Kim Moore

- United Kingdom -

Kim Moore’s first pamphlet ‘If We Could Speak Like Wolves’ was a winner in the 2012 Poetry Business Pamphlet Competition. The pamphlet went on to be shortlisted for a Michael Marks Award and the Lakeland Book of the Year. It was also named in the Independent as a 2012 Book of the Year. In 2011 Kim won an Eric Gregory Award and the Geoffrey Dearmer Prize. She won a Northern Writers AwardNorthern Writers Award in 2014 to buy time to work on her first full length collection, ‘The Art of Falling’ which will be published by Seren in April 2015. Kim was recently Poet-in-Residence at the Ilkley Literature Festival and Digital Poet in Residence at The Poetry School. She was Young Poet-in-Residence at Ilkley Literature Festival in 2012. She works part time as a peripatetic brass teacher and has recently completed her first half-marathon.

Kim Moore’s first pamphlet If We Could Speak Like Wolves was a winner in the 2012 Poetry Business Pamphlet Competition. Her first full-length collection The Art of Falling is forthcoming from Seren in April 2015. She won a prestigious Eric Gregory Award in 2011 and after she read at Ledbury Poetry Festival she was invited back as Young Poet in Residence in 2012, giving workshops and a reading. As a performer she exudes warmth, intelligence and humour.

“Kim Moore’s poetry is tough and beautiful. It is also an absolutely distinctive presence: hers is a voice that knows its own mind. Moore’s work is drily hilarious but also mysterious, disciplined but also risk-taking. Exact and exacting, she is modernizing the lyric tradition.” Fiona Sampson

Carol Ann Duffy writes about If We Could Speak Like Wolves, “These are terrifically assured poems- sensual, perceptive, entertaining – which bridge the gap between feeling and utterance with a genuine lyric gift.”

A review in the TLS states, “A number of poems in If We Could Speak Like Wolves by Kim Moore ... seem to address explicitly the strengths of this excellent and versatile poet. The Master Engraver is about a man whose night-long dedication to his craft – ‘his solitary light shining for as long as the dark / holds the city to account’ – hints at the poet’s own passionate craftsmanship, while in The Ferryman the souls of the dead make their own way across ‘as if the rules did not exist’. This is a poem that both acknowledges tradition and insists on remaking it. Although in many ways Moore’s poems are like the old path she describes in Walney Channel – ‘the spine of some forgotten animal / turning in its sleep before you come’ – it is with the imprint of a lover’s foot – ‘go barefoot / Don’t stop”’– that they come alive.”

About her new collection, The Art of Falling she writes “Poetry helps me see the funny side of things, and a poem often comes from a moment of pure exasperation, like a child stuffing a pom pom down her cornet (in The Trumpet Teacher’s Curse) It’s both awful and funny and somewhere in the gap between them is the poem. I had nearly finished the manuscript of The Art of Falling before I realised that I had a lot of poems about falling. I love that the word ‘falling’ has so many connotations in the English language, both positive and negative. I think my fascination with falling also has a lot to do with my father, who is a scaffolder and who has had two death-defying falls in his life. The best part of writing a poem is the feeling of setting off and not knowing where you will end up.” The Art of Falling is filled with particular and vividly realised places and people. In Tuesday At Wetherspoons,

All the men have comb-overs,
bellies like cakes just baked,
risen to roundness. The women tilt
on their chairs, laughter faked,

like mugs about to fall, cheekbones
sharp as sadness.

Fred A’Aguiar writes that this poem “places a woman novice with a critical eye in the middle of her apprenticeship to male oppression, except that the males are bundling and helpless and the powerful women limit themselves to serving these unworthy men in a cycle resembling one of the lower rings of Dante’s Hell.”

Kim Moore’s poetry has a quality reminiscent of old hymns, prayers and church songs. Sometimes the language is overtly religious (‘let them be plagued’, ‘a psalm for the scaffolders’, ‘a pillar of smoke’). She writes, “I’ve spent a lot of time in churches as a musician, listening to the language that is used in services. I think the thing that is interesting about Biblical language is that there is often a power imbalance inherent in it, which is maybe what attracts me to it. Like the phrase ‘Let them be plagued’ – it assumes that there is a speaker who can call a plague on somebody else (and in the Bible there is).”

