From the editor's desk
Though I often feel like a whole bundle of different people,
and I still use the royal "we" when I talk about the firm, Flarestack these days is just me, my pc, my amazing Epson AcuLaser C900 colour printer, my long-arm stapler, a shedful of paper and card and the lessons my mate Jane taught me when she invented Flarestack & Obsessed With Pipework.
In a good year (and most years are good years) we bring out 4 magazines and 8 pamphlets - basic, handfinished,but I hope stylish - of the best poetry we can find.
Fortunately I enjoy the kitchen-table aspect of the job (and there's something satisfyingly zen-in-the-art-of-archery-like about stapling with just the right mix of attention and absentmindedness to not crunge the staples sideways - and you must have the unpicking knife ready like an umbrella to keep it from raining) as much as the editor's desk part.
I get a buzz when a poet says how pleased s/he is with the look of shis book, but the biggest buzz is opening an envelope or an email from someone I've never heard of and discovering amazing poems that let me see the world through the eyes and mind of another unique human being and knowing I can share this with you.
People have blown my own trumpet for me:
my first book-length poetry collection
THE FEATHER-LIST EXTRACTS
(edited by David Hart)
was published in 2005 by Five Seasons Press.
You can read reviews here
by Sam Smith, Roz Goddard, and Bob Mee.