Tuesday poem: 'severe weather warnings' by Vivienne Plumb

severe weather warnings

always come just as you have something nice planned/
thunderstorms a house-sized slip heavy rain causing localised
areas of surface flooding the grounds and soil will be sodden nil
visibility chains essential care required snow and black ice plus
low avalanche hazard/ the sheep were loaded into a cargo net and
flown out by helicopter/ the Desert Road is closed/ showers have
left the Rimutakas slippery and icy/ there will be a cold snap a
disturbed westerly flow a sudden southerly change gusts and gales/
we like our weather in New Zealand gives us something to talk
about flooding on the West Coast and Aucklanders are likely to
get drenched later today


This prose poem is in honour of the weather over the weekend, which was pretty awful and made early autumn feel like the depths of winter. I love this poem - as someone or other once said on The Simpsons, it's funny cos it's true. Like many New Zealanders, I find myself rather obsessed with the weather, despite my intentions of being a more interesting person than that.

This poem is from The Cheese and Onion Sandwich and other New Zealand Icons: Prose Poems, by Vivienne Plumb. Vivienne herself will soon be joining us Wellingtonians again - she is going to be this year's New Zealand Randall Cottage fellow from the middle of the year, where she will work on a new novel.

You can check out all the other Tuesday Poems via the hub blog: http://tuesdaypoem.blogspot.co.nz/

(Very late) Tuesday and Christmas poem: 'Pōhutukawa' by Vivienne Plumb

Vivienne Plumb has just been announced as one of the two Randell Cottage fellows for next year (she's the NZ one in the second half of the year, Florence Cadier is the French one in the first half of the year). She plans to use the time to research and write a novel with political themes set in Wellington. I'm very proud to have published her most recent book, The Cheese and Onion Sandwich and other New Zealand Icons: Prose Poems, from which 'Pōhutukawa' comes, in October.

I chose this because it's a very Christmas poem, a very New Zealand Christmas. Red pōhutukawa threads on the ground, hot asphalt, asparagus, fractures.

And look, I have 10 minutes left of Tuesday!

Check out other Tuesday (and some Christmassy) poems over at the Tuesday Poem blog: http://tuesdaypoem.blogspot.com/

Tuesday poem: 'bach cds' by Vivienne Plumb

Vivienne Plumb: With a New Zealand mother and an Australian father, Vivienne Plumb has one foot on either side of the ditch. One of literature’s all-rounders, as well as six previous collections of poetry, she has written plays, short fiction and a novel. She has been the recipient of several awards, including the Buddle Findlay Sargeson Fellowship, the Hubert Church Prose Award, and the Bruce Mason Playwrighting Award.

This poem is from a book I've just published (!!!!) (as Seraph Press): The Cheese and Onion Sandwich and other New Zealand Icons: Prose Poems. This book grew out of a series of prose poems that Vivienne was writing, mainly about iconic New Zealand things. Some of these poems made their way to the middle section of Crumple, which I published last year, but I felt these New Zealand icon poems deserved a book of their own.


In these poems, which are often hilarious and frequently have a tug of fond nostalgia, I find a New Zealand I recognise. One filled with our national cuisine (represented by such things as whitebait, crockpots and muttonbird), with sheds, dogs, tramping, birds, sly-grogging, The Warehouse, inter-island ferries, inter-city buses, motels, gambling and bad weather.

Because summer is on the way (I even got sunburnt yesterday!), I chose this poem from the collection. When I first came across it, I thought it was Bach CDs (as in Johann Sebastian), but very quickly realised my mistake. We never had a family bach, but I've stayed in other peoples, and they are so often filled with the stuff you almost discard, but not quite.

There are a few more sample poems from the book that you can download on the Seraph Press site: http://www.seraphpress.co.nz/cheese-and-onion.html.

And, for even more poetry, check out the other Tuesday Poems: http://tuesdaypoem.blogspot.com/

Tuesday Poem: The Cheese and Onion Sandwich, by Vivienne Plumb

I've been working a lot in the last week or so on the next book I/Seraph Press am/is going to publish. It's by Vivienne Plumb, and now has a title The Cheese and Onion Sandwich and other New Zealand Icons: Prose Poems. As you might expect, it includes the above poem, but that version of it is actually from Crumple, where it is also included.

I'm really looking forward to getting The Cheese and Onion Sandwich out into the world, and hope to do it while the world cup is still on. There's a lot of representing ourselves to the world going on, and what I love about the prose poems Vivienne has written is that they represent New Zealand to me in a way I understand. As you might expect from her, if you know her work, they're pretty tongue in cheek, they gently and fondly skewer, and they're hilarious.

