John Gallas Poetry

'the greatest New Zealand poet no one has ever heard of'

(Spinoff)

Poem for July 2026

I can’t hear you ...

The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) produces over 70% of the world's cobalt, an essential mineral for lithium-ion batteries in smartphones. An estimated 40,000 children, some as young as six, work in hazardous, unregulated artisanal mines there, earning as little as $1 to $2 a day.

Go Little Harmony, dig dig dig:

I’ll give you tuppence and a whirligig:

O I’m chatting babe and I just can’t stop:

I’ll give you thruppence and a lollipop.

Sick turacos go beep beep beep.

Raffia and limba

flicker in blighted sleep.

Go Little Sammy, tote tote tote:

I’ll give you tuppence and a paper boat:

O I’m chatting mate and I’m just not done:

I’ll give you thruppence and a hot cross bun.

The train tears into an underpass.

Passengers stare

at the lighted window-glass.

                                        *

WHAT'S AFOOT?

The Maker's Top Ten

1. My 'translated version' of Carmen Bernos de Gasztold's 'Prayers from the Ark' (animal-voiced delights ... by a Nun) is to be published by SLG Oxford. Picture search for illustrations now on!

2. Won the 'Rest of the World' Chesham Literary Festival Poetry Prize with a real EnZed number. Honoured & delighted.

3. Completed judging, with Gerda Stevenson, the inaugural St Magnus Orkney Festival Poetry Competition. The pamphlet with 10 fab poems from the competition is now available 'The Air We Breathe' ISBN Number:978-1-0369-9351-1 Charity numberSC0116

4. Just finished work on 'Verhaeren50', a translation of 50 Emile Verhaeren poems: some serious Flanders realism ('The Yard' The Orchard' 'The Espaliers' 'Breadmaking' 'The Cowherd' 'The Pig' etc). Bring considered.

5. Won the Regional (Midlands) Aurora Writing Prize 2025 with a poem called 'warm weasels at Amar el Husn'. Delighted and honoured. (See my facebook page).

6. 'Te Pūrere' (The Exodus), a huge collection of EnZed expatriate poets/poems, edited by Vaughan Rapatahana and me, now published/out from Cold Hub Press NZ. Order from their website www.coldhubpress.co.nz

7. New publication: CARCANET now out: 'Billy 'Nibs' Buckshot: The Complete Works' - my (his?) 198 tankas. See above: bookshops, order from www.carcanet.co.uk, or, for great overseas postage rate, Blackwell's Books www.blackwells.co.uk

8. PNReview No.288 now out: with 'Mondo de Muzikfaristoj' ('World of Music Makers') - my translations of short musicky poems from around the world.

9. A wonderful review of 'Billy Nibs' in the introduction to 'Best NZ Poems 2024': 'Absurdly good' - buy, and read on ... find it at https://www.bestnewzealandpoems.org.nz/

10. Work in Progress: '10X10' - 10 sections of 10 poems each, with tantalising (I hope) titles like 'The Retractions of Death' 'Luminosities' 'The Persian Version' 'ffenestri' 'It's Your Sam' 'The Revolutionary War in Cuba' etc. Nearly there.

Complete Book List

Practical Anarchy (Carcanet)

Flying Carpets Over Filbert Street (Carcanet)

Grrrrr (Carcanet)

Resistance is Futile (Carcanet)

The Ballad of Robin Hood and the Deer (Agraphia Press), pictures by Clifford Harper

The Ballad of Santo Caserio (Agraphia Press), pictures by Clifford Harper

The Song Atlas (Carcanet)

Star City (Carcanet)

The Book with Twelve Tales (Carcanet)

Fucking Poets (3 vols) (Cold Hub Press NZ)

40 Lies (Carcanet) pictures by Sarah Kirby

Fresh Air & The Story of Molecule (Carcanet)

52 Euros (Carcanet)

Pacifictions (Cold Hub Press NZ)

Mad John's Walk (Five Leaves : Occasional Pamphlets) January 2017

The Little Sublime Comedy (Carcanet) 2018

17 Very Pacific Poems (Indigo Dreams) 2019

The Blood Book (Gerolstein Press)

The Gnawing Flood (Cerasus Publishing) 2021

The Extasie (Carcanet) 2021

Amado Nervo: Poems of Faith & Doubt (SLG Press, Oxford) 2021

Aotearoa/Angleland: 30+30 tankas (New Walk Editions) 2021

Petrus Borel 'Rhapsodies', translated from the French by John & Kurt Gallas (Carcanet Classics)

The High Roof of Heaven (Anglo-Saxon poems transl. JG) (SLG Press, Oxford) 2022

Where Grace Grows Ever Green (Middle English poems transl.ed JG) SLG Press, Oxford) 2022

17 Paper Resurrections (from graveyards in mid-Wales: picture-poems) (Dempsey & Windle 2022)

Drops in the Sea of Time: Poetry of Woman & God (SLG Press, Oxford 2022)

Fly Not Too High: Holy Sonnets of Gabrielle de Coignard & Vittoria Colonna (SLG 2022)

This Far Place: poems of Gabriela Mistral (SLG 2023)

Touchpapers (SLG 2023) Contemplative Poetry series No.11 (SLG 2023)

The Poems of Reinhard Sorge (SLG 2024)

Billy 'Nibs' Buckshot: The Complete Works (Carcanet) - October/.November 2024

Te Pūrere (The Exodus: an anthology of expat Aotearoa/NZ poets/poems. 2025 (Cold Hub NZ)

The Steadfast Throne of Three (SLG 2025)

Prayers out o' the Ark (to be published by SLG, 2026/7).

Contacts

John Gallas Poetry www.johngallaspoetry.co.uk

Carcanet Press www.carcanet.co.uk

Carcanet blog www.carcanetblog.blogspot.co.uk

John Gallas Facebook

Cold Hub Press (NZ) www.coldhubpress.co.nz

New Walk Editions www.newwalkmagazine.com

Five Leaves publishing/bookshop (Mad John's Walk) www.fiveleaves.co.uk

Agraphia / Clifford Harper www.agraphia.co.uk

YouTube (Paterau Sonnent / The Blobfish Sings Under the Sea)

STAND Magazine www.standmagazine.org

Indigo Dreams publishing www.indigodreams.co.uk

Spinoff (NZ) www.thespinoff.co.nz

The John Clare Project www.brookes.ac.uk/the-meeting

The Sutton Hoo Ship Build (Sponsor that Rivet) www.saxonship.org

SLG Press (Series of Contemplative Poetry) www.slgpress.co.uk

Dempsey & Windle, publishers of '17 Paper Resurrections' www.dempseyandwindle.com

                                                   *

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