E Y E W E A R, THE BLOG - FREEDOM MEANS BEING UNAFRAID TO WRITE WHAT YOU THINK

Ivo, Marianopolis, 1984 Like rain, desiring, the Cocteau Twins return, bringing that cold sadness again: sweet as a bare shoulder, lost pain, an ice flavoured as your skin, which was, summertime, the toast of my tongue, trying to barely possess your black boy-cut bangs as they ran like water in mythic April showers – you and your cherry Docs, alley-dancing, your lips as untouched as the Rhodes I forfeited for high style, laughing gas; A. Alvarez mourns that no one reads I.A. Richard s anymore, but I do, and we did – shivering, music like kisses: recollection. 

Kevin Higgins , the Galway-based poet and satirist, has written a review of my 2009 collection, Mainstream Love Hotel , from Tall-lighthouse (No. 23), for The Wolf, James Byrne 's uniquely important little magazine - perhaps the most adventurous and critically febrile of all the British poetry magazines - skirting as it does the main and marginal streams, and bridging the Atlantic effortlessly.  This issue features poems by Evan P. Jones, Richard Parker, Anne Carson, James Brookes , and an interview with Alfred Corn , among other highlights.  Higgins knows me well enough to note the curious way my work explores both theology and sexology: "One sometimes gets the impression that his [Swift's] politer lyrics are a kind of trick on the reader which gives him the element of surprise when he decides to unveil the spoiled priest in a brothel (or some other such enemy of politeness and hope) he has waiting around the corner from us."  This is true, I think, and is exactly w...

My book Mainstream Love Hotel has received a review from Ellipsis . Here goes. I like their linking of Alvarez and Spiderman - nicely incongruous.

Warning: this post is about Todd Swift's recent collection, Mainstream Love Hotel . It is a self-serving notice of a very positive review in the April/May 2010 issue of London Magazine , by Leah Fritz . It is being posted in order to interest readers in the collection, in the hopes that some might seek out the book, to read it, even buy it. If this act is suspect, or even considered downright bad, consider the following: what are poets doing when they a) read their books at launches and book signings; publish their poems? What are publishers doing when they a) send books for review; market books; sell books in shops and online; enter books in competitions? The motives of authors and publishers are complex, and cannot all be boiled down to the purely virtuous act of distributing literary material freely, for the sake of education, enlightenment and entertainment. Poets, and publishers, both want a) their books to be read; and b) their books to be borrowed or sold. This may be i...

The Irish poet and writer, Niall Walsh , currently based in Hungary, has sent in his reading of Mainstream Love Hotel .  With transparency (I wrote the book) let me offer it here to those who might find it of interest: Niall Walsh reviews Mainstream Love Hotel by Todd Swift The first theme that emerged for me was one concerning water. The opening poem 'Mirror' presents us with the platonic question of reality: which is real, the shadow or the substance? Are we to believe in the paddlers in the boat, or their shadows reflected in the water? The answer comes in the final line of the poem, "the sister of knowing is making". This reflects Yeats 's resolution of the dilemma of body and soul in 'Among School Children' "how can we know the dancer from the dance?". In 'Seaway Park' the act of swimming becomes a form of delving into one's past, to retrieve the unresolved issues of our childhood. The final line of the poem "light in ...

Todd launched his new collection Mainstream Love Hotel this September. Unfortunately, he has had to cancel his remaining public events in 2009 due to illness. For those who would like to support his book, it would make a particularly festive gift this Noel, not least because it’s jolly, red and all about love. Please order a copy direct from the tall-lighthouse website. KJ

Thanks to all those who came, or wrote, or called, about last night's launch. It was a resounding success, and very moving. The Calder Bookshop on The Cut was packed, we sold almost all the books we had, and many of my dear friends, and very fine poets, were in attendance - and on a night of monsoon-like rains. I must thank especially Emily Berry , Les Robinson , and my wife, for making the night so special. The book is now on sale at the tall-lighthouse site, for those who couldn't be there. And, thank you to those who have written about my health. I have a painful but treatable condition which can usually be resolved in a few months, without surgery, and there is no current worry it is pre-cancerous (though it can go in that direction). My spirits were raised by the launch. But the weeks ahead will be a challenge. I am juggling teaching, co-editing a Carcanet anthology, finishing my PhD, and the usual writing and organising. I may well have to take it easier. I mov...

I cannot hope to compete with The Beatles , who roll out this week their video games and remastered mono tracks. How many fans got mono from the fab four fellers? Anyway, I too am rolling out my latest (sometimes music-themed) collection of love poems, and poems that love poetry (maybe too much). For those abroad, or bored, or all-aboard, they can go here to the mainstream love hotel site and order a copy. Thanks! Canadian orders will be possible soon, too. I'll suggest they do a US thing too.