Kim Moore is willing to share the “realities of the things around the act of writing poetry – submissions, acceptances, rejections, work, readings – all of these things can help or hinder your writing. I think poets are usually very private about such things, but I’m interested in what happens if you open all of this up to the open air.” In her blog she is also generous in her enthusiasm for the work of other poets. She works with young writers, facilitates writing in prisons and in a myriad other ways she acts as a champion for poetry. Her approach to talking about her poetry is open and humorous. In response to a question about product versus process she writes, “if the product was the most enjoyable thing we would only need to write one poem, but it is the process of writing that I find irresistible and all consuming, whereas the victory dance (a routine in my house) around the living room when a poem is finished only lasts a couple of minutes. Maybe ten minutes if I’m really showing off.”

In her ‘other’ life, Kim Moore works as a part time peripatetic brass teacher for Cumbria Music Service. She also conducts two brass bands, the Barrow Shipyard Junior Band and Brasstastic. She plays the trumpet in a soul band called Soul Survivors and in the South Lakes Brass Ensemble. Kim Moore’s other hobby is running.

There is no doubt that Kim Moore is a hugely impressive talent and there is considerable excitement surrounding her forthcoming collection.

More about the poet

Poetry

/ If we Could Speak Like Wolves

If I could wait for weeks for the slightest change
in you, then each day hurt you in a dozen
different ways, bite heart-shaped chunks
of flesh from your thighs to test if you flinch
or if you could be trusted to endure,

if I could rub my scent along your shins to make
you mine, if a mistake could be followed
by instant retribution and end with you
rolling over to expose the stubble and grace
of your throat, if it could be forgotten

the moment the wind changed, if my eyes
could sharpen to yellow, if we journeyed
each night for miles, taking it in turns
to lead, if we could know by smell
what we are born to, if before we met

we sent our lonely howls across the estuary
where in the fading light wader birds stiffen
and take to the air, then we could agree
a role for each of us, more complicated
than alpha, more simple than marriage.
/ Tuesday at Wetherspoons

All the men have comb-overs,
bellies like cakes just baked,
risen to roundness. The women tilt
on their chairs, laughter faked,

like mugs about to fall, cheekbones
sharp as sadness. When the men
stand together, head for the bar
like cattle, I don’t understand

why a woman reaches across, unfolds
his napkin, arranges his knife and fork
to either side of his plate. They’re all
doing it, arranging, organising, all talk

stopped until the men, oblivious,
return. My feet slide towards a man
with one hand between his thighs,
patience in his eyes, who says you can

learn to love me, ketchup
on the hand that cups my chin,
ketchup around his mouth,
now hardening on my skin.
/ Barrow To Sheffield

Even though the train is usually full of people
I don’t like, who play music obnoxiously loud
or talk into their phones and tell the whole carriage
and their mother how they’re afraid of dying
even though they’re only twenty-five,

even though the fluorescent lights
and the dark outside make my face look like
a dinner plate, even though it’s always cold
around my ankles and there’s chewing gum
stuck to the table and the guard is rude

and bashes me with his ticket box,
even though the toilet smells like nothing
will ever be clean again, even though
the voice that announces the stations
says Bancaster instead of Lancaster,

still I love the train, its sheer unstoppability,
its relentless pressing on, and the way the track
stretches its limb across the estuary
as the sheep eat greedily at the salty grass,
and thinking that if the sheep aren’t rounded up

will they stand and let the tide come in, because
that’s what sheep do, they don’t save themselves,
and knowing people have drowned out there
like the father who rang the coast guard,
who put his son on his shoulders as the water rose

past his knees and waist and chest, the coast guard
who tried to find him, but the fog came down,
and though he could hear the road, he didn’t know
which way to turn, but in a train, there are no choices,
just one direction, one decision you must stick to.

This morning the sun came up in Bolton and all
the sky was red and a man in a suit fell asleep
and dribbled on my shoulder till the trolley
came and rattled in my ear and he woke up
and shouted I’ve got to find the sword.
/ Hartley Street Spiritualist Church

The first hymn is Abba: I Believe in Angels.
No music because Jean has forgotten the tape.
We sing without, led from the front by a medium
with long red hair, who announces that a dog
is in the room, and is, at this very moment,
sitting next to the tea urn. This means someone

is ready to be healed. Another medium stands,
running coloured ribbons through her hands,
points behind and says a woman is pacing
up and down, flicking her hair and pouting,
and will anyone claim her, does anyone
have a relative who would do such a thing?

