Elisabeth Shuker

From The Encyclopedia of Alternative Facts Frankenstein was the monster’s name.   There’s no such thing as climate change.   A solero is a type of hat.   The planet is not round but flat.      Six is the legal drinking age.   Women get paid an equal wage.   Elvis once sang in Take That.   The planet is not round but flat.      Achilles had a dodgy knee.   Terror comes from refugees.   Insomnia affects most cats.   The planet is not round but flat.      The president’s above the law. Russia did not start the war. It’s impossible to change a fact.   The planet is not round but flat.   Brian Bilston

Here’s a poem called ‘From The Encyclopedia of Alternative Facts’.

A group of metal and terracotta plant pots with daffodil, tulip and crocus shoots growing. Yellow and purple buds starting to grow on the crocuses.

Bulb lasagne are coming along well! 🌱🌷

In today's usage, ‘disinterested’ most often means "not biased," whereas 'uninterested' means "not interested."

When these words were first introduced it was reversed, with ‘disinterested’ originally meaning "lacking interest," and ‘uninterested’ meaning "unbiased."

A copy of Maggie O'Farrell's 'The Marriage Portrait' with a crochet bookmark and a mug of black coffee.

80 pages in & really enjoying this so far, particularly loving the non-chronological timeline and use of tenses. For a moment I was worried the FMC was going to be ✨not like other girls✨ but then I remembered it's a limited third person narrator from a child/teenage girl's perspective, so it tracks.

Went to a poetry workshop this evening - for the first time since school - and desperately wanted to take a nice aesthetic photo for the socials, but I have to accept I don't have a nice little notebook and pen... Just a notes app on my phone. How dull.

On a wooden bedside table, books piled horizontally: Einstein in Kafkaland by Ken Krimstein, Great Goddesses by Nikita Gill, Femina by Jamina Ramirez, The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O'Farrell, Poyums by Len Pennie and Shadow Reader by Imtiaz Dharker. Leaning vertically against that pile: Orbital by Samantha Harvey, The Sirens of Titan by Kurt Vonnegut and The Models Trilogy, Plays Prose Pieces Poetry and Four Films by Harauld Hughes.

Thanks to Christmas and a January birthday, I have my 2025 reading list...

Five small Christmas tree cuttings in a small, green, plastic pot, with a layer of pine needle mulch and sat on a frosty wooden table outside.

Seven pots - one medium terracotta, three small terracotta and three small metal - sat on small stones next to a garden path. In the pots, small bulb shoots are poking through frosty compost.

Small bulb shoots poking out of wet soil, with some small weeds growing around.

Time for the Christmas decorations to come down, and I've decided to have a go at growing future trees from cuttings 🤞 and while outside, I saw some spring bulbs peeking through the frost. Nice metaphors for the start of a new year. 🌲🌷

Sounds great! I have really enjoying learning how to weave - my problem now is that most people only need one bookmark, so now I need to be creative and work out what else can be woven on a bookmark shaped loom!

A copy of Jessie Burton's The Muse with a matching bookmark woven in gold, dark blue, teal and red wool.

A copy of Alberto's Lost Birthday by Diana Rosie with a matching bookmark woven in gold, dark green and red wool and a couple of Genealogy: Essential Research Methods by Helen Osborne with a matching black and gold woven bookmark.

A copy of Manda Scott's Boudica with a matching gold and black woven bookmark and a copy of The Summer Queen by Elizabeth Chadwick with a matching gold, red and dark green woven bookmark.

On the tail end of maternity pay, I decided to be thrifty with Christmas presents this year. My family each got a second hand book with a matching bookmark. I enjoyed my evening weaving sessions and I'm very pleased with the results! #bookmark #weaving #bookmarkloom #secondhandbooks

A poem, black text on a white background, that reads: The nights that I’m home late Are heartbreak. I tiptoe into your room To listen to your sleeping breaths And smile at your soft face. My favourite part of every lunch break Is when I scroll through photos taken By the people who spend the day with you While I’m away from you. Work hard To remind myself That this is okay That you are so safe That I’m not failing you.

I wrote this poem shortly after I returned to work after having my first child. Tomorrow I will go back to work after my second (and last) so here we go again... #poem #workingmum #mumguilt

Yes, definitely harrowing. I remember being struck by her almost calm determination in it all, not sure if that's quite the right way to describe it. And I think I remember a really interesting conclusion about memory? Which I find interesting in any piece of writing.