There's lots more Tuesday Poems via the Tuesday Poem blog. Go check them out!

Forthcoming Seraph Press books: New Zealand Icons by Vivienne Plumb, and The Comforter by Helen Lehndorf

Seraph Press is basically just me, and over on the Seraph Press site I've just announced the two books it/I is/am going to publish in 2011: New Zealand Icons: Prose Poems by Vivienne Plumb, and The Comforter by Helen Lehndorf. You can read more about them over there: http://www.seraphpress.co.nz/1/post/2011/06/forthcoming-books-in-2011-poetry-by-vivienne-plumb-and-helen-lehndorf.html.

Tuesday Poem: 'severe weather warning' by Vivienne Plumb (and interview)

Vivienne Plumb was interviewed on the Radio New Zealand National Arts on Sunday show, by Lynn Freeman. It begins with Vivienne reading 'severe weather warnings', from Crumple, so that's my Tuesday Poem today. You can listen to it here: http://podcast.radionz.co.nz/art/art-20110206-1448-Vivienne_Plumb-048.mp3.

Vivienne Plumb, with a New Zealand mother and Australian father, has spent much of her life crossing the Tasman. She is one of literature’s all-rounders; as well as six previous collections of poetry, she has written and published plays, short fiction and a novel.

Vivienne has held many awards and residencies, including the Hubert Church Award for a first book of fiction, which she won for her collection The Wife Who Spoke Japanese in Her Sleep (1993), the Buddle Findlay Sargeson Fellowship and the University of Iowa International Writing Programme.

Not one to sit still, she is currently dividing her time between Auckland and Sydney, where she is completing a doctorate in creative arts.

Vivienne Plumb interviewed on Radio New Zealand

As I've just blogged over on my shiny new Seraph Press site (which suddenly seems to have grown 'like' and 'tweet' buttons that I'm not entirely certain I like) Vivienne Plumb is going to be interviewed by Lynn Freeman on the Arts on Sunday show this Sunday (at 2.30 pm). More details on the Seraph Press site: http://www.seraphpress.co.nz/1/post/2011/02/vivienne-plumb-talks-about-crumple-on-national-radio.html (go on, humour me and have a look - I've just managed to get Google Analytics to work on the site, finally, so every visit will make me happy.)

I'm really excited about this interview, and the fact that I have been involved in organising three upcoming Seraph Press-related readings - I'm feeling like maybe I'm not such a totally useless publicist after all.

More details about the readings will follow, but the first one up, which is the most finalised, is Helen Cubed (me, Helen Heath and Helen Lehndorf) at the March Ballroom Poetry Cafe in Wellington.

Tuesday poem: 'Forty-League Boots', by Vivienne Plumb

Forty-League Boots

Everything about the day feels massive –
at the beginning I am careful to make sure
I am wearing my forty-league boots.

At Bidwell Street the plaster Madonna
stands on the mantelpiece and rattles
whenever a visitor shuts the bedroom door.
She lies at rest in her wooden casket.

Such a strange late afternoon light
during our pre-funeral picnic.
We drink with parched gusto
and laugh so hard that
the winking knives and forks laugh with us.

My dusty boots are leaden feet
on the plaid picnic blanket.
Above the city in shivering paspalum
and talking trees
the invisible ones are with us,
kissing our foreheads.
The vaporous fog draws in closer
off the tongue-shaped hills.
The words are pearls in our hands,
running, running away through our fingers.

Best not to endure life
in the shallows, better to dive deep –
a pure white sheet, a kiss between
the thighs, and cachinnations not sighs.


By Vivienne Plumb

I'm afraid there's been a bit of a dearth of Tuesday poems from me lately, though today there is not just this one, but I'm also the editor of the Tuesday Poem hub blog today, and you'll find another poem selected by me over there - that one is 'Hunt the slipper: a romantic divertissement' by Jo Thorpe, which is from the recently published JAAM 28.

Here, I've chosen 'Forty-League Boots' this week to celebrate all the busyness that has been keeping me from such things as Tuesday poeming (and almost, I sometimes feel, from breathing): publishing stuff - both JAAM and Crumple recently.

I'm still buzzing from the two launches we had for Crumple: one in Wellington - my home turf, and Vivienne's home for years and years; and in Auckland, which is where Vivienne is living now. The Wellington launch was in my neighbourhood - at the Aro Valley Community Centre hall, just down the hill from where I live (possibly I can see it from my lounge window, but its too dark to check), and only about 25 steps from where Vivienne lived for a couple of years. It was a perfect venue: cosy and welcoming - there were even couches - with large windows and doors and a playground next door for the many younger launch attendees. It was great having our friends and family around. It was a great pity that Kate Camp couldn't make it at the last minute, but I read her launch speech in her stead.

