Salford has been crying out for a volume of poetry based around the city and, fittingly, it's been The Sound of Salford radio station svengali and author, Simon Williams, who's put it together.
Titled Salford: We Help Our Own, the anthology features 13 poems by twelve local verse creators, some well known, some bedroom bards, all with a theme that Salford people can relate to.
There's the old and new Salford spirit, captured by EJ Beckett's Yesterdays, Sharon Louise Manhood's Memories of Childhood and Carol Robson's Adopted Salfordian. There's a Manc v Salford allegory used by JB Barrington in Red Romeo and Blue Julie, a stab at up-moderning Shakespeare he did for the BBC, plus an ode to the Busby Babes by Jimmy Tawmley (The Babes), who also weighs in with Escape With Music, re-working a chart-full of singers and songs.
Meanwhile, Noreen Bailey, more known for campaigning on behalf of disabled people and standing for MP, shows her emotional side with My Rainbow's End, as Mike Duff hits hard with The Prettiest Girl in Eccles and Mike Garry gets ultra contemporary with Spring Crossings, a sad reflection on the plight of refugees.
Of course, no true Salford poetry would be complete without an attack on the changing city, and there's plenty of that, with Scott Todd lamenting the `soulless town' and Jimmy Potts hitting planners with The Leaning Tower of Salford. Scott Todd also opens the collection with the hilarious but unprintable The Valentine's Day's Massacre. Simon Williams himself contributes The Dockers...
`Old Ordsall, Weaste and Langworthy all but gone
Councillors hang your heads in shame
What have you done?'
"There's no shortage of poets in Salford, they're coming through all the time, and if it's not poets, it's authors or new bands" says Simon "I think Salford is a hotbed of talent at the moment and everyone is doing it their own way, it's like it's gone back to the seventies punk thing.
"I did the anthology for a mate's charity, a lad called Anthony Grosvenor whose baby was born with CDH, or Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia" he explains "It's to raise money CDH UK and I thought `If I produce two hundred books and charge a fiver it's a grand for the charity isn't it?'"
Salford: We Help Our Own
A book of Manchester and Salford poems £5
Most of the unique pamphlets have sold out but there are still some available at the Dog and Partridge pub in Eccles, from Simon Williams himself, via Facebook, or email siwilliams123@outlook.com
For further details on CDH UK – click here
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