CAROLINE STRONG   

DIRECTOR - WRITER - ACTOR - PRODUCER

   Beyond the Storm - WRITE OUT LOUD

   All Becomes Art - SPECULATIVE BOOKS

RUNNER UP

SAA

International Poetry Competition 2022

Sonyashnyky   

This hard soil,

scored by lines of frost,

pounded left then right,

gives up no secrets;

the fine arterial spray,

flies up and falls away.

In the barn, the old

tiller still sleeps, under

tarps and webs,  

winter rusting; where

mice, once nesting,

woke to groundbursts

of a new thunder.

Terror darts between

stubble and stalks,

burrows the deep dark

or breaks cover; the

stench of menace ahead,

the scent trace of blood,

from open wounds,

or the fresh dead.

The seasons persist,

fair and intransigent;

ninety revolutions on, air

will warm and stir, with

calls of returning migrants.

Seeds, displaced, will rise

in dizzying towers, where

wild birds can feast.

Mirrors to the sun,

humming columns

of them, facing East,

row after row

blurring the eye,

defiant daub of yellow,

under a cobalt sky.

LONGLISTED

Write Out Loud Poetry Competition 2020 

Published in Beyond the Storm

Mourning Cloaks

They have gorged themselves,

consumed their verdant willow 

home until, slow, fat and trapped

within their skins, the subtle shift

begins inside each warm cocoon.

Change, the exacting architect,

purges with painful reimaginings

of form, until the stupefied awake.

They crack and wriggle, emerging

into day, irrevocably altered, shot

through with darkness and with

light, gifted with colour and flight.

So many small deaths fluttering 

in the grass, insubstantial chimaera.

Also published in A Proof of Light

C.M. STRONG ©2020

 POETRY PUBLICATIONS

 Writing as C.M. Strong

Legacy of Love - EMMERSON PRESS

Poems for Innerpeffray

INNERPEFFRAY LIBRARY

POETRY COMPETITIONS

SHORTLISTED

Liverpool Poetry Prize 2023

                AUB ONLINE ANTHOLOGY 2021

               A Proof of Light - AMAZON

HIGHLY COMMENDED

The Joan Eardley Centenary

Poetry Competition 2021

Published in All Becomes Art

       Children Of Chalk

        Skip the chalky squares,

         heat raising the stench

         of urine, fags and beer.

         Hop and rhyme, till she

         calls you up the stair.

         Sticky haired, peachy,

         tan-skinned cherubs.

         Lean out across the sill.

         Giggle for the woman

         below, caught in your

         boxed and numbered

         imaginings: stick men,

         snakes and ladders,

         pirates and palaces.

         Your scrawls, crawl the

         walls to a crowded bed.

         A snapshot in her head

         spews out, bitter acids,

         raging onto the canvas.

         You, dart away to another

         room, under the dark stain.

         A crust and jam, a warm

         lap, chalk dust kissed away

         from grime-striped cheeks -

         that’s all the world to you.

LONGLISTED

AUB International Poetry Competition

Published in AUB Online Anthology  2021

Final Departure Before Lockdown

Cafe doors swing; a case on wheels

trundles past the furtive truants and

the high-vis workmen on a break,

the mini-skirted bride adorned with

‘L’ plates by her boisterous posse, the

bored waitress with an undisguised yawn.

Coming to a halt, discarding burdens at

a vacant seat, her escaping breaths hiss;

drawing looks of pity from the manicured

mother, with perfect child in a spotless bib.

Unexploded bomb, squeezed in a corner by

random possessions she’d grabbed in haste.

A woman, stationary between belongings,

shunted to a siding; a figure to forget, like

the irrational fear that loneliness is catching.

Behind her mask, an undetected smile is

spreading; eyes pricking as gel evaporates

from her naked palms, sharp and purifying.

Outside, passengers spill and sprawl in

a careless littering, as carriages uncouple.

Caroline has been Creative Director at MOUSEHOLE FILMS since 2016. She writes and researches for their features, shorts, online content, corporate and promotional work. She scripted documentary feature The Village on the Loch IMDb (2018) which achieved 14 wins, 3 nominations, 3 semi finalist placements and a number official selections and screenings, across 11 festivals. The film is distributed by 7Palms in the USA. She scripted their latest feature, The Bough Breaks, which recently premiered (June 2023) at the LUMA Festival, York. The majority of their output has natural history and conservation themes. Her poetry also features in a number of their short film commissions which you can view below.

