Poetry in the New Phase

 After seven weeks now of this strange interiorised life, I continue to be poised between thinking these home-bound spring days could well be the optimum conditions for the fruitful work-life balance a writer needs and at other moments feeling adrift in a world that often seems to be rapidly crumbling into disarray as the daily tolls of coronavirus victims continue to swell across the world and the global economy sinks into catastrophic depression. At least here, in a UK whose government could hardly have handled the crisis worse, we seem to be coming to the edge of something. Although we will have to wait to see where next this already negligent and veering ship of state will take us, we know that certain forms of easing are now in place without at the same time lockdown being lifted: positive for many people whose livelihoods have been compromised yet worrying if we are contemplating sending children back to school and allowing the inroads we have made to be eroded again.
   Books and literature seem to have been a renewed source of solace and engagement for many, or in some cases a way to pass the time or evade reality that doesn't involve the internet or TV. After an initial surge, however, apparently book-sales in general are down and it is small presses that are feeling the pinch of a shrinking market and the ongoing closure of bookshops - surely some of these will re-open now with the justification that they provide an essential service to our communities? Other independent book-sellers, of course, have been doing a sterling job of remaining open to online buyers throughout the lockdown and in some cases even extending their service to personal delivery. In already straitened circumstances, you have to admire their tenacity and determination to keep that vital stream of books and words pulsing into the life-blood of our culture.
  By definition, of course, many of these small presses are poetry publishers and its incumbent upon everyone who cares about what was up until now (and hopefully will continue to be) a thriving and vibrant UK poetry scene to support them and try to buy books directly from them rather than via Amazon (and, if you weren't aware, Abebooks, sometimes perceived as a more ethical alternative to Amazon, is also owned by Bezos's vast corporate leviathan). Some interesting independent presses I wasn't previously too familiar with have caught my eye recently as I've had more time to survey what's out there than I usually do: Longbarrow from Sheffield, for example, who describe the work they publish as exploring "the intersections between landscape, history and memory" and who have several sampler-anthologies available to read as PDFs on their website; The High Window, an online journal of international poetry, reviews and translations edited by David Cooke, well worth a browse; and Contraband Books, who describe themselves as "a Modernist press" but don't otherwise give much away on their site, other than to promote their piquant range of titles. I've also been dipping into the recent Tears in the Fence 71, which has a high count of strong and distinctive poems by the likes of Gavin Selerie, Sian Thomas and the late Reuben Woolley, lamented in his editorial piece (among other fascinating mentions) by David Caddy.
  I say more time, but as this new phase of lockdown comes into being, I have the sense that it may be slipping away from me. With both myself and my partner working remotely and our small children also at home - those delightful and irrefutable little people from Porlock, less "enemies of promise" and more the termites of any sort of long-term ambition or domestic order - the huge swathes of additional writing time that seemed to open out before me at the beginning of lockdown seem to evaporate day by day and the novel I wrote such an exhilarating first chapter of in late March has hardly swelled its word-count since then. The summery balminess of Bank Holiday Friday and Saturday turned grey and blustery on Sunday and as I stare out at the gale-swept garden, listening to the surge of the buffeted trees, I'm wondering if this is the sound of reality gradually setting in.