And then the psychic artist stands up, unrolls
a scroll, a picture he drew many years ago,
in anticipation of this day, a man in a flat cap
with a cigarette, a man who used to get back
from work and watch the sun go down
from his back porch and smoke and smoke,

and he says this is your Grandad isn’t it
to a woman who nods vigorously
and then he starts to draw an old lady
with short hair who he says is standing
next to me, and am I feeling warm
because this is the energy of Spirit

and do I ever feel I’m being followed
even though there’s no one there,
because this is the energy of Spirit,
and come to think of it, I think I am warm
but that might be because everybody’s
staring, and he’s whispering, over

and over, it’s your Grandma isn’t it
and I believe him, I want to think she’s there,
even though in his drawing she has permed hair
and glasses. He gives me the image
of this woman. Later on I bin it, but before
we go we sing I Believe in Angels again.
/ The Art of Falling

This is for falling which is so close to failing
or to falter or fill; as in I faltered when I heard
you were here; as in I filtered you out
of my life; as in I’ve had my fill of falling:
a fall from grace, a fall from God,
to fall in love or to fall through the gap,
snow fall, rain fall, falling stars,
the house falls into disrepair,
to fall in with the wrong crowd,
to fall out of love, to fall like Jessica
who fell down a well and watched
the bright disc of the sun and moon
slowly passing, for twins who start
so close together they must fall
apart for the rest of their lives
or be damned, to fall down a hill
like a brother, to follow like a sister,
to be a field and fall fallow, to fall pregnant,
for vertigo, the cousin of falling,
for towers and stairs and pavements
which are the agents of falling,
for the white cliff top of a bed,
for climbers and roofers and gymnasts,
for the correct way to fall,
loose-limbed and floppy,
to fall apart after death,
for ropes and fences and locks
which carry the act of falling inside,
for fall which over the ocean
means Autumn, which means leaves
like coins of different colours
dropped from the pockets of trees,
which means darker evenings,
which means walks with the dogs,
which means walking alone
and not falling apart at the sound
of your name, which God
help me, sounds like falling.
/ In That Year

And in that year my body was a pillar of smoke
and even his hands could not hold me.

And in that year my mind was an empty table
and he laid his thoughts down like dishes of plenty.

And in that year my heart was the old monument,
the folly, and no use could be found for it.

And in that year my tongue spoke the language
of insects and not even my father knew me.

And in that year I waited for the horses
but they only shifted their feet in the darkness.

And in that year I imagined a vain thing;
I believed that the world would come for me.

And in that year I gave up on all the things
I was promised and left myself to sadness.

And then that year lay down like a path
and I walked it, I walked it, I walk it.
/ The Trumpet Teacher’s Curse

A curse on the children who tap the mouthpiece
with the heel of their hand to make a popping sound,
who drop the trumpet on the floor then laugh,
a darker curse on those who fall with a trumpet
in their hands and selfishly save themselves,
a curse on the boy who dropped a pencil
on the bell of his trombone to see if it did
what I said it would, a curse on the girl
who stuffed a pompom down her cornet
and then said it was her invisible friend who did it,
a curse on the class teacher who sits at the back
of the room and does her paperwork,
a curse on the teacher who says ‘I’m rubbish at music’
in a loud enough voice for the whole class to hear,
a curse on the father who coated his daughter’s trumpet valves
with Vaseline because he thought it was the thing to do,
a curse on the boy who threw up in his baritone
as if it was his own personal bucket.
Let them be plagued with the urge to practice
every day without improvement, let them play
in concerts each weekend which involve marching
and outdoors and coldness, let their family be forced
to give up their Saturdays listening to bad music
in village halls or spend their Sundays at the bandstand,
them, one dog and the drunk who slept there the night before
taking up the one and only bench, Gods, let it rain.
/ A Psalm for the Scaffolders

