A Chapbook Underway

If you don’t know what a chapbook is, I’ll tell you – a chapbook is a small volume of poetry, usually somewhere around 15 to 40 pages, and in a size smaller than a common paperback size. They are a handy size to fit in a pocket, and usually sell for $5 or so, or are given away at times.

I’ve been thinking about putting together my first chapbook ever since I became aware of them, but until now, have never had a theme I could decide on, that seemed suitable. Until now. Now, I have a theme, I have a title, and at the moment I have 10 poems I am happy with, and hope to have at least one or two more poems before the end of the day.

I have written about this proposed chapbook on another of my blogs, the most relevant blog for this proposed book. Here is the link for that blog post. I plan to have this small book ready to send off for possible publication by the end of the month.

I know I can have a good book launch, in Gawler, where my writing group meets every week (usually), and where two of the group members (I’m one of them), hold a monthly poetry reading. All of this fun happens at the P/A Hotel on the main road in Gawler, and we have had many happy times with poetry there.

The idea of having a theme for a poetry collection always seems like a good idea to me, as it helps to hold poems together in some way, even if, as in my proposed collection, there are different poetic forms. Some of these poems are rhyming, others not. There is one page of Senryu (a Japanese poetic form, similar to Haiku). Some of the poems are serious, others not so serious.

The theme is very personal to me, as it relates to my most pressing thing for me right at the moment, the theme is my broken right ankle, which happened at the end of September. It happened on a date I will always be able to remember, it was the day of the AFL Grand Final, and it happened after the game was finished.

I suspect I should write a poem about that … Hmm, Yes, definitely, it will be a kind of wryly amusing poem, I suspect … I’m enjoying doing my wryly amusing thing, if feels right for me, and this kind of thing goes down well when reading poems to others, a bit funny, but not too much, something to connect with people without overwhelming them.

So who would have thought a broken ankle could lead to a new poetry book? Actually it isn’t that surprising. I’m a poet, I’m having to spend lots of time just sitting around at home as I heal, and my ankle and immobility are taking up a lot of my attention.

They say ‘write what you know’ and I sure know “Broken ankle”, now! I’d appreciate any thoughts about this project! It won’t be a morbid little book, I have a bit about having a Stoic attitude in there, and I’m aiming at wry rather than wretched …