Full Description
From diamonds hidden in a grandmother's pantry to a peahen's shout of ecstasy, from the voice of a deranged bridesmaid to that of a nun teaching a sex education lesson, Birdhouse is full of life - and its flip-side. It includes an award-winning sequence of elegies for the poet's grandparents and great-grandparents who were victims of the holocaust (the sequence was a Poetry Book Society Choice).
Throughout this dazzling debut, Woodford explores sex, running away from school, and the happy ever after endings of Goldilocks and Eliza Doolittle. She takes a reader from Poland to Darlington on a dizzying scenic route involving graveyards and playgrounds. Along the way she celebrates a dead pigeon, a washing line, a big bed scene and an endless pair of legs. Her poems speak directly to a reader. Intimate and compelling. Casually artful. They stir up time and place to dissolving point, honouring the material word but not taking it for what it is. Or isn't.
Woodford has received an Eric Gregory Award, an Arvon/Jerwood apprenticeship, a Hawthornden Fellowship, a major Leverhulme grant and is a previous winner of the International Poetry Business Competition. Widely published in magazines and anthologies, she has completed residencies in Alnwick Garden, Durham Cathedral and the Tyne & Wear Fire and Rescue Service. Her work has been described by Anthony Rudolf as 'tough-minded and tender-hearted'.
Contents
Birdhouse
Epithalamium
Trying
Desk
Sex Education
Relic
The Goldilocks Variable
Assembly
Journey 14/35
Two Up Two Down
The Higgins' Honeymoon
Looking Back
Guernica
Big Bed Scene
Singing in the Bath
Six Weeks
Party Piece
Taking in the Washing
Going Underground
Darling
Gran's Diary
Gran's Parting Shot
Gran's Death
Grandfather Once Removed
Bookcase
Violins
PLAQUE
Portrait of the Magenheims
Gran's Pantry
Naturalization
Extract
Memento Mori
After You
Trailer
My Legs
Staying the Night
Grounded
Fresco
Dancing Lesson
Lot 927
La Donna
Burden
In Passing
Suttee Song
Feral
The Runaway Piano
Exchange
High Chair
Travelling with Isaac
Twitching with Isaac
Engaged
Finding True Love
Condensation
Scan
Clipping
Sonograph Story
Homecoming
Arbour
Bait Shed
The Blackie Boy Roundabout
Summer Cold
The Tree
