Poetry Treasure Hunt by Sandra Horn
I wish everyone a happy, healthy and creative 2020! 2019 had its share of horrors with which we’re all too familiar, but to start the new year I’m going to concentrate on a huge December lifting-of-the-spirits for me. I signed up to Live Canon’s Poetry Treasure Hunt, which began on December 1 st and ended on 31 st , with a new clue and a new poet’s work every day and a grand finale on 31 st incorporating all the clues. Each day, an email arrived with a short biography of a poet, a link (or links) to a video of the poet or someone else reading their work, sample texts and a particular poem which contained a clue – in every case, a missing word to be identified and recorded. The range was very wide, across continents, traditions and time, from the 17 th century to now. It included 8 poets whose work I knew, or rather, some of whose work I knew: Christina Rossetti, Derek Walcott, John Betjeman, U A Fanthorpe, Robert Frost, Sylvia Plath, George Herbert, Isaac R...