We were saddened to learn of the death of Kate B Hall on 29th November. She was a regular and welcome presence at many Dodo events over the years. Her fine poetry and ebullient warm personality will be sorely missed.
We are pleased to attach links to some of Kate’s Dodo performances, including contributions to online shows and a live event in London where she was a featured act. This performance on a warm spring afternoon marked the first of our afternoon residencies at the King and Queen pub, Foley St, W1. Until then we had put on evening shows. It was a happy occasion and Kate was in sparkling form with poems ranging from the personal to the political, just how we want to remember her. I recently reread Irises, one of Kate’s collections of haiku. It remains a pleasure to revisit this lovely book.
Regards
Patric Cunnane
PR Murry
The obit below appears on the Haikupedia site. The editors say a longer piece is forthcoming.
Kate B Hall (born Kay Brenda Stephan, June 22, 1945, Amersham, Buckinghamshire, U.K.; died November 29, 2023), retired British artist and adult education tutor. She wrote poetry, haiku, reviews, and fiction and recently completed a creative writing MA degree. She published two haikai and tanka collections, Running for Nothing (2004) and Irises (2015). Her poetry collections The Story Is (2018) and Spell for Melting Ice (2021) were published by Bad Betty Press and she was working on a collection of short stories and other haiku and poetry collections just before her death. Her works appeared in Still, Blithe Spirit, Time Haiku, Presence, and BHS members’ anthologies. Hall edited the BHS members’ anthology Root (2019). She was a member of the London Haiku Group and the British Haiku Society and served as BHS president (2016–2018). Hall resided in London.
The evening was a joyous occasion celebrating
the life, poetry and art of Ramsgate-based Emile Sercombe.
All
performers have a personal connection to Emile through his engagement with
poetry events and organisations across many venues over the years. These
include Apples and Snakes, Worthless Words, Tongue Circus, Dodo Modern Poets,
Ragged Trousered Cabaret and Landing Place. He was the host of Eats ‘n’ Beats
in Ramsgate.The event shown here was
organised by Multiverse Poets.
We recall his inspirational poetry as well as
his knack for bringing people together. Emile involved everyone with his
captivating performances and was able to connect with poets and audiences from
a diverse spectrum. This event celebrated that and provided a platform to
continue connecting with other poets and other poetry events.
The evening was hosted by Multiverse Poets.
Poets in order of appearance, introduced by
Sarah Tait.
Our dear friend Emile Sercombe died on 14th
May 2023. Here we remember his friendship, his poetry and his art. Feel free to
send us poems or comments about Emile and we will publish them as a separate
post.
I met Emile in 1980 through London listings
magazine Time Out – poets were invited to Worthless Words workshop in
Kennington. There I encountered the finest performance poet I’ve seen. A poetry
adventure began that would last over 40 years.
Worthless Words was formed by Emile and Pete
Murry, now Dodo co-organiser.We
performed as a group, touring arts and community centres and supporting Roger
McGough at a Croydon festival, in a show directed by Christine Eccles.Performers included my sister Berni, Chris
Cardale, reggae influenced Markus Jahn and 17-year old Mark Steel.
The eighties were a busy time. With Pete Murry
and other union members I founded Ragged Trousered Cabaret, which staged
benefits and shows for the labour movement. Emile performed in the first show,
for Sutton Labour Party, and many subsequent events. We took shows to
picket lines and to Snowdown Colliery during the miners’ strike. Emile also
regularly performed for Apples and Snakes, founded by our friend Mandy
Williams.
In 1984 Pete and I read at the St Ives Poetry
Festival in Cornwall, invited by local poet and artist Bob Devereux. Emile came
on our next visit. Bob and Emile immediately clicked – they were both artists
and poets, both brilliant performers with a similar world view.
Audiences were amazed by Emile’s verbal and
visual audacity, often combinedwith
home-made props. They watched spell bound as he constructed an unreliable chair
which fell apart at the poem’s end; they ached at the comic tragedy of Brian
and Terry, where an innocent night out results in a fiery finale in a pub;they sighed for the fate of a worm eaten by a
thrush. One of his potato poems used a humble spud to represent a cruise
missile which explodes terrifyingly in a dustbin; in Kohinoor, the fabled jewel
of the ages is shattered by a hammer; in Werewolf it turns out these
sartorially sensitive creatures eat architects. Of course they do!
Emile was a brilliant writer. His poems are
just as effective on the page as proved by collections Forty Best, God and His
Mates and Worm Poems.
In 1989 Pete and I started Dodo Modern Poets,
to provide a stage for new and established poets. Emile has been a regular
performer ever since, appearing often at our London residencies, including the
Poetry Cafe.
We took Dodo to Laugharne in Wales where Dylan
Thomas once lived. Emile, Berni and London-based Cornish poet Sue Johns joined
me for a gig at the Cors Hotel.The
poets performed against a backdrop of French windows on a mild October night.