2023 -  Caroline was Shortlisted for the Liverpool Poetry Prize with her poem No Words (a confused stroke patient conflates his new reality, with a battle he faced long ago, on the beach at Dunkirk). The competition was judged by celebrated Liverpool poet Brian Patten and organised by The Brain Charity, who support people coping with the challenges of neurodiversity.

2022 - Caroline was Runner Up in the SAA International Poetry Competition 2022, with her poem Sonyashnyky, inspired by the war in Ukraine and two further poems No Words and Calandra's Song were Longlisted in the same competition (the SAA provide a wonderful service for soldiers, veterans and their families).

2021 - Caroline was Highly Commended for her poem Children of Chalk, in the Joan Eardley Centenary Poetry Competition 2021 for Paisley Museum and Art Gallery. It was also chosen to feature in the new collection of writing from Speculative Books, celebrating the artist's life and work. All Becomes Art was launched in March 2022 and is edited by Sam Small and Colin Herd.

2021 - Caroline was Longlisted for her poem Final Departure Before Lockdown in the AUB International Poetry Prize, judged by Glyn Maxwell which now features online in the AUB Digital Anthology, launched on 7th October 2021 for National Poetry Day. Her recorded reading is above.

2021 - Caroline's poem, Just Animals, inspired by the work of the animal welfare charity OneKind, was published in the beautiful new coffee table book, Legacy of Love, Emmerson Press. The book, created by Lynne Chitty and Gary Hodges, has already raised nearly £60,000 for over 50 animal charities world wide. It was launched at The Nature in Art Gallery and Museum in September 2021, where Caroline read it to an invited audience. The foreword is by Virginia McKenna OBE, with many other well known animal advocates contributing, including: Joanna Lumley OBE, Pen Farthing, Jenny Seagrove, Nigel Marven, Martin Shaw, Dame Maureen Lipman, Peter Egan and Will Travers OBE. 

2021 - Mousehole Films were commissioned to make a short film for Scotland's oldest lending library. Caroline wrote The Walk to Innerpeffray, to create the poetic narrative to this haunting short film, below. It has also been published in Poems for Innerpeffray 2021 . This lovely collection of poetry is inspired by the Library of Innerpeffray and is available from their online shop.

2020 - Caroline collaborated with singer songwriter Gavin Alexander, writing the lyrics for Mari's Lullaby, she also directed the music video, below.

2020 - Caroline was Longlisted in the Write Out Loud Poetry Competition 2020 for her poem Mourning Cloaks, which was judged by Andrew McMillan. It is now featured in the national anthology Beyond the Storm and published in support of the NHS. The poems explore a world in Lockdown.

2020 - Her first collection of poetry was published with Amazon. A Proof of Light is sold in support of Scottish animal welfare charity OneKind, available at their online shop and the Mousehole Films Store. More details below.

 A Proof of Light 

Collected Seasons

Caroline's first collection moves through time and locations, with the seasons as a backdrop, threading the poems together. Our need for a more restorative relationship with the natural world is a recurring theme, along with explorations of loss, grief and isolation. The earliest poems were written in the 1980s and the most recent emerged in the shadow of Covid 19.

The front cover photography is by Gabriel Strong and the landscape and wildlife photography complementing the colour version of the collection, is the work of both Gabriel Strong and Danny Strong, with their kind permission. A beautiful collaboration of words and images, inspired by the Scottish Highlands. A Proof of Light is available on KINDLE and in paperback from Amazon in two versions. Black & White and Colour editions, A sample of its 5 Star Amazon Reviews -

'This is a beautiful collection of inspiring, thought provoking poetry. The addition of the stunning photography of Scottish wildlife is an added bonus. A real pleasure to own this during our time if uncertainty.'

'What a lovely collection of poems so beautifully written and such a joy to read.'

All editions are sold in support of the Scottish animal welfare charity OneKind available to purchase at their online shop and also the MOUSEHOLE store. The collection also features the long-listed poem Mourning Cloaks, chosen for the new national anthology Beyond the Storm, judged by Andrew McMillan and available to buy from Write Out Loud - a beautiful poetic chronicle of lives in lock-down, sold in support of the NHS. Below is an extract from a review by Pat Edwards -


'I am not here to judge these poems again, rather to delight in them and admire the way so many of them voice what we are all feeling. Once things start to return to relative normal it would be all too easy to forget, not the sacrifices of key workers or the loss of loved ones, but the more mundane disturbances and inconveniences we have endured. This anthology stands as a fine record of our social history and is testimony to the power of poetry.'  - Pat Edwards - London Grip.