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Beschreibung

The concept of identity – be it class, gender, sexuality, national, institutional, or anything else we define ourselves by – has gone through radical change over the past half-century, and the idea of definition by binary oppositions is no longer as relevant as it once was. Spectrum is a poetry anthology that seeks to amplify marginalised voices, and to celebrate the great diversity and rich variation in the identities of people from around the world and from a huge cross-section of walks of life.

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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

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spectrum

poetry celebrating identity

renard press

Renard Press Ltd

124 City Road

London EC1V 2NX

United Kingdom

[email protected]

020 8050 2928

www.renardpress.com

Spectrum: Poetry Celebrating Identity first published in 2022

Poems and biographies © the poets and judges, 2022All other text © Renard Press, 2022

Cover design by Will Dady

The authors assert their right to be identified as the authors of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental, or is used fictitiously.

Renard Press is proud to be a climate positive publisher, removing more carbon from the air than we emit and planting a small forest. For more information see renardpress.com/eco.

All rights reserved. This publication may not be reproduced, used to train artificial intelligence systems or models, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means – electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise – without the prior permission of the publisher.

EU Authorised Representative: Easy Access System Europe – Mustamäe tee 50, 10621 Tallinn, Estonia, [email protected].

contents

About Spectrum

About the Judges

Spectrum

god is a trini

Rayne Affonso

when i balanced who i am upon the turning of a book

Jane Burn

12 years old, in my superman dressing gown

Mia Jasmine Rhodes

a bicycle reminisces about 1962

Ivy Raff

a garden of new song

Ewa Gerald Onyebuchi

a highly sensitive mission

Lana Silver

all that i am

Dianne McPhelim

autumn drive with father

Sophie Laura Waters

back to black

Alyson Smith

barber off the harrow road

Jenny Mitchell

bbc young dancer 2022

Daphne Sampson

be careful who you invite home

Thea Smiley

body

Rachel Burns

but where are you really from?

Neshma

cardiogram variations

Oz Hardwick

changing state

Jess Skyleson

community payback

Damon Young

dance of the drag queens

Cameron Rew

dissimilarities

Peter Hill

elderly swimmers at the pool

Cathy Bryant

emigrant/immigrant

Roisín Harkin

grounded

Ellie Herda-Grimwood

half-life

Jazz McCoull

he

Frankie Whiting

home is here

Overcomer Ibiteye

i am not what you think

Jennifer Cousins

in shaa allah

Fadairo Tesleem

keys to the city

Deborah Finding

lavender menace

Elle Echendu

listen, stranger man

Arinze Chiemenam

memory is a mother to every little beginning

Nwuguru Chidiebere Sullivan

mother tongue

Caroline Am Bergris

mum’s heels

Sam Honeybone

my dear iraq

Samah Alnuaimi

nebulous strike in minnesota

Nnadi Samuel

olympus

Kat Dixon

on reading my transatlantic poem, she sends me the laughing emoji

Chiwenite Onyekwelu

penance

Carolann North

pink carnations outside the russian embassy

Tim Kiely

precious

Suman Gujral

sappho’s nightwalk

Ozzy Welch

screw the pantomime

Jessica Appleby

some comments on your thoughts about being british indian

Anita Goveas

sunday lunch

Matt Leonard

sunday vaudeville

Naomi Madlock

switched out

Lucy Zhang

t4t (trans for trans)

Abhainn Connolly

the boy from the estate

Steve Baggs

the collector

Jessica Oakwood

the odd space in between

Raina Muriithi

the wraith and the magpie

LJ Ireton

to the caged bird in church

Martins Deep

transformation

Susan Cartwright-Smith

whale watching in the arctic circle

Kerry Ryan

where four worlds meet

Dave Wynne-Jones

About the Poets

Supporters

about spectrum

In February 2021 Renard put out a call for submissions for the New Beginnings poetry project, a competition open to all those who ‘felt their voice was silenced in 2020’. We were absolutely overwhelmed by the response to the project, and it became clear how important such projects are in raising the voices of those who feel shut out of the mainstream.

With 2022 has come, for many, a gradual easing of restrictions and an improvement to life – but, of course, for others it has also brought war and oppression, and myriad old prejudices have yet to be banished. How important, then, to celebrate the rich tapestry of the human race, to talk about our differences, to explore others’ experiences – and that’s exactly what Spectrum is: a celebration of identity.

