Alan Payne
Exploring the Orinoco
The Poetry Business is delighted to announce the publication of Alan Payne's first collection, Exploring the Orinoco.
This pamphlet was a first stage winner in the 2009 Book & Pamphlet Competition, with judge Andrew Motion describing it as "an exotic and ambitious collection, in which deceptively simple structures are built to carry an impressive weight of interest and reference".
And John Lyons wrote, "With a well-crafted economy of language in this collection, Alan Payne evokes the sensuality and vibrancy of life in the Caribbean".
Alan Payne was born in the Caribbean, and has childhood memories of Grenada, Trinidad and Guyana. He arrived in England by boat in 1959. Since then he has lived mainly in the North - and feels that he is rooted in Yorkshire as well as the Caribbean, although his parents were from Essex. His wife, daughter and son all grew up in Sheffield.
For twenty years he taught in an infant school, where he shared his enthusiasm for poetry, story-telling and drama with the children. Since retiring, he has maintained contact with the school, going in to tell stories and read poetry. He is a member of The Word Train - and enjoys the process of constructive criticism, as well as the experience of reading in public and listening to other voices. He has had several poems published in The North and in Smiths Knoll.
Order a copy from The Poetry Business website or contact us directly for trade terms or review copies.
With the Thames in their hearts,
and childhood fevers in common,
my father and his dead brother
explored the Orinoco.
The boat of my father’s faith
carried them upstream
to the port of Encaramada,
past the granite domes
of Punta Curiquima.
There, on a deserted island,
they camped for the night,
sitting on the scattered husks
of turtle shells,
reading in the moonlight,
and dining. A faint stink
of rotting crocodiles
corroded the air.
During the night, a jaguar
added discord to the howling
of their dogs,
and cataracts answered
the rumbles overhead.
Once, a small black monkey,
like a widow in mourning,
returned the sweet, sceptical smile
of my father’s brother
as he glanced up
from his beloved Darwin.
With a pencil, he underlined
a few words; then disappeared
into the forest
of my father’s mind,
where their mother’s grief
(one boy saved, one lost)
left him bereft.
— Alan Payne, 'Exploring the Orinoco' (Smith/Doorstop, 2010)
The Poetry Business receives financial assistance from Arts Council England.
