One must have a mind of winter

One must have a mind of winter

To regard the frost and the boughs

Of the pine-trees crusted with snow;

And have been cold a long time...

as Wallace Stevens put it (The Snow Man).  I'm the kind of wimp that if in doubt wears several vests, and is properly respectful about having no power for days on end - but today I know I'm missing out on experiencing south-west Scotland's heaviest snowfall in decades, and there's a sting in that.

So this blog post is a wallow in the white stuff, with poetry to sharpen the experience denied to me in actuality.
Here's a beautiful photo of a small child (dressed in red!) absorbing the world made new near Dalbeattie.

Look at winter

With winter eyes...

Douglas Florian

And here the beach under snow at Portpatrick, on the Rhinns in Galloway.  It's about as far west as you can go, a soft coast of Atlantic air and Gulf Stream warmth.  Just south of here is Logan Botanic Garden, where the palm trees must be bent with snow this afternoon.

the feathers

of some unimaginable bird

that loves us,

that is asleep now, and silent—

that has turned itself

into snow.

Mary Oliver from 'White-Eyes'

And here is a lane near Tinwald, in Dumfriesshire.  Snow re-writes.

The snow whirls over the courtyard's roses.

Didn't bring my boots and scarf, leafing

through books, don't know what to do with all this light!

Tua Forsström (Poem of the Week in the Guardian recently)

How it snowed on StAnza 2013, but poetry melted us

Dry, bitter snowflakes whirled in the streets of St Andrews, where StAnza International Poetry Festival merely gained in warmth and conviviality as the thermometer fell.  I'm just back from a fab four days in the north.

Highlights for me were Gillian Clarke reading from 'Ice', and explaining the principles of cynghanedd - and Eurig Salisbury reading in Welsh.  Mark Doty read a beautiful poem about a - dog.  Rare, that, but this one was perfectly weighted, humane, moving.  Wasn't really just about the dog.

I fell big time for 'Found in the Fields', Carrie Akroyd's work on John Clare.  You felt it was a collaboration.  
Alvin Pang was great, and over my last Poetry Breakfast I heard him reading in Chinese, and then the translation.  All the Poetry Breakfast discussions were absorbing.  I especially enjoyed listening to friends Dave Borthwick and Andy Forster talking with Mandy Haggith and Carry Akroyd about how poetry engages with the environment.  I had to rush from that one though, to beat my way through Arctic winds to St. John's Undercroft for my reading with Zoe Skoulding.
Which was a sell-out, especially appreciated as it was the official launch of my first collection from Oversteps Books, 'Not Lost Since Last Time'.  (Mandy Haggith told me later how she got the last ticket).  I had a lovely audience, and since I went first I was able to enjoy listening to Zoe's work too.
John Burnside's Masterclass was fascinating, and ran to time, though I could have taken more.  Dumfries and Galloway poet Em Strang put in a tremendously strong poem, as did Fife based poet Barbara Davey.

Jean Johnstone's book (collaboration with Jane Hirshfield)

In the middle of one busy day I walked very fast (to avoid hypothermia) down to the Westport Cafe where I met with artist Jean Johnstone, who had brought her handmade artists books, created in collaboration with poets, specially to show me.  We set the coffee and soup safely away to the other side of the table, and slowly unwrapped rough silk cloths to reveal the books.  When I picked up the first book, I gasped.  It had no weight at all, yet substance, like holding a songbird, with the same sense of both frailty and life pulsing.  Jean sets words and images into beeswax, and the books retain a faint scent of wax alongside the woodiness of handmade and hand-moulded paper.  Sensational.  And she's coming to Ludlow Fringe to do a special event  in June.  Don't miss.

From 'Unmapped'

And I loved 'Unmapped' an exhibition and poetry book by poet Rebecca Sharp and artist Anna King.

Gael Turnbull's 'The Edinburgh Poem'

And I played with Gael Turnbull's famous 'Edinburgh Poem' (slot the words together in magical serendipitous ways that always work).

And met Maureen Sangster and Paula Jennings, and admired their work on the collaborative Farlin project, involving artists and poets from Fife and Shetland.  And we all missed The Byre as a venue, and hope it'll be back before long, but the spirit of StAnza certainly remained in place. And John Hegley and Jacob Sam la Rose were just great, as was Erin Moure's twinkly humour and experimental mind.  I could go on, but it's my bedtime.

Basically, if you can get to StAnza next year, go.