Poetry and cities, in March

In these increasingly difficult times, sometimes poetry can bring us hope, or inspire us, or  express how we are feeling.

We can go looking for it, but occasionally it just comes looking for us.

1. Bristol – on the side of the Arnolfini, I first came across the poet Salena Godden and her inspiring poem ‘Pessimism is for Lightweights’.  Yesterday I happened to switch on the radio for Poetry Please (R4), and who was there with Roger McGough choosing the poems but Salena Godden.  It was a treat to hear her choices, and especially to hear her read one of her own poems and learnt that she has just published a new book of poems, called (what else!) ‘Pessimism is for lightweights’.  Definitely a book I will have to search out., and a poem for our times.

2. Leiden – earlier this month we went to Delft for a few days, somewhere we seem to have fallen in love with.  One day we visited Leiden, and I was surprised to see many poems painted onto walls.  What a delightful idea. I photographed just a few, to share with you.  (I don’t know what the last one means, nor who it is written by.  Nor I realise now, whether it is even a poem, though it looks like one.  But I particularly loved the way it is has been carefully painted to give the impression of a page and a shadow.  A double work of art.)