As with any project, there were several vital people working away behind the scenes. Miriam Halahmy, Tom Denbigh, Hannah Fields and Will Dady, the judges, had quite a task whittling down the vast pile of submissions to the shortlist you see here today, and it is testament to their hard work that the list is so varied and rich in talent.

The project was supported by a crowdfunding campaign – thanks in abundance go to all those kind souls who supported the project; their names can be found on p. 161. And finally, our thanks to you, reader, for picking up this book, for supporting this project and, above all, for helping us to celebrate the great spectrum of identity.

the publisher

about the judges

miriam halahmy

Miriam was a teacher for twenty-five years, and, having worked with refugees and asylum seekers in schools, her writing engages with historical and contemporary issues that affect children across time – most notably the plight of refugees. Her young-adult novel, Hidden, was a Sunday Times Children’s Book of the Week, was nominated for the Carnegie Medal and has been adapted for the stage. Saving Hanno, Miriam’s latest book, is about a boy who comes on the Kindertransport and reflects on the grief and loss experienced by refugee children.

tom denbigh

Tom Denbigh lives in Bristol with an obscene number of books. He is the first Bristol Pride Poet Laureate and a BBC 1Extra Emerging Artist Talent Search winner. He has performed at the Royal Albert Hall and festivals around the UK, and has brought poetry to Brighton and London Prides. He is a producer at Milk Poetry and has facilitated writing workshops for groups of students from the UK and abroad (he is particularly proud of his work with queer young people). His debut collection …and then she ate him is out now with Burning Eye Books.

hannah fields

Hannah Fields is a writer, editor and publisher from Texas. She founded the independent publishing company, Folkways Press, in 2020, and launched the company with an anthology, We Are Not Shadows, as its inaugural publication. The anthology selected writing from women of all ages and backgrounds and covers a wide range of topics – including issues of race, gender, sexuality, trauma, adversity, disability and more. She has worked on various publications, from children’s books to award-winning magazines, along with various publishers in the US and UK.

will dady

Will Dady grew up in the wonderfully named Great Snoring in North Norfolk, and now lives in London. He is the Publisher at Renard Press, which he founded in 2020. A publisher of classic and contemporary fiction, non-fiction, theatre and poetry, part of Renard’s raison d’être is to empower and provide a platform to marginalised voices. The New Beginnings project was set up in 2021 as an antidote to the less pleasant aspects of the pandemic, and its huge success in attracting stirring entries has made these projects a firm fixture in Renard’s publishing programme.

spectrum

winner

god is a trini

Rayne Affonso

runner-up

when i balanced who i am upon the turning of a book

Jane Burn

special mentions from the judges

Miriam Halahmy

whale watching in the arctic circle

Kerry Ryan

Tom Denbigh

olympus

Kat Dixon

Hannah Fields

barber off the harrow road

Jenny Mitchell

will dady

the boy from the estate

Steve Baggs

god is a trini

Rayne Affonso

sweating bullets in the embassy line, while the older woman in front of him

sings praise for her daughter’s marriage to a man in Houston

who has one of those computer jobs, she could never remember the name,

but their child is bright bright and can’t get the valleys out of his Yankee trill and

God wishes he didn’t wear black when it’s so blasted hot,

idly scrolls through Facebook, thumb brushing over the latest kidnapping and

the video of that vagrant scratching his balls in the middle of Independence Square

and today’s Parliament dispute, and God scoffs

at the comments by the party supporters who lie and the party supporters

who can stand being lied to, but God himself didn’t vote,

because no man with one foot out the door will cut the next one off

if he plans on running and God plans on running, has planned on running,

has dreamt of running to a place where sugar doesn’t still grow in the streets,

bloodied at the root, a place where you can have a girl child

without shittin’ bricks, but God still averts his eyes when

his bredrin cuffs down his child mother so hard she has three chipped teeth

and God clinked beers with him that day, the dread in his belly not unfixable

with some hard local… besides, God is only leaving

to take up temporary residence in his auntie’s basement, not really his auntie

but the fat sister of his mother’s seamstress, whose son he pitched marbles with

and God will be back in time for Carnival, to kick his feet up on Wednesday

with a buzz from the nostalgia of the present moment’s ocean: blue,

as yesterday’s devil with her round painted breasts,

as the barrels he will send for his children.