WHAT POETRY/POET AND/OR COLLECTION IS YOUR INSPIRATION?

This was a question I was recently asked to answer – on behalf of Wenlock Poetry Festival and their search for the second ever Shropshire Young Poet Laureate. It was one of several questions. The answers that I and other poetry lovers gave can be found on

http://www.wenlockpoetryfestival.org/laureate/

Unfortunately I got somewhat carried away –  there wasn’t enough room for the selection of poems that I wanted to share with everyone. So here they are now (one at a time because technology is not letting me lay them out as it should !!!)… Thank you poets xx

THE CLOSING DATE FOR ENTRIES for Shropshire Young Poet Laureate 2015 IS 5pm ON FRIDAY JANUARY 16TH 2015

Out of Essex        Emma Purshouse

To be known as small

or scarce was fine,

but then came the Essex tag,

which stuck

like eggs to curled grass.

And with the label

the inevitable titters

amongst the hedgerow flitterati.

Much was made of

Cocks’ Foot and Common Couch,

the male’s noticeable sex brand,

the amount of amber nectar

necked by gangs of them

socialising in rough pastures

at the weekend.

And then those dumb butterfly jokes.

Perhaps that’s why so many left.

Upwardly mobile skippers

skipping town;

spray tan orange clouds

moving up the M1 corridor,

along the verges, heading North.

© Emma Purshouse 2011. From Shropshire Butterflies A poetic and artistic guide to the butterflies of Shropshire (Fair Acre Press)This poem is reproduced here with the kind permission of the poet.