 2020, I started a hashtag on Twitter and Instagram called #mypoetrybookshelf. I outlined my aims for this hashtag in a blog post last year but, essentially, I planned to reread a poetry book everyday and share one poem that spoke to me. I had no idea that two months after picking up the…
Category: Poetry Collection
The Landscape(s) of Home
The turning of the year and the current lockdown has gotten me thinking closely about home. While I am grateful for my home here in Wales, I realize that it is going to be a long time before I am able to visit my friends and family back in America. It has already been over…
My Poetry Bookshelf – March
In January, when I started revisiting collections for #mypoetrybookshelf, I never imagined that my life would utterly change just three months later. In March, one of my students tested positive for Covid-19 and I went into self-isolation for two weeks. My university teaching moved swiftly online, my husband could no longer work and our busy…
Striking the Match – Introducing the How to Carry Fire Blog Tour
Back in 2012, I was asked to design and run a blog-writing course for a community organisation in South Wales. Although I was no expert, I said yes! and started reading blogs every day to prepare. I loved the versatility of this form and feeling connected to people through their posts. It wasn’t long before…
My Poetry Bookshelf — February
I was introduced to the work of Jorge Luis Borges back in 2009 when I started my Creative Writing MA at Cardiff University. Richard Gwyn, who later became my PhD supervisor, used Borges’ writing in one of our early seminars. I cannot remember which piece he brought but I remember the sense of cracking open….
Proofs, Previews, Pre-Orders
I submitted my PhD on February 4th and since then I have been spending my time catching up on sleep and ‘decompressing’. This deserves a whole blog post of its own which I hope to write after my Viva in May. For now, I am enjoying having space in my brain again and time to…
Christina Thatcher 