Rehomed, Renamed
As part of the 2024 Summer School, Newcastle University's Writing Poetry MA students were poets-in-residence at the Great North Museum Hancock. Around the museum you can find poems written by the students during the Summer School.
The professional writing residency with the GNM:H encouraged new ways to engage with the museum’s collections, history, and modern cultural presence. It allowed the students to explore new perspectives to the way they approach writing.
Further information about the Writing Poetry MA can be found on the Newcastle University website.
Writing Poetry MA | Postgraduate | Newcastle University (ncl.ac.uk)
Dumb Dead Lion
O, Lion Ghost!
your eternal open-mouthed
death surprise
falls
into me
without pride.
Your frozen
roar is cut.
I hear it in mine.
Geraldine Maxwell
Context; when I first walked into the museum and looked up, it was the box with the lions that first resonated with me. His expression was so shocked and innocent, I wondered at the taxidermist’s intention.
Leg Riddles: whose legs?
Super slim, bold red,
Longer than my pied body
My name describes them.
Doctor Who creature!
If you scuttle those bent, peach
drinking straws, I’ll scream.
Louise Ordish
The Polar Bear at the Museum
In a display box, stacked high.
A Polar Bear is caught in a colder time,
nosing down to the depths of the blue plinth.
His jet eyes stare to where the ice should be.
Blunt claws grip at a dry pool of shadow.
Poised to dive, he waits while a Sockeye
Salmon leaps on a pole below, just out of
reach. His fearsome jaw is like an old toy’s,
his cockle ears turned to catch a wind.
Hard furry folds yoke his neck in mock fluidity
for his bulk sulks, dusty and dull, and the green
light of the exit sign reflects on his pelt.
Kate Boston-Williams
It's in response to The Polar Bear at the Museum, looking at it
from today's perspective of climate crisis.
