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joinedupwriting
Photo, Nick Wright Photography
Exuberant
new collection joinedupwriting (pub.28 Mar, touring
Mar-Dec'19) ranges from forgotten
friendships and the idiosyncrasies of family life to the
trauma of war and contemporary global politics. These poems
explore the human experience in all its shades of light and
dark but always with McGough's signature wit, irreverence and
vivacity. This is the nation's favourite poet at his finest.
'Liverpool's
own Poet Laureate' Daily Post
Roger’s show with
LiTTLe MACHiNe features a fine selection of vintage, classic
& surprising poems set to music. It’s a gala gig
that’s making waves. New album The Likes of Us.
‘What
a night. Roger and Little Machine stormed it’ Bewdley
Festival
'one
of the best concerts we’ve ever had!' Stamford Arts Centre
‘a
terrific show’ Canterbury Festival
‘It’s
my great privilege to be the warm-up act for LiTTLe MACHiNe
- the most
brilliant music and poetry band I've seen in decades’
Carol Ann Duffy, Poet Laureate
***
I Hear America Sighing
(after Walt Whitman)
I hear America sighing, the varied complaints I hear.
Those of mechanics each one bemoaning his as he walks away
from the shutdown factory. The carpenter bewailing his
as he boards up another broken shop window. The matron
in the hospital barking hers, harking back to the days of Kennedy.
The boatmen lamenting theirs, nets full of plastic bags and bottles.
The celebrity tweeting hers about the intrusion of privacy.
The banker howling his like the ghost of a wolf on Wall street.
The shoemaker grumbling his as his son buys another pair
of adidas trainers. The belly-aching of the blame-throwers.
The keening chorus of mothers grieving for murdered sons.
Each crying what belongs to him or her and to no one else
America, I grew up with you, you my brash elder brother,
Super hero, singing in the rain from the Halls of Montezuma
to the shores of Tripoli, from the sands of Iwo Jima to
A Coney Island of the mind. Star-spangled romantic,
laconic wise-cracker, go-getter, no sooner said than done.
Now the wisdom, has it cracked, the getting, has it gone?
The stars have dimmed, no moon ahead. Oh, say!
Can you dance by the light of the rocket’s red glare?
Flags furled, insults hurled, banners waved in anger.
In Times Square the wind moans, and all around the sound
of groaning, the earth trembling as the screen fades to black.
Stop sighing America, start singing. Time to come back.
(New Statesman, 23.1.18)
***
Photo, Nick Wright Photography
... the new album
Available: ORDER
NOW
FEATURES ROGER AND LITTLE
MACHINE PERFORMING MUSICAL SETTINGS OF TWELVE OF HIS POEMS:
The Ginsberg Skeleton
Pay-back Time
Tomorrow Has Your Name on It
5 Car Family
The Late Night News
Oxygen
Crazy Bastard
All in Time to the Music
A Song Just for Me
The Care Less Cat
And So to Bed
The Likes of Us
[photo Nick
Wright]
'the highlight of the festival' Weaver
Words, Frodsham Literature Festival
Photo, Colin Clarke ARPS
'His poetry is like a supermodel who can complete a Sudoku puzzle moments before swishing down the catwalk --- easy on the eye and smart as a whip.'
Lorne Jackson, Birmingham Daily Post
Roger
McGough, ‘a trickster you
can trust’, is one of Britain’s best-loved poets for
both adults & children.
Photo, Patrick Neale
He was awarded his O.B.E. for services to
poetry in 1997 and more recently a C.B.E. He was recently
honoured with the Freedom of the City of Liverpool.
Live concert cd Lively available here.
"There you go son. Makes you smell like
Roger McGough."
© Bill Stott www.billstott.freeuk.com
His autobiography Said And Done (Century)
explores overnight fame with Lily The Pink, The Scaffold and
Yellow Submarine which he helped write for the Beatles.
'the
patron saint of poetry' Carol
Ann Duffy
‘He is a true original and more than one generation
would be much the poorer without him’ The
Times
'Liverpool's own Poet Laureate' Daily Post
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