Later, we joined Nick, the hotel’s owner, for drinks and a little weed. A fine
mellow evening.
During the pandemic Pete suggested starting an
online Dodo show. Emile contributed videos to many of these. Our latest show,
Virtual Dodo Eleven, features two of his poems. These include the imagined
reaction of a horrified T.S. Eliot when confronted by Tracey Emin’s bed in
Margate’s Turner Contemporary.
I last shared a stage with Emile at the
Canterbury Festival in October 2022, where Sue Johns and I staged an evening.
Emile read Brian and Terry and a poem written on the spot, celebrating the
festival. This was his party trick – writing something in the moment to read
out loud. He did the same thing at our wedding reception when Ruth and I got
married.
In 2013 Emile and his wife Berni moved to
Ramsgate. The following year Ruth and I moved to Folkestone. We became neighbours
by the sea.
Emile engaged enthusiastically with local
poets, co-organising Eats n’ Beats in Ramsgate and appearing at the Landing
Stage events at Turner Contemporary.
We last saw him at Berni and Emile’s house in
May 2023.We shared fizzy wine and cake
and passed round the Worthless Words broadsheet. We mused about those poets we
had once worked with. Where did the time go?
My beloved poet had become my beloved brother
in law. For anyone starting a new poetry adventure look no further than the
extraordinary works of Emile Sercombe.
Patric Cunnane, June 2023
Here’s the poem Emile wrote on the spot at the
Eleto Chocolate Cafe, Canterbury, 21 October 2022, during the Canterbury
Festival.
POETRY
AT ELETO
In
this late Octobre when the trees in switch colour fold
and
tempests drive leaves soaring into piles of gold
for
kids and dogs and spadgers to kick and dance in
Then
from ilke hamlets of Kentenland and een
from
oure capital do poets come to be seen
and
share their joyful words at Eleto chocolate cafe
by
Saint Thomas’s Cathedral of blessed memory
in
Caunterbury
And
especially from Mitcheham Sue Johns has comen
And
Patric Cunnane hot foot from distant Folke-stone
Frank
Crocker feted poet of Londone
and
great wordsmiths Aisha Celestino and Luigi Marchini
who
live in towne
Yes
Welcome
all poets and brilliant audience alle
To
our festivalle
But
now no silence more
Let
us beginne
HURRAH
HURRAH HURRAH!
EMILE AS
ARTIST
Thanks to Berni Cunnane for permission to
include extracts from the obituaryshe
wrote for The Guardian.
Emile was also a gifted artist and muralist
under the name Steve Lobb, working in south east London’s community arts
movement. Together With Carol Kenna he set up artists’ collective Greenwich
Mural Workshop in 1975. Public murals included The People’s River on the
Meridian estate in Greenwich, designed in consultation with tenants. Other
large scale murals included one in Floyd Road, Charlton, celebrating a
successful campaign against demolishing the street and another at Rathmore
youth centre which featured Gaudi-style mosaic benches.
In 1983 the Greater London Council asked him to
produce a Wind of Peace Mural for GLC Peace Year. The following year it
commissioned People of Greenwich Unite Against Racism for its Anti Racism Year.
The murals graduated from paint to mosaics,
including the Hitchcock mosaics at Leytonstone tube station and the Glyndon
estate mosaics in Plumstead. The workshop also made scores of banners for
unions and other community groups. It restored a banner for the International
Brigade, British Battalion, that fought in the Spanish civil war.
In 2019 Steve and Carol were involved in
creating For Walls With Tongues, an online project with a book that gathered
together some of the oral history of street murals.
Steve regularly exhibited his paintings in
Greenwich and after moving to Ramsgate in 2013 staged several exhibitions of
his paintings and constructions at the Pie Factory gallery in Margate.
A SELECTION OF EMILE’S DODOPERFORMANCES
Featured act,
full set, in Virtual Dodo Six, May 2021
Welcome to the 11th virtual show from Dodo Modern Poets. This programme
takes our tally to around 280 performances and contributions since launching in
April 2020. We thank everyone who has contributed, enjoyed and supported the
shows along the way.
While finalising this show we learned of the sad death of our dear and
beloved friend Emile Sercombe, a brilliantly gifted poet, artist,
muralist and teacher. Pete and I have known Emile since 1980. We met through
London-based poetry workshop Worthless Words, a regular event set up by Emile,
Pete and others.A separate tribute will
follow soon. Meanwhile we are delighted to include two poems by Emile in this
show and poems by Pete and I dedicated to Emile.
The latest event begins with two exceptional featured acts, Camilla
Reeve and Joseph Healy followed by open mic contributors.