I actually read, and loved, Educated a few years ago, so maybe I'm a memoir reader after all! Thanks for the recommendations!

This looks great - thank you!

This, together Seamus Heaney's Beowulf being my favourite of the books I studied at uni, has lead me to decide I want to read more verse fiction. Deep Wheel Orcadia has been sat in my TBR pile since last Christmas, so I'll probably start there!

When I'm reading books to my children, I love how many of them are written in verse. I know that it helps them to learn language and reading, but it also just adds an extra layer to the story.

Copies of The Lion Inside and The Way Home for Wolf, written by Rachel Bright and illustrated by Jim Field, placed on a yellow blanket.

Illness and general motherhood have prevented me from delving into a particular poet this week, so perhaps fittingly I will highlight my favourite children's book series: verse written by Rachel Bright. Gentle fables with very loveable creatures and wonderful use of language. #apoetaweek

I'm not much of a memoir reader and I feel I may have ruined myself for others by starting with such a good one! What are some of your favourites?

Dandelions by Thea Lenarduzzi - best book I've read this year, and probably in my top 10 of all time!

This poem, entitled 'Needles' is presented in the form of a Christmas tree. These words form the shape of the tree: I wrote a poem in the shape of a Christmas tree but then forgot to water it and only a few days later there And these words are distributed around the base of my poem 'tree' as if they've fallen off it: were words all over the carpet

Today’s poem is called ‘Needles’.

I haven't been active anywhere other than Instagram for years, so this is the first I've heard about this proposed GCSE. My first question was how is this distinct from Geography and Biology? I found a very thorough answer in the FAQs on the OCR website - in picture - it sounds great.

Copy of Ian McMillan's To Fold The Evening Star on a table with a cup of coffee and a focaccia sandwich.

#apoetaweek continues with Ian McMillan's To Fold The Evening Star, a collection ranging from poems published in 1994 to new. I've always loved his work, so it's fun to jump in at random. I'm so used to listening to him on the radio, it's slightly odd reading his words on a page without his accent.

Almost completed black and gold woven bookmark on a loom, with a purple blanket in the background.

I tried watching some tutorials to learn how to weave different patterns, but I couldn't follow any of them, so discovery by experimentation it is! #weaving #loom #bookmarkloom

Veg plot with raised beds, most coveted in black fabric. One bed half-filled with caterpillar infested brassicas.

Third year, still mostly clueless. Most of the beds have been mulched and covered. I've taken the netting off of the brassicas in the hopes that birds will eat the caterpillars? Some romanesco heads are forming, so hopefully all is not lost? #allotment #vegpatch

Love that final line, "coaxing supper out of stony ground."

...before it gets knocked on the floor.

Optimist: the cup is half full

Pessimist: the cup is half empty

Mother: I've no idea where the cup is, but whatever's in there has gone cold.

Poem on blue background: Your labour Keeps you motionless A statue in the wind That pulls the branches Of ancient trees Out of their alignment You hold position Your feathered bones Working in the wind Your endless labour Keeps you where you are Never forward But never backwards either The effort taken Just to be idle As a painted ship Upon a raging ocean

Driving yesterday, I saw a bird flying furiously against the wind, just to stay completely still - I've never felt such kinship with a bird before. Here's a poem for you, little fella... #poetry

A copy of Amanda Gorman's Call Us What We Carry next to a cup of coffee on a black and white floral background.

Continuing #apoetaweek with @amandagorman.bsky.social's Call Us What We Carry. This collection has surprised me, because the only poem of hers I knew before reading was The Hill We Climb, and this is much more varied in style and subject than I had expected - fun surprise. #poetry

This is Not the Poem I Had Hoped to Write   This is not the poem I had hoped to write when I sat at my desk and the page was white. You see, there were other words I’d had in mind, yet this is what I leave behind.   I thought it was a poem to eradicate war; one of such power, it would heal all the sores of a world torn apart by conflict and schism. But it isn’t.   Lovers, I’d imagined, would quote from it daily, Mothers would sing it to soothe crying babies. And whole generations would be given new hope. Nope.   I had grand aspirations. Believe me, I tried. Humanity examined with lessons applied. But the right words escaped me; so often they do. Have these in lieu. Brian Bilston

Today’s poem is called ‘This is Not the Poem I Had Hoped to Write’.

There is a remarkable similarity between being 8 and a half months pregnant and putting an offer in on a house: this incredible, life-changing thing could happen today or more than a month from now. Wild.