Tag Archives: Circle poems

Adult Workshops, Poems

Going in Circles Again (Inverness)

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The recent post on Circle Poems reminded me of a project I did a few years ago in Inverness. The Teachers Resource includes a photograph of a circle poem carved into sandstone, and installed by the River Ness. The poem came from some circle poem workshops I led for local residents, and some of their other poems were published as postcards. For some reason I didn’t blog about them at the time, but I managed to find the files and present them here.

`Author credits

Stones

time & tide / Chrissie Meeks

clouds eyes / Merkinch Primary School

mouth ear / Heather Gregg

The stone-carving was facilitated by Mary Bourne.

Postcards

flourishes / Alison Spriggs

HARBOUR HOME MARINA / Karen Beaton

highway / Carla Ure

link chains / Anna Griffin

resounding / Chrissie Meeks

salmon / Mel Kerr

tidal seasonal / Heather Gregg

clouds shoulders / Jesse Paul

the bird drew / Cliff Lilley

wavy roof / Alasdair Williamson

This post describes the wider River Connections project those workshops were part of.

Poems, Schools

Going in Circles

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I was asked to write a Teachers Resource for this year’s National Poetry Day, on the theme of ‘Environment’. I decided to focus on Circle Poems, a form I’ve used occasionally over the years, as a way of thinking about sustainability and recycling, as well as highlighting the temporal cycles we all live within – days, weeks, years, the four seasons, the waxing and waning moon.

I’ve included some examples of my own circle poems within it, and I’ll add a couple more here.

The ‘moon’ circle was published in Quait, issue 2 (2015).

The ‘Dansette’ circle was published in the anthology Turning Toward Living (2004).

The resouce was commissioned by the Scottish Poetry Library.

You can download the Teachers Resource here.