Camilla is a long-standing member of the Wordshare Poets and She Voices
writing groups and enjoys performing live. Her young adults futuristic fantasy,
“The Cloud Singer”, 2016, https://palewellpress.co.uk/Books-Nature.html#Cloud-Singer, is about global
warming and she is working on its sequel. In 2016, after 30 years in IT, she
founded Palewell Press, an independent publisher focusing on books about Human
Rights and the Environment. Many of the publisher’s 60 books were written by
refugees.
Palewell Press(http://www.palewellpress.co.uk) is a founding
member of the Changing Wor(l)ds Network of cultural activist organisations
supporting anddisseminating
radically marginalised voices in literature. Together with Latefa Narriman Guemar, an Algerian-born Research
Associate at the Centre for Migration, Refugees and Belonging, Camilla hosted
‘Homeland and Exile’ – biennial panel discussions at the Poetry Café, examining
the refugee-exile experience through literature.
JOSEPH HEALY
I have been writing
poetry since I was a teenager in Dublin, hugely influenced by the literary city
where I grew up, where virtually every second person was a writer of some sort.
In 1982/83 I organised the first poetry readings by openly gay poets in Ireland
and toured the country encountering huge opposition and homophobia. The
well-known poets John Hewitt and Eddie Linden were involved. I moved to London
in 1984 and have been writing poetry since. I have been involved in my trade
union as a shop steward and also as a leftwing political activist outside the
Labour Party. As such my poetry deals with issues like Brexit and Covid but
also with the imminent destruction of the planet. Irish history and
landscape have also been a major theme in my poetry. I am a regular contributor
to Dodo readings and have been involved for a number of years. Poetry has never
been more necessary than now as an antidote to the grim unrelenting reaction of
the society driven by short-term thinking that we live in. I am also a member
of the Irish Literary Society.
Anti
Capitalist Resistance
https://anticapitalistresistance.org/
Left Unity
https://leftunity.org/
We hope you enjoy the
show and welcome your feedback.
Best wishes,
Patric Cunnane
PR Murry
DODO MODERN POETS
01303 243868
07769 7770222
SUE JOHNS
STUART LARNER
ZOLAN QUOBBLE
PR MURRY
JULIE STEVENS
MAX FISHEL
FRANK CROCKER
CHRISTINE EALES
PAUL GANDER
WENDY YOUNG
TEXT
Emile Sercombe
T.S. Eliot Goes to the Doctor
Doctor doctor
what can I do for you my man?
I don’t feel
Don’t Fret my man
I’m just the same
it’s normal
I’m the urban spaceman buddy
There is nothing new here
except your mobile
Imagine our poet just last month maybe
perhaps despite him saying there is nothing
here in Margate
hears that there’s new art down by the strand
rises from the shelter by the toilet
and wanders over to the Turner and
despite its severe yet lightweight presentation
(“A greyish Russel and Bromley shoe box darling”
he’s said to have said to Nancy Astor)
enters the gallery through the opening glasses
politely accepts a programme but avoids the lift
“a servant vehicle” and carefully ascends the
stairs
and turning takes the door that’s straight ahead
and guided by some whim or intuition enters
where amidst some precious Turners he
staggers as though stabbed
by the installation
of the artist
Tracey Emin
The bed she’d slept like a ravaged throne
tossed and twisted like some stormy sea
the coverlet puffed and rumpled
grey the sheets and stained so odorous
to take your breath away
whilst around in in array disorderly
amongst the flotsam lay diverse
scraps coloured tat and underclothes
I could go on but I could not
it was nothing? Was it not?
Yet do you know
As I left in haste and some distress
what I thought?
this abject stuff
who let it out?
Was it I that started all this mess?
February And The Poet In Margate Says There Is
Nothing Here
Février est dur
bien sur
très dur
ah oui
Rien
rien
Says:
Oft then when on my couch I lie
in restless or in vacant mood no
blooms burst on my inward eye
only migrant daffodills
cut untimely from their beds and
stuck in jars
oblige
but
this month from Thanett a-comme in reveraunce
doubty gens of ilke race and classe
from rames-gat and herne baye
and alle hamlets in betweene and outer
(to Margate where was penned wastelande)
and lay sweete flowres in a shelter
And they to Dreamland go on helter skelter
bumper cars big wheel and dipper after
grow fat on fish and chips and alcho pops
dent the cars and fight the cops
unknowing some wordsmith geezer
at the shelter might find therein
or not
a metaphor for recent slaughter
But he turns his back on Dreamland
and cant believe his eyes
sees Tim Spall pretending
to be Turner on the sand
But they the others travel on to westward cross
a hard concrete place that’s unforgiving
where no cattle at the end of day
trudge homeward slowly o’er the lea
no jocund daffs do play no tugboat with tin
trays
puffs by westminster bridge or children play
and where profit and loss and going to shops
is all the day
to see nothing no-one but talk infanticile
whilst the traffic comes and goes
sometimes fast but mostly slow
on the mobile
friends or lovers baby brothers
mothers bosses butcher baker candlemaker
soldier sailor friend or neighbour
safe from warmth or touch or smell or glance
safe from feeling
speaking into a black hole where where alls
smooth and spun
where nowt gets in and nowt gets out
PR Murry
4 EMILE
Like a suspended blade
That has to descend
The news came,
And your name cannot now be called
So that you will hear.
