MODRON Issue 4: Editorial

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So the Conservatives are gone, and their legacy is the wreckage of fourteen years of austerity: broken public services, food banks, anxiety, anger, rivers and seas full of sewage, shorter life expectancy. A triumphant Labour now form the government and must make dramatic changes to rebuild. But will they? Can they? The initial rejoicing among many on the left has given way to disquiet. The turnout was low, and the number of votes Labour received has fallen compared to the last two elections. The populist Reform UK, offering only simplistic answers and scapegoating, beat the Tories in over a hundred seats. Many questions, many doubts, much handwringing; things seem vaporous and volatile. No smoking please.

Here in Cymru/Wales, Plaid Cymru achieved their best ever result in a Westminster election and increased their vote across the board. In the UK, the Greens surged, winning four seats, and coming second in dozens of others. Independent candidates standing in protest at Labour’s clumsy equivocation over the ongoing massacres in Gaza won five seats, if we include Jeremy Corbyn among them, and came close to winning more.

For many, these are grounds for cautious optimism. Here at Modron, we have faith in imagination, in writing, in poetry. We take full account of the worst in order not to falsify the best. Weigh the evidence, however bleak it may be, and write anyway.

For this issue, we are very pleased to bring you new work from the vitally important and internationally renowned Australian poet, novelist, and critic John Kinsella, whose ‘Out of the Forest Killzone & Into the Corn Crop Ambush’ comes to grips with the electric fences that surround us and our more-than-human neighbours. We also have poems from Corinna Board and Amanda Rackstraw who separately follow the fence-crossing fox and find metaphors of metamorphosis. There are poems on Gaza from Abeer Ameer and Naomi Foyle. Jane Burn and Philip Gross return to our pages, alongside new poems from Madailín Burnhope, Rachael Clyne, Mari Ellis Dunning, Rhian Edwards, Elizabeth Gibson, Jayant Kashyap, Hannah Linden, JLM Morton, and Di Slaney.

We publish an opinion piece from Suzanne Iuppa, addressing the recent protest and ensuing discussion over the sponsorship of literature festivals – are alternative funding models possible? Eve Ruet reports on the potential for creative writing workshops to deepen understanding of the biodiversity crisis, Simone Mansell-Broome introduces us to an anthology published to draw attention to the pollution of the Teifi, and fellow editor, Zoë Brigley, reviews Seaglass by Kathryn Tann and Gathering: Women of Color on Nature edited by Durre Shahwar and Nasia Sarwar-Skuse.

Also, don’t forget to keep an eye open over the coming months for the ongoing #morethanhuman interviews by Glyn Edwards, who recently won the Nation.Cymru People’s Choice Award at Wales Book of the Year 2024, as well our past guest blogs if you missed them, featuring a video poem by Iestyn Tyne, a post on eco-opera, and poems from Earth Day with the Poetry School.

Finally, writing in Cymraeg will always be central to Modron, so we hand over to our Cymraeg editor, Siân Melangell Dafydd, for the last word on contributions by Gareth Evans-Jones, Meleri Davies, and Jo Heyde.

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Yn y llinellau Cymraeg yn y rhifyn hwn o Modron, mae llinyn byw o gloroffyl ag o ddŵr. Darllenwch i weld lle mae cymuned, teulu, iaith a phob tyfiant yn tyneru ei gilydd, lle mae un yn gofalu am y llall. 

“Mae lliw’r dre’ yn y lli’” yng ngherdd Jo Heyde, mae diffyg gofal am y glannau, tra bo tyndra yng ngwaith Gareth Evans-Jones wrth ystyried beth yw gofal.  Ai dofi ‘nialwch ydio yntau ei adael? Yng ngwaith y ddau, mae ôl llaw ddynol i’w gweld ar fôr a thir, a chwestiynnau’n llechu. Nid ar draethau Cymru yn unig yr ydym yn myfyrio ar effeithiau hirdymor ein heli. Trowch at gerdd Iestyn Tyne i’w glywed yn darllen ei gerdd sy’n uno bae Nefyn a thraeth Kovalam ar arfordir Kerala, India – yr un bygythiadau, yr un dymuniadau, yr un gân.

At rym afon rydym yn troi nesaf, gydag erthygl gynhwysfawr Meleri Davies am Egni Ogwen, am ymdrechion cymuned i droedio’n ofalus ar y dreftadaeth naturiol gan hefyd ofalu am eu dyfodol nhw eu hunain. Dwi’n herio unrhyw un i ddarllen yr erthygl hon heb deimlo’n uchelgeisiol a brwdfrydig dros ein tir, ein dŵr, ein pobl â’n dyfodol. “Mae hanes yn y dŵr” yn wir, ac felly mae cerdd Meleri i Ynni Ogwen yn dechrau. Mae Hanes ac mae Heddiw, ac yn erthygl a dwy gerdd Meleri, cewch falchder a hyder yn y ddau. 

Diolch am ddarllen. Mae’r gwaith sy’n cael ei gyhoeddi yma yn lais o bwys. Darllenwch, rhanwch.