Caroline Shaw

Continuing my series of Gloucestershire Poets, I recently had the pleasure of meeting and photographing Caroline Shaw.

Caroline writes;

"When you read a poem and you feel raw. When you read a poem and it liberates

you from yourself. When you read a poem and you have to put it down, not because

it’s bad but because you need time to savour the words and what they’re doing to you.

This is what inspired me to write poetry. I hope, by the time I die, I will have learnt a little about this extraordinary craft. I have had two pamphlets published by Yew Tree Press;

Brute Swan 2019 and Night Walking 2025. I’ve held regular poetry/coffee meet-up groups and put on poetry workshops including the Stroud Poetry Course, 2024. I have also had poems published in various anthologies and magazines. I am currently working on my first collection."

THE GLOVE

Like if I came out of the sea

like the sea was a glove

and I would feel naked

without it, you

would lift me up

by my skin

by your fingertips

tease me

toss me

in waves of your grin