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Poem by Julia Casterton

Eyewear is featuring a poem by Julia Casterton, the much loved poet and creative writing tutor, who died last Saturday in London.
Julia (pictured) was born in 1952 in Nottingham where she grew up. She studied at Essex University and worked as a creative writing tutor at the City Literature Institute since 1981, at The Poetry School, and also had a twenty year association with Ambit magazine. A winner of the Poetry Business pamphlet competition in 1990, her first full collection The Doves of Finesterre (2004) won the Jerwood Aldeburgh Prize in 2004. Her books on writing include Writing Poetry: A Practical Guide (The Crowood Press, 2005) and Creative Writing: A Practical Guide (Palgrave MacMillan, 2005).

Julia was one of the most striking, electric, intriguing and engaged people I have ever met. Brilliant. Sympathetic. Critical. Funny. Kind. She was instantly compelling. I taught with her on a shared course at London Metropolitan University last year, and she also read for my Oxfam series, summer 2006. She was a fine poet. This is a great loss.


Blood Oranges

I halve and squeeze them for my breakfast,
their lovely egg and bacon red and yellow,
and see my own blood and my bone marrow
on the six glass hospital slides
like sunrises. “Oh, beautiful,”
I said to the doctor who’d take it
so gently from my hip-bone. “Yes,”
she replied. “Even more so when it’s magnified.”

We sit in the bare ward, waiting,
sunrise after sunrise waiting in my bones.

poem by Julia Casterton
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Comments

Maybelline Jones said…
simply beautiful and sad.
Fri Mar 02, 08:39:00 pm 2007
Unknown said…
That is beautiful and reminds me of a poem by Howard Miller sharing the same name

It makes you wonder!
Sat Mar 03, 09:00:00 pm 2007
Ms Baroque said…
I do have a favourite anecdote about Julia - but it's not something I want to post on here! Bit rude. Actually, a couple. Maybe not the right moment for those. But you know, the point is her love of life, her openness, her humour, her amazing sense that every day was a great adventure. Julia would do and say things no one else would do or say. She was a riot! In fact, I've just thought of another hilarious story but it's about her being sick. So maybe not a favourite.

I'm so, so, so sorry to read this news.
Tue Mar 06, 10:32:00 pm 2007
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