Zaffar Kunial and John Glenday @ByLeavesWeLive 23rd November 2014 Edinburgh

Looking forward to this event this evening - Zaffar Kunial and John Glenday at the Scottish Poetry Library should prove oddly complementary. Edinburgh is in fine autumnal colour with a grey sky and I fancy there'll be a ghost or two gathering later tonight...along with myself trudging up after work in Easter Road.

I recommend it! Nice combination was a p&g idea.

You can find more here http://www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/connect/events/zaffar-kunial-and-john-glenday and John Glenday blogs here http://www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/connect/blog/thursday-post-measuring-belonging-distance-and-love

Greetings from Madrid

The p&g travels continue with a visit to Madrid this month. Looking forward to browsing the "best poetry bookshop in Madrid ... Hiperión (calle Salustiano Olózaga, 14)." as recommended by Spanish poet Roger Wolfe.

Once back, there will be some news from p&g after this quiet peripatetic peregrinatory month.

You can find more about Hiperión and buy books here http://www.hiperion.com/.

Greetings from Dubai

Morning light in the hotel room; Arabic interface to Blogger -

Lots of birds and stuff to see and do in the parks and souks - even elephants.

Time is short so enjoy the pictures and p&g will return in full on mode once back in Scotland.

UAE live poetry

p&g is in Dubai for the next week seeking out some local poetry.

Get in touch if you know where we should look.

Being a poet in UAE is a respected and sometimes quite lucrative profession - remember Nabati Poet Idol (http://poetandgeek.blogspot.it/2012/02/nabati-poet-idol.html). And poetry itself is also the subject of well-funded academic research in the Emirates.

p&g has a consistent fascination in Arabic poetic forms and how some drifted into western consciousness through the Islamic kingdom of Spain - of which we have spoken a little bit before here http://poetandgeek.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/muwashshah-poetry.html. And indeed Madrid is our next destination.

Plus we note that publications of translated pre-20th century Arabic poetry in its pure forms seem to bring out the Rudyard Kipling in the translators - I guess it is the desire to emulate the elaborate structure - we are sure there is good work being done maybe into languages other than English? French or Spanish? Again we would love to hear about this.

And beyond that we are hoping to have a thoroughly good time obviously...

Launch of The Book of Ways 4th October 2014 Edinburgh, Scotland

Scottish poet, Open Mouse headwrangler and allotmenteer Colin Will's new book is released from Red Squirrel Press at the Scottish Poetry Library. And an added bonus Red Squirrel Press are also launching the Double Bill anthology (the follow-up to the much praised Split Screen).

From 3-5pm and the event is free and fabulous with lots of different readers in addition to the inimitable Colin - p&g would be there but sadly likely to be shuffling through an airport. So much nicer to be chilling with new poetry...

You can find out more here https://www.facebook.com/events/602356753209251/ or order the book here http://www.redsquirrelpress.com/

Last call for poetry for poetandgeek.com Issue 9

The big p&g issue 9 is waiting for your contribution but don't dawdle. As the deadline is 30th September and we are imminently off to hunt out some Nabati poetry in UAE.

All the fun of the fair! Haven't seen us yet? Then all will be revealed here http://www.poetandgeek.com/.

New Gerry Loose - Fault Line

You can catch the launch of Scottish poet Gerry Loose's new book Fault Line at Waterstone's in Glasgow Argyle Street at 6.30pm on Wednesday 24th September 2014. Or available online now.

Robert Macfarlane says:

"fault line is a very special piece of work. It feels as if this is a book born of a decade or more's looking and watching (surveillance). I relish the form: field-note, jotting, face-off, counter-movement. There's movement across the sequence, but no neat arc, and somehow over 100 pages there's no sense of repetition in the sense of stagnation, though of course the whole is bound and patterned by its recurrences - the white hart, the wild-flowers, the subs. Words flit and slide, 'fault' is not pure division but a kind of friction and slippage that is productive of vision as well as signalling separation and mutual harm. The atomic dark-stars of the submarines versus but also because of the glowing white deer. It's a poem - poems - of menace and mixture and anger, that finds its way into the immense complexities of contemporary 'nature', recording the beauties born of collision, while also keeping room for 'old aesthetics'. I heard shades of Buile Suibhne, hints of Mercian Hymns, though it is of course its own thing also. And there, too, were glimpses of domestic life lived on amid all this: kindling split, beans shelled, sights seen - the registration of 'enduring beauty' hard up against 'danger of death'.

Or find out more here https://www.facebook.com/events/806497846061794/.