Jonathan Davidson is the next guest on the podcast sharing poems from his latest book, A Common Place. It is a collection of Jonathan’s poetry and much more. There is a commentary, a selection of influential poems by other poets, a gazetteer with all the places mentioned in the book and footnotes – a lot of footnotes!
You can find out why Jonathan chose to publish in this unusual format on the podcast as well as hearing a few poems. He will also be offering valuable advice and inspiration from a writing career of more than 30 years.
Father
I walked with my invisible father
out into the fields on the edge
of town. But they are gone now:
new roads, new names, new people.
Dad, stay here for a while, I said,
and I’ll go and find out what
has happened to our lives. He sat
on the newly installed bench.
And when I returned, furnished
with stories of change, I found him
utterly dead, his cold eyes
on the cold world closed. So
many years he had lived here
and then this: his roads re-named,
his fields built over, his people
now coming into view as strangers.
By Jonathan Davidson, from A Commonplace (Smith|Doorstop, 2020)
Poetry Non-Stop 