Kona Macphee

In recent years there's been a fashionable rash of Saying Yes - to everything from dating requests to - well - everything. While certain junior members of my family might contend that I never say yes to anything, these days I always try to accept commissions and project invitations, unless there's some inescapably huge reason to turn them down. I do this for two reasons - the first mainly pragmatic, the second more philosophical.


On the practical front, since late 2007 I've had a Poem Of The Week blog, which cured a seemingly unshiftable case of creative block, and whose relentless weekly deadlines I must therefore, rather superstitiously, continue to meet at all costs. The very constraints of a commission - for example, the Hidden Door theme of "Impossible Journeys" - can be a paradoxically rich source of inspiration, in just the same way that a strict form (such as a sonnet or sestina) can actually help a poet to write about a difficult subject.

Finding inspiration for poems is one thing, but there's the bigger question about why we might want to get our poems out into the world in the first place. Given the impossibility of actually making a living as a poet, one thing we may still hope for is that our poetry "career" might bring us a richer and more interesting life, a life that takes us in unexpected and stimulating directions. Commissions and projects, especially new, grass-roots or multi-disciplinary ones, act as a conduit for serendipity - people to meet, ideas and happenings to encounter, coincindences, synchronicities, sparks - and serendipity, rather than a Five Year Plan, is the wellspring of most of life's best adventures.


Hidden Door has been a particularly appealing project for me because of its multi-arts approach. As an "I'm-really-a-musician-at-heart" kind of poet, I always enjoy events involving poetry and music, and as a part-time IT geek, I'm very interested in how computer animation/digital art and poetry might intersect, so the chance to plug into Edinburgh's wonderful visual arts network is very exciting. The best bit for me, though, is that thanks to Hidden Door I've managed to have my Impossible Journeys poem "Prodigal" studio-recorded by Alastair Cook, whose sublime reading voice I've adored since the first time I heard it. I hope that Hidden Door visitors will find the result as spine-tingling as I do!


Kona Macphee grew up in Australia and now lives in Scotland. Her latest collection, "Perfect Blue" (Bloodaxe Books 2010), includes a free e-Book of commentaries intended to support new readers of poetry. The remaining copies of her first collection, "Tails" (Bloodaxe Books 2004), are being sold to raise money for UNICEF. Kona writes a monthly blog column for the Scottish Poetry Library.