The Cotton Grass Appreciation Society is now available to pre-order from our newly stocked shop. The collection is officially released on the 1 August 2019 and all July orders will be despatched to ensure that your receive your copy of the day of release.
To celebrate the news we have also created some very special offers for our Maytree Folk. Take a look in side our shop for more details.
News has been released today about tour project so look out for items in the media and help spread the word by liking and sharing our socials.
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The Cotton Grass Appreciation Society – Press Release
Poets from across the country, including the Marsden born Poet Laureate, Simon Armitage, have joined together in a new society created by Marsden based publisher, Maytree Press. The Cotton Grass Appreciation Society is the title of a new poetry anthology featuring a wonderful collection of poems inspired by the South Pennine landscape, it’s towns and communities.
In his forward to the collection, poet and editor, David Coldwell poses the question as to whether The Cotton Grass Appreciation Society really does exist, which gives a hint to the playfulness of the title but also serves as an entertaining insight into the creative process and how the collection came together.
Maytree Press was formed by husband and wife team, David and Amanda Coldwell earlier this year and is already gaining a national reputation for producing beautiful poetry pamphlets featuring unique art covers.
The Cotton Grass Appreciation Society will be the publisher’s first anthology and profits from the sale of the book will go towards helping the work of Marsden Walkers are Welcome – a voluntary organisation that helps to look after and promote the sixty miles of footpaths around the village of Marsden as well as organising an annual walking festival each September.
Edited by David Coldwell and Mark Kelly and featuring poets from across the country including Simon Armitage, Sarah Watkinson, Alison Lock, Gaia Holmes, the collection serves as both a celebration of this unique area and a lament to the embattled countryside as the climate crisis continues.
Amanda says, ‘Whether you’re a poetry reader, a keen hill walker or simply looking for a unique gift as a reminder of this beautiful area, we believe there’s something for everyone in this truly wonderful collection. We’re very proud, not only to be able to bring so many amazing poets together but hopefully to be able to raise some vital funds for a local charity. Enabling people to access the countryside offers so many health and wellbeing benefits and in turn brings people to the village allowing businesses to thrive. We’re delighted as a local company to play our part.’
The Cotton Grass Appreciation Society will be available from the 1 August 2019 to order direct from the publisher’s website or from all good bookshops. The collection will be officially launched with readings from several of the featured poets during the Marsden Walking Festival in September.
The Hill Village
How long I’ve stood here looking
at this hillside, how it’s carved into blocks,
split for weavers’ cottages and pubs,
lintels and mullions, sawn into slabs,
remnant rocks made good for walls,
crushed into cobble to lay down rough tracks
Seeing how life takes on the colour of stone,
cheeks rose-ruddy, eyes soft in brown and blue,
the hard and dusty work that builds homes,
doorways rusted by nail, hammer-marked in white,
clarty with boot-muck and time’s graft,
braced for storms that lash yon windows still
How in finger-deep cracks of crumbling mortar
a shadow history is mapped in millimetres,
the etched cradles of damp yards hold stories
of all who’ve passed, a mill’s closure below,
a wildflower meadow, a birth, a rush of waters
rounding out the contours, a hill becoming a hill
M W Bewick
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