Instead, it will be inscribed
On the certificates, the obituaries
And the programmes.
You were a wonderful man,
A man of many aspects
Shining out through many facets
Like a diamond.
Shining out through words and paint
Onto paper canvas and walls,
Giving generously to all and for all.
And those of us left behind,
Must try to continue to create as best we can,
With your memory in our minds.
Patric Cunnane
POETRY
AT THE CORS HOTEL
For
Emile
The
poets perform-
French
windows for a stage
Reading
to a willing crew
As
waitresses pass through
October
in Laugharne
Where
Dylan Thomas lived
The
Cors Hotel a favourite place
To
savour a gentle boozy pace
A
new adventure begins
Down
from London, these upstart bards
Set
the night alight, with energy and words
Later,
round the bar, pints are sunk
Weed
passed round, job well done
Tomorrow
they can see the sights-
Tonight
they’ve set the world to rights
The
visitors to Laugharne in October 1996 were Emile Sercombe, Berni Cunnane, Sue
Johns and Patric Cunnane
Ann and Tony Pattison
Express steam train to Winchester
Written 1965
This is the engine that runs on the line
Driver and fireman to keep her on time
Guard blows his whistle and shuts the door
Open the regulator and let her roar!
Gleaming brass and shining green
Hissing steam, a sight to be seen
Pistons moving, crossheads gliding
Big ends revolving and coaches gliding
Over the points, there’s no waiting
Sixty-five and accelerating
Coal on the fire, steam up full
Running at 70 and still there’s plenty!
Eyes on the water gauge
Eyes on the oil gauge
Eyes on the air gauge
Eyes on the line!
Eyes on everything, running on time
Speeding through stations, nearing destination
Into the tunnel, smoke everywhere
Close up the window and hold your breath
Two minutes later, out into fresh air
Distant signal shows yellow
A touch on the brake
Gently we slow, and passengers wake
Cases reached for and tickets appear
Winchester City drawing near.
Station buildings can now be seen
Paintwork smart and windows clean
A little more brake and shut off steam
Quietly she enters, only seen
The perfect halt, an excellent driver
A minute for a rest, a very quick breather,
This is where we leave the train
Driver and fireman take her on again,
Guard blows his whistle, and she roars into life
The road is clear, the signal green
Hissing steam, a sight to be seen!
Yan Li
Untitled
You are a daffodil by the lake.
I am a lotus in the mud.
No matter where we grow,
Wait till we bloom.
You are a hawk in a cage.
I am a cock in a shack.
No matter where we claw,
Loud you shriek I crow.
You are a phoenix in the sky.
I am a whale in the ocean.
No matter in air or water,
We love our space.
You are a soldier in battle.
I am an inmate in jail.
No matter where we are taken,
We long to be free.
But you are no soldier. Nor I inmate.
Nor phoenix. Nor whale,
Nor hawk. Nor cock.
Nor lotus. Nor daffodil.
Just thoughts passing through.
Dumb in exile.
A lost mother-tongue.
None of us talk.
Speak. We try. With hands.
John Hurley
COLLATERAL DAMAGE
Rocked in Neptune's cradle
For her final hours
Now discarded on the beach
No mourners
friends or flowers
Just another nameless person
A lifeless broken reed
Deposited like jetsom
Fleeing terror and mans greed
Some where this little body
A mothers arms did enfold
As a dodgy ferry foundered
Caused by owners lust for gold
It is called collateral damage
This child without a stain
She’s like truth another casualty
Hope the warlords can explain
Will fighters claim a victory?
Do they care who they betray?
Why do Gods mills grind so slowly
Does he listen when they pray?
Still the refugees cross water
Knowing its dangerous and wide
And we have a compassion by pass
To bodies washed up by the tide
We all came out of Africa
Is this just a repeat?
Has our meddling there caused havoc?
Or could it be the heat?
We have learned nothing from the past
If anything wer’e
madder
Still a case of blow you Jack
Let us pull up the ladder.
Kevin Morris
How Sweet and Sad Was the Bird.
How sweet and sad was the bird I heard As I stood at my open window.
When I go To the pub to meet my friends, We will pretend That there is no end; Or at least hide for a while In the smile Produced by drink, Which makes men think That all This will last.
But I shall recollect the bird’s call As I stood at my open window And know That all That sings must pass.
