Hippocrates Prize win!

 

I’m honoured and delighted to have been awarded first place in the prestigious Hippocrates International Prize for Poetry in Medicine.

My poem The Cancer Garden will be published in their 2025 anthology. Further details here when I know more…

 

Biography

Marc Woodward’s writing reflects his surroundings in the rural West Country, often with a dark undercurrent - and a degree of wry humour. 

He has been widely published in journals, anthologies and online, and currently presents the Marco Radio Show, a weekly hour of poetry and music, broadcast by Sandcastle Radio, an internet radio station based in Pensacola, Florida. 

He was writer-in-residence at The Wellstone Center in Santa Cruz, CA. in 2018, shortlisted for the 2018 Bridport Prize, won the 2019 Teignmouth Poetry Festival ‘Keats Footsteps Prize’, and was commended for the 2020 Acumen Poetry Prize, the 2020 Aesthetica Creative Writing Award, and the 2025 Indigo Dreams Competition.

He is a 2022 Pushcart nominee. 

He is the winner of the 2025 International Hippocrates Prize for Poetry in Medicine.

His collections include A Fright of Jays (Maquette Press 2015),  

Hide Songs (Green Bottle Press 2018), 

The Tin Lodes written in collaboration with Andy Brown (Indigo Dreams 2020), 

Shaking The Persimmon Tree (Sea Crow Press 2022), 

and Grace Notes, a second collaboration with Andy Brown, also published by USA based publisher Sea Crow Press, in 2023.

He is currently finalising a new collection scheduled for publication in 2026.

In addition to writing he is also an accomplished musician who has recorded, performed, and taught internationally. His album Bluemando is available on ITunes and Spotify. 

Aside from his artistic activities he has also worked in finance and even presented much of the third series of Homes Under The Hammer for the BBC!

He was recently diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease and this is touched upon in a number of his newer poems. 

Reviews:

Beautifully crafted poems...that sing in the dark of darkness

Canto Magazine;

...stories of moonlight and wildlife in the strange small wildernesses of the south west.

In its strongest passages the relationship with the landscape is both brutal and beautiful - hints of the sublime and the realistic one finds in Jack Clemo or Ted Hughes.

Ink, Sweat and Tears.

[Woodward]...achieves a level of observational exactitude, empathy, and at times, quite frankly, psychological menace, which many would fail to muster in a full-length collection.

Sabotage Reviews

In his new collection ‘Hide Songs’, Marc Woodward is the factotum of a gruff, stubbled country of hedgerows, pubs and disrepair. He avoids twee landscapes or bucolic destitution for a mud-and-gravel, wing-and-wind patchwork. 

In poems populated by rescued animals and women, silky transformations, hangovers, fishermen and pub gigs, as well as fifty different ways of describing the changing skies of the West Country, there is always a notable quality of craft present, too. Nothing is wasted on a fancy phrase, when a telling detail will do. Like John Burnside’s poetry, Woodward writes gently and concentratedly about things vanishing and uncertain,

The Blue Nib 

Of ‘The Tin Lodes’

This is a very fine collection, a closely observed and well-researched piece of work that succeeds in operating on several different levels at once. The collaboration is seamless and a testament to the way these two writers have worked so well together on this project. Fully recommended.

Quill & Parchment

Of ‘Shaking The Persimmon Tree’

In these searching, songful poems, Marc Woodward reflects on the ricketiness of life; of the body, and on the certainty of earthworms.   His imagery elevates the natural world to its rightful place; birds, sky and trees glimmer like new-found things­, while his pragmatism puts on its boots, picks up its keys and looks you straight in the eye. 

 Helen Ivory

As well as a poet, Woodward is an accomplished musician. His poetry is correspondingly neat, practised, highly lyrical. The poems are singing, in a predominantly minor key, but they are a joy to listen to. 

Andrew Geary, Acumen Literary Journal 9/22

Easter Egg Hunt / The Forgetting

I was pleased to have this poem published in the Spring ‘25 edition of online journal The High Window.

Although it’s true title should be Easter Egg Hunt I submitted it under the title of The Forgetting as I wanted to make sure readers unfamiliar with my work received a big enough clue as to what it’s about - specifically early onset dementia in Parkinson’s. A serious and sad matter which I’ve deliberately countered with a cheery and light tone. 

A reader asked me ‘why Moses?’. In truth it’s a name I’ve come across several times in our West Country farming community and it just felt suitable - but it probably implies a religious meaning which is unintended. 

And yes, I have a fluffy Buff Orpington - just one now since Mr Fox’s last visit…

THE FORGETTING

Moses lifted the hatch, let out the hens.
The fluffy Buff Orpingtons bustled down
after him, haphazardly scampering.
Moses sang softly, some old soul ballad
unknown to poultry or those under fifty.
Later he’d muck out the chicken house,
scoop up and barrow their shitty hay
before shaking out fresh, making the nests
a warm and cosseting place to lay.
Accountancy eluded him, his old trade,
rules and rates playing hide and seek.
Sometimes mid-sentence he’d number away,
free range. Mostly he chose not to speak,
as if he’d been born with an allowance,
whittled back now to a settled account.
No longer bound by paper clip chains
to software updates and late returns,
he wandered the garden’s perimeters
checking for weak spots, faults in the fence.
He wore jeans, t-shirts, slip on shoes,
nothing with buttons, all of it blue.
On sunny days he might lie on the ground,
lost to the sky’s hovering vacancy
while the two big hens clucked around.
It wasn’t so bad. Neighbours believed
the fowl seemed ‘…fond of him, genuinely.’
Could it have been the birds’ morning feed
occurring more often than scheduled?
This Easter weekend Moses spent gently
trembling about in the wildflower margins,
worrying the hens had started to lay
somewhere away from their nesting boxes.
While he leaned, head bowed in dandelions,
prodding a cane at the end of the plot,
‘…his poor wife’ went quietly up to the run
to come back with three days’ cold eggs
cradled inside the crook of her arm.