Because Vivienne is living in Auckland now, and has so many important people there, we decided to have a second launch. This one was at The Women's Bookshop, which was so appropriate as they are really supportive of independent publishers, they're Viv's new local bookshop, and she and Carole, the manager of the shop, go a long way back to when they were both acting in Wellington. Crumple was launched with aplomb by Janet Charman. I was blown away by the support everyone gave Vivienne and the book, and how many poets turned up. I had such a wonderful time meeting people I'd communicated with in various ways over the years, meeting other people I knew only by reputation, and getting to see some of the friends I have in Auckland. It was also a good opportunity to introduce myself and Seraph Press. I realised that I have always had really great experiences at poetry events in Auckland – though admittedly not have that many, but three out of three isn't bad.

Back to 'Forty-League Boots' though, it's my favourite poem in a book full of favourite poems. It's the final poem in the collection, and seems to me to be really key. It's also a poem that never fails to make me emotional. There is a lot of travelling around and rootlessness in Crumple - a lot of homelessness. In 'Forty-League Boots' home is in people, both here and gone. But the bit of the poem I love the most, which always gets me, is the final stanza - it's a call to life and really living. When I first read this poem, I typed up the final stanza and sent it to several of my friends (also with the explanation that cacachinnations means laughter, more or less) because it touched me so deeply.

After you've checked out my other Tuesday poem selection over at the Tuesday Poem blog, you can have a look at the many other Tuesday poems in the sidebar on the left.

Auckland launch for Crumple, by Vivienne Plumb

You are invited to come along and help us celebrate the launch of Crumple, Vivienne Plumb's latest collection of poetry, and Seraph Press's latest publication.

6 pm, Wednesday 24 November 2010
The Women's Bookshop
105 Ponsonby Road
Ponsonby
Auckland

Crumple will be launched by Janet Charman. Copies will be available for purchase at $25. All welcome.

For more info about Crumple, visit: http://homepages.paradise.net.nz/seraphpress/publications/crumple.html

If you can't make it, but still want to buy a copy, email me at seraphpress@paradise.net.nz, or visit The Women's Bookshop online: http://www.womensbookshop.co.nz/books/Crumple/047317717X.html

We're also launching Crumple in Wellington: http://wingedink.blogspot.com/2010/11/wellington-launch-for-crumple-by.html

Wellington launch for Crumple, by Vivienne Plumb

You are invited to come along and help us celebrate the launch of Crumple, Vivienne Plumb's latest collection of poetry, and Seraph Press's latest publication.

3.30 pm, Saturday 20th November 2010
Aro Valley Community Centre
48 Aro Street
Aro Valley
Wellington

Crumple will be launched by Kate Camp. Copies will be available for purchase at $25 (cash or cheque only). All welcome.

For more info about Crumple, visit: http://homepages.paradise.net.nz/seraphpress/publications/crumple.html

If you can't make it, but still want to buy a copy, email me at seraphpress@paradise.net.nz, or visit The Women's Bookshop online: http://www.womensbookshop.co.nz/books/Crumple/047317717X.html

This launch is in our home patch - I proudly live in The Valley, and Vivienne used to live virtually next door to the park and community centre.

We're also launching Crumple in Auckland, where Vivienne mostly lives now: http://wingedink.blogspot.com/2010/11/auckland-launch-for-crumple-by-vivienne.html

Tuesday Poem: 'Rural Delivery' by Vivienne Plumb

Rural Delivery

You are back in that country
you claim you would love to vacate,
and I feel like the stoic, white cottage
with its vacant windows, the one I noticed
from the car.

Our telecommunication connections
are frequently bad –
sibilance and echoes, white noise –
I hear sentences that may not be true,
the sound waves crash against my ears,
a distant subaudible shore.

I am that vast red corrugated-iron
roof we saw for sale outside Whanganui,
mute and inanimate;
although an appalling longing to see your face
has forced my thoughts to pack their own bags
and even as I speak,
they are filling out a destination card
and boarding a flight to meet you.

I am that green rural delivery box
on the grassy verge of a farm near Sanson,
a lop-sided patient receptacle
waiting for notification of our next contact.


I'm posting this poem – which features in Crumple, which I am about to publish – in celebration of the fact that I've just finished the final touches. I hope.

I have so many favourite poems in this book, and this is one of them. I'm going to use an extract from it on the back cover: 'an appalling longing to see your face/has forced my thoughts to pack their own bags/and even as I speak,/they are filling out a destination card/and boarding a flight to meet you', because it highlights some of the themes of the book - rootlessness, longing, travel - and also because I found it such an arresting image. It's so concrete - describing a feeling by describing an action.