who balanced like tightrope walkers,
who could run up the bracing
faster than you or I could climb
a ladder, who wore red shorts
and worked bare-chested,
who cut their safety vests in half,
a psalm for the scaffolders
and their vans, their steel
toe-capped boots, their coffee mugs,
a psalm for those who learnt
to put up a scaffold standing
on just one board, a psalm
for the scaffolder who could put
a six-inch nail in a piece of wood
with just his palm, a psalm
for those who don’t like rules
or things taking too long, who now
mustn’t go to work uncovered,
who mustn’t cut their safety vests
or climb without ladders, who must
use three boards at all times,
a psalm for the scaffolders
who fall with a harness on,
who have ten minutes to be rescued,
a psalm for the scaffolder who fell
in a clear area, a tube giving way,
that long slow fall, a psalm for him,
who fell thirty feet and survived,
a psalm for the scaffolder
who saw him fall, a psalm for those
at the top of buildings, the wind whistling
in their ears, the sky in their voices,
for those who lift and carry
and shout and swear, for those
who can recite the lengths of boards
and tubes like a song, a psalm for them,
the ones who don’t like heights
but spent their whole life hiding it,
a psalm for those who work too long,
a psalm for my father, a psalm for him.
/ My People

I come from people who swear without realising they’re swearing.
I come from scaffolders and plasterers and shoemakers and carers,
the type of carers paid pence per minute to visit an old lady’s house.
Some of my people have been inside a prison. Sometimes I tilt
towards them and see myself reflected back. If they were from
Yorkshire, which they’re not, but if they were, they would have been
the ones on the pickets shouting scab and throwing bricks at policemen.
I come from a line of women who get married twice. I come from
a line of women who bring up children and men who go to work.
If I knew who my people were, in the time before women
were allowed to work, they were probably the women who were
working anyway. If I knew who my people were before women
got the vote, they would not have cared about the vote. There are
many arguments among my people. Nobody likes everybody.
In the time of slavery my people would have had them if they
were the type of people who could afford them, which they
probably weren’t. In the time of casual racism, some of my people
would and will join in. Some of my people know everybody
who lives on their street. They are the type of people who will argue
with the teacher if their child has detention. The women
of my people are wolves and we talk to the moon in our sleep.
/ And the Soul

And the soul, if she is to know
herself, must look into the soul
Plato

And the soul, if she is to know herself
must look into the soul and find
what kind of beast is hiding.

And if it be a horse, open up the gate
and let it run. And if it be a rabbit
give it sand dunes to disappear in.

And if it be a swan, create a mirror image,
give it water. And if it be a badger
grow a sloping woodland in your heart.

And if it be a tick, let the blood flow
until it’s sated. And if it be a fish
there must be a river and a mountain.

And if it be a cat, find some people
to ignore, but if it be a wolf,
you’ll know from its restless way

of moving, if it be a wolf,
throw back your head
and let it howl.
/ Boxer

If I could make it happen backwards
so you could start again I would,
beginning with you on the floor,
the doctor in slow motion
reversing from the ring, the screams
of the crowd pulled back in their throats,
your coach, arms outstretched, retreats
to the corner as men get down from chairs
and tables, and you rise again, so tall,
standing in that stillness in the seconds
before you fell, and the other girl, the fighter,
watch her arm move around and away
from your jaw, and your mother rises
from her knees, her hands still shaking,
as the second round unravels itself
and instead of moving forward,
as your little Irish coach told you to,
you move away, back into the corner,
where he takes your mouth guard out
as gently as if you were his own.
The water flies like magic from your mouth
and back into the bottle and the first round
is in reverse, your punches unrolling
to the start of the fight, when the sound
of the bell this time will stop you dancing
as you meet in the middle, where you come
and touch gloves and whisper good luck
and you dance to your corners again,
your eyes fixed on each other as the song
you chose to walk into sings itself back
to its opening chords and your coach
unwraps your head from the headguard,
unfastens your gloves, and you’re out
of the ring, with your groin guard,
your breast protector, you’re striding
round that room full of men,
a warrior even before you went in.

Kim Moore

- United Kingdom -

Poetry

/ If we Could Speak Like Wolves

/ Tuesday at Wetherspoons

/ Barrow To Sheffield

/ Hartley Street Spiritualist Church

/ The Art of Falling

/ In That Year

/ The Trumpet Teacher’s Curse

/ A Psalm for the Scaffolders

/ My People

/ And the Soul

/ Boxer