Fantastic to have a couple of my poems in a new anthology of writing from my local area, Battlefield. I love the cover image, transforming one end of the New Victoria hospital into something like a giant orange post-it note for the lives of all Battlefieldians to leave their mark on.
The force behind the book was Linda Jackson, who runs Seahorse Creative Arts and Publications. I got to know Linda last year when I joined one of her writing groups at Finn’s Place. She’s a fabulous teacher, natural raconteur, and a superb writer herself. Above all Linda puts an incredible amount of energy into nurturing other people’s writing. Since meeting her I’ve read poems live at a couple of Seahorse events, and we’ve worked together to set up free creative writing classes for refugees and asylum seekers. I do the recruiting from students I teach English as a Second Language (ESOL) in college; Linda runs the classes with the help of another poet, Donna Campbell.
The classes have been a great success, and an anthology of the group’s writing (called Writing the World) is due to be launched at a Seahorse Summer Festival at the end of August. I’ll have a poem or two in that, and read at the Festival as well. There’s a fine looking live music line-up to go with the poetry, and possibly a special big name guest or two. All round it should be a cracking event.
T.Y. Garner Writer 