Here's the rest of my back-cover blurb, which I agonised over last weekend:

In Crumple Vivienne Plumb takes us on a series of journeys, both geographic and metaphoric.

These poems have itchy feet, wandering from Poland, to China, through Italy, Australia and home to New Zealand. But is New Zealand home, or where in New Zealand is home? We roam up and down the country, we get lost in Kiwi icons which swing between hyper-real familiarity and unsettling surrealism, we find ourselves again and again on a long-distance bus.

Our constant travelling companions are Plumb’s sharp observation, her quirky sense of humour, and her skill of skewering both the ridiculous and the miraculous in the everyday.

‘Best not to endure life / in the shallows, better to dive deep –’; Crumple is, in the end, a celebration of life and living.


Vivienne Plumb, with a New Zealand mother and Australian father, has spent much of her life crossing the Tasman.

One of literature’s all-rounders, as well as six previous collections of poetry, she has written plays, short fiction and a novel.

Plumb has held many awards and residencies, including the Hubert Church Award for a first book of fiction, the Buddle Findlay Sargeson Fellowship and a University of Iowa International Writing Programme residency.

Not one to sit still, she is currently dividing her time between Auckland and Sydney, where she is completing a doctorate in creative arts.

For more Tuesday Poems, check out the Tuesday Poem blog: http://tuesdaypoem.blogspot.com/

In which I finally announce Seraph Press’s next publication: Crumple, by Vivienne Plumb

I haven’t been meaning to be so coy about announcing this, but I’ve just been so busy. Alongside JAAM 28, I’ve also been working on Crumple for several months.

I’m really excited about this book. Of course I get really excited about all the books I publish, because I only publish books I love. And also I’m a big fan of Vivienne’s work. But this book also has come along at a time when the theme/story of it – at least in my interpretation of it – was exactly where I was at at the time.

I’ve been agonising this weekend over writing a blurb for Crumple, trying to make it evocative, without being an English-101 interpretation of the collection. But basically, for me, this book is a journey between ‘crumple is a word / I refuse to acknowledge’ ('crumple') to ‘Best not to endure life / in the shallows, better to dive deep –’, ('Forty-League Boots'); a journey which takes us all around the world – to Poland, China, Australia, Italy, and then back home to New Zealand. But is New Zealand home, or where in New Zealand is home? There is never a sense of settling, we roam up and down the country, we get lost in Kiwi icons which turn surreal, almost nightmarish. But no, there is a sense of settling, in the end. Home isn’t any one place, it is people, and it is life, and actually, it’s also people we’ve loved who are no longer alive.

Crumple is a serious book, but it wouldn’t be Vivienne Plumb’s if it wasn’t also frequently very funny. Her humour is quirky, deadpan, sharp. She has a way of skewering the ridiculous in the everyday, but also the beautiful and miraculous in the everyday.

This is the cover, or, at least, it is the cover as it is at the moment. I’m forever making teeny little adjustments to it, but it’s almost there I think. The image is a photograph I took (and only slightly photoshopped for emphasis) of the hearts on the fence in Vivian Street, Wellington, where the service station used to be. It’s been an ugly, fenced wasteland for a while now, but every time I walk past it and see the hearts on the fence, it makes me smile. The hearts were made by OutdoorKnit guerrilla knitters. I love them. I feel that by making beautiful things like this they’re giving everyone a big hug. There is so much ugliness, sometimes especially in cities, and it’s wonderful to make something colourful and beautiful. These hearts, and also the ‘It will all be OK/You are doing ok’ message on Buckle Street, were a source of comfort for me during Sean’s health ‘thing’ this winter (and they were right - it's all clear now). I felt that what they were saying in wool form has resonance with what Vivienne was doing in poetic words.

If you don't know Vivienne's work, there is a lot to catch up on. She's published six previous books of poetry - ranging from full-length collections: Salamanca and Nefarious, to various smaller volumes and one mini (Doppleganger, with Adam Wiedemann). I published Scarab: a poetic documentary, a hand-bound chap book which traced the illness and death of her son from cancer, back in 2005. (I have a small number of copies left if you want one - let me know.) She has also published a collection of short stories, a novel (Secret City) and a novella, and has written and published several plays. Phew! You can read more about her here, should you wish to continue to be amazed: http://www.bookcouncil.org.nz/writers/plumbviv.html.

We’re going to be launching Crumple in Wellington on Saturday 20th November (afternoon) and in Auckland on Wednesday 24th November (evening), so if you’re in or near either of those places I hope you’ll be able to come and celebrate with us. More details about that soon.

And it’s not long now, so best I finish up everything with this book and get it to the printers as soon as possible!