#IBuyYourPamphlet: WEEK 4

‘Random Trail’
by Vron McIntyre

we climb / and the pain is healed

Vron McIntyre (they/she) is a queer, disabled poet, who has in their life been a peace camper, a fat liberationist and a DIY editor and publisher. They live in Nottingham and are part of the DIY Poets Collective and the Social Model Writers.

I was lucky enough to encounter Vron at an online event and having heard them read their work, I wanted to know more. This pamphlet is a rich, earthy slice of an existence that I have only ever seen in pictures or as part of other people’s narratives. It was, therefore, a fascinating and enlightening experience to read from the poet’s viewpoint.

What’s in it for Me?

The opening poem, Patterns, gives so much and resonates though me as can only happen to someone who fundamentally connects with a poet and their work on a molecular level. Whether it is domestic appliances or the risk assessments of her own mother, everything possesses just enough precision and the exact amount of compelling detail to keep me reading the poems, time and again. Here are a complex and compelling set of snapshots.

The photographic brilliance in Rollercoaster and repeat many times evoke shared experience in the most vivid means possible: you can indeed write anything you want, and when your business is DIY subversion and protest, women’s rights and protesting nuclear proliferation, those moments take on a significant and substantive historical resonance of their own. You are not simply recording your own history, but that of thousands of others who use protest as their lever.

However, it is in poems like the superlative Pareidolia (the tendency for perception to impose a meaningful interpretation on a nebulous stimulus, usually visual, so that one sees an object, pattern, or meaning where there is none) or the incisive and telling Ghosts where Vron’s true mastery and cohesion comes to the fore. These poems may again be the life of someone else, but their telling has a familiarity and accessibility which allows you to truly immerse in the moments and experience their brilliance for yourself.

Personal Favourites

Pareidolia for the imagery
Twelve Months for the inference
my life is an apple tree for the impact

Any Other Business

There are a number of pamphlets that I have which are well-read and often returned to, and Random Trail has already been added to that pile. The best poetry encourages you not just to read, but learn from each word. This is poetry steeped in history and activism, the narrative of a life lived very much in the moment. It is also a reminder of what other women have provide and fought for in order for us all to stand here with a measure of confidence.