Penny Dedman
@spanishtom.bsky.social
430 followers 65 following 300 posts
Writer, Writer's HQ, feminist, just about hanging in there. Any photos my own unless stated otherwise.
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A #LiftToTheSky to @alanparrywriter.co.uk, who does so much for the writing community. #PoemsAbout is my favorite corner of Bluesky, because (even when I'm not brave enough to post) it challenges me to keep writing, revising, and engaging with others on the same journey.

Cheers to you, Alan.
This is me right now.
You usually have to be signed up to our newsletter to read it. However, this week is too important, and I wanted to share it more broadly.

preview.mailerlite.io/preview/5022...
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#poetry #poems #poet #poetrycommunity
#promptCombo #simplePleasures
#senryu #poem #poetry

I am not entirely sure this fits the brief, but here's Hot Drinks!
Hah! I always look forward to seeing your poems!
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Pope Leo XIV has blasted how wealthy people live in a “bubble of comfort and luxury” while the poor suffer. In his first teaching document Thursday, Leo confirms that he is in perfect lockstep with Pope Francis on matters of social injustice.
Pope Leo blasts economy that marginalizes poor while wealthy live in bubble of luxury
Pope Leo XIV has blasted how wealthy people live in a “bubble of comfort and luxury” while the poor suffer.
bit.ly
Yes - I came across it on an R4 programme the other day, though they didn't read one of the unpublished pieces. The editor/s talked about the process of deciding whether it's OK to do that with a writer's work.
*hastily adds to Birthday list
Is this the one with some previously unpublished poems in it?
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I've been keeping this quiet, but I can now share that my poem 'Arboreal' won First Prize in the Whispering Wisdom Poetry Competition! 💙
Arboreal - by Bex Hainsworth
It was my first time taking the bus to school
and the 662 was late. Half-carried into the aisle,
I was a squat shrub, crowded by a canopy
of strangers. My sapling arms reached up
for the swinging vines of the grab handles,
but I stumbled as the bus rounded a corner.
Sunlight was swallowed by anoraks, blazers.
And then I felt the elderly woman beside me
shift the soft branch of her arm around my waist.
The sequins on her mossy cardigan shimmered,
both of us undergrowth, but her roots were deep
in the floor, her walking stick like a tree stake.
She anchored us, bud and trunk. It was the safety
I’ve been searching for, all my life.
​
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Ting for the poetry mandem/gyal dem. MLE, isolated biophonies, the beat of walking and a sprinkle of the devil’s lettuce.

open.substack.com/pub/jamesmcc...
Biophony
Finding your poetic beat in the soundscape.
open.substack.com
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This week’s #poemsabout prompt is #mannequin
Due to illness my poem is short and dark from fever dreams and the news.
@thebrokenspine.co.uk @thepaulconnolly.bsky.social #poemalttext #UseAltText #poetrysociety #poetsonbluesky #poemsforpeace
Mannequins
By Dawn McLachlan

She thinks of them as mannequins
Lined up
Nameless
Cold and still
Too many to count
Beyond the rope-stitched canvas
She can see rows of them
With their hideous labels
She thinks of them as mannequins
Because to say "shroud" 
Is to drown in grief
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Very pleasant to discover on #NationalPoetryDay that I've got a poem with a recording published in Wildfire Words.City Church. I've posted the text below. The link to the WW page is in the chat. A few ecclesiastical #characters here
#poetrycommunity #poetsonbluesky #promptcombo @rfsmith.bsky.social
City Church. A poem by Paul Connolly, first published in Wildfire Words

City Church
Walled in both sides by offices, this Church's
blown candle pollens and Inti monstrance dredged
the lost me up easily, made those pledged
Nevers and Noes crassly proleptic urges

here. Strained to eastward, mumbling, a dark cassock
pipes a sudden wild deaf octave at Mary’s
indulgence, while a sallow father’s keys
shiver down a side-aisle and he unlocks

the booth that baffles spoken sins.  
                                                         This squeezed
one-storey aperture hence conjures a room
upstairs, whitewashed, where an older priest looks
at sun-glit flooded pasture, horses, and the sea.
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Welcome @joseph-nutman.bsky.social to Bluesky!

#poetsofbluesky #poetrycommunity #promptcombo #poemsabout

He's a fab poet & well worth a follow.
Hello, Bluesky! I am here for poetry, mainly - the sharing of it, reading of it (when I should be working), and connecting over it. I am fully aware that with no followers, I am currently talking to an empty room - well, there is no authenticity without absurdity, after all. Why am I still talking?
Oh Lord, now we've lost Brian Patten, one of the poets of my time at school, and an inspiration as to what poetry could be freed from English Lit. classes!
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"Happy Memories". This new small painting is based on a photograph I didn't know I had..... me walking towards Sycamore Gap- before the iconic tree there was felled.

#Northumberland #HadriansWall #NationalTrust #heritage #history #Romans
Oh - we've lost Tony Harrison - RIV (rest in verse) - remarkable poet.
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I’m thinking that before the next election, all the other political parties just get together and make a party called “Not Reform”. The tories can even join in if they like. I’m past caring.
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I had a prophetic vision last night.

On September 23rd, those people who can correctly identify traffic lights in a grid of 16 images will be taken up as part of the Great Captcha.
They peaked too early I think. The Socialist left sucks at this (uniting) - single-ish issue collaboration needed in this time, sort the rest out later: - I can't believe I'm saying this as a. feminist... but this feels like war.