The Blackheath Poetry Society was founded on 25 March 1952. We have around 25 members, and usually meet in members' homes in London SE3 at 8pm on the second Monday of the month, every other month.
Over the years we have had talks from visiting poets, including Dannie Abse, Fleur Adcock, Leo Aylen, Alan Brownjohn, Julia Casterton, Wendy Cope, Cecil Day-Lewis, Clifford Dyment, DJ Enright, Gavin Ewart, Roy Fuller, John Heath-Stubbs, Tobias Hill, Jenny Joseph, Sarah Lawson, Laurie Lee, Christopher Logue, Blake Morrison, Peter Porter, Kathleen Raine, L.K. Robinson, Carole Satyamurti, Gaie Sebold, Jon Silkin, Stevie Smith, Matthew Sweeney and Hugo Williams.
Most of our meetings nowadays are on a given theme, agreed in advance and notified by email to everyone on our mailing list. We bring one or two poems on the theme, and read once or twice around the room. The poems can be published or unpublished, old or new. This is an opportunity for those who write poetry themselves to read their own work and get feedback.
Visitors and new members are always welcome. Membership is free. Our next meeting is on 15 September 2008 at a member's home in SE3, and the subject will be Mystery. Please contact us for further details.
Virago's latest blog is by author GILLIAN SLOVO. She writes about the inspiration for her new novel, BLACK ORCHIDS, published next month. Please come and read it.
Would that we were, my beloved, white birds on the foam of the sea! We tire of the flame of the meteor, before it can fade and flee; And the flame of the blue star of twilight, hung low on the rim of the sky, Has awakened in our hearts, my beloved, a sadness that may not die.
A weariness comes from those dreamers, dew-dabbled, the lily and rose; Ah, dream not of them, my beloved, the flame of the meteor that goes, Or the flame of the blue star that lingers hung low in the fall of the dew: For I would we were changed to white birds on the wandering foam: I and you!
I am haunted by numberless islands, and many a Danaan shore, Where Time would surely forget us, and Sorrow come near us no more; Soon far from the rose and the lily, and fret of the flames would we be, Were we only white birds, my beloved, buoyed out on the foam of the sea!