The Bluejay’s Dividend

Several years ago I was staying in a cabin on Cape Cod working on poems that were eventually published in Hide Songs. While there I went running in the woods and became quite lost, ending up down by the Atlantic shoreline. The idea for this poem began to formulate but wasn’t completed until recently. 

As it is a metrical,  rhyming poem I thought it would be fun to create some music to go with it - and here is the result.

 

Some snaps from my readings in Florida for the ‘Radio Is Not Dead’ celebration

 

Reading in Florida!

I currently present a weekly poetry and music radio show which is broadcast by Sandcastle Radio based in Pensacola, Florida. www.sandcastleradio.com 

They’re having a mini festival called Radio Is Not Dead (RIND) the first weekend in February and I’m flying over from the UK to do my show live, playing music and reading some poetry. I’ll be joined by two local poets, Mary Gutierrez and Debra Stogner who will chat with me about their work and read a few poems. 

This takes place in the Gordon Community Arts Centre, 306 N De Villiers St, Pensacola, FL 32501 on Saturday, the 3rd of February between 1pm and 3 pm. Free entry. 

I’m also doing a reading in the Open Books Bookstore at 1040 N. Guillemard St., Pensacola, on Tuesday 6th February at 5pm. Free entry. 

So if you happen to be near North West Florida - or know anyone who is - come along and say hello!

The Dusts

 I was pleased to see this poem published as Front Page Feature at the Open Arts Forum recently. 

I wonder if dusty libraries are becoming a thing of the past? I know my son scoffed at my requirement for more book shelves  when we moved house recently. “Why do you need all those books? You can get everything online digitally” he remarked. I’m not sure about that myself. One of my favourite books is an old natural history guide with information bordering on mythological - not so much fact as animal rumour!

Burning Barrels

The 5th November, Bonfire night (or Guy Fawkes night as we used to call it when I was a kid),  came and went last week with a return to usual pre-Covid activities - including the resumption of the ancient Burning Barrels tradition in Ottery St Mary. 

Filmmaker Danny Cooke created this beautiful short film for which I wrote this poem. It was good to see it selected by Dave Bonta for his Moving Poems website:

https://movingpoems.com/poet/marc-woodward/

September gigs

September is here, season of mellow fruitfulness etc. Season of gigs too it seems.

Wednesday 6th September 7.30pm,  I’ll be reading from Grace Notes and playing music with Andy Brown and The Hot Club of Stonehouse at Ashburton Arts Centre.

Friday 22nd September 7.30pm, Andy Brown and I are delighted to be reading from Grace Notes and playing songs at the prestigious Budleigh Literary Festival. Google for ticket info. (£10 I believe). 

Thursday 28th September 8.00pm I’ll be performing for The Word Cafe at the Barrelhouse in Totnes. 

Please come and say hello! 

The Great Estate Festival

Looking forward to performing a solo show at the fabulous Great Estate Festival in Cornwall

Upcoming readings and gigs

Spring is here and with it a return to performing. 

I’m very much looking forward to getting out, reading some work and meeting a few people, so if you can make it along to any of these, it would be lovely to see you.

More information on individual events can usually be found on the web or you can message me for details.

March 23rd, 7.30pm - Andy Brown and I will be launching our new collaboration Grace Notes at Plymouth Proprietary Library.

March 31st to April 2nd - I’ll be hosting and MCing at Teignmouth Poetry Festival.

April 23rd to 29th - writing residency in Brittany, France.

May 3rd, Exeter University - final details tbc

May 8th, 8pm - Andy Brown and I will be launching our new collaboration Grace Notes at Poets and Pints, The Barrelhouse, Totnes.

May 13th 7pm - musical gig at The BK Lounge, Budleigh Salterton.

June 2nd 2.30pm - The Great Estate Festival, Scorrier, Cornwall.

June 24th - running an all day workshop for Moor Poets with Professor Andy Brown. 

July 7th - The Quaker Meeting House, Exeter 

August 12th - Book launch at The Wild Goose, Combeinteignhead

September 6th 8pm - Ashburton Arts Centre, poetry & music with Andy Brown 

Sept. 22nd 7.30pm - Budleigh Literary Festival,  poetry & music with Andy Brown

https://budlitfest.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Bud-Lit-Fest-programme-July-2023-1.pdf

NEW BOOK! Grace Notes and Other Poems

 I’m really delighted to have a new collection published this month (February 2023) by Sea Crow Press.

This is my second collaboration with Andy Brown, well-known poet and professor of creative writing at Exeter university, who, like me, is also a musician.

Grace Notes is a collection of music related poems and draws on our musical experiences and influences - from artists we love and gigs we’ve enjoyed to more philosophical considerations of the nature and role of music in human life.

The wonderful cover painting is by Jenn Zed.

Now available from all good book shops, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstones and as an e-book.

"From the intimacy of a pub singalong or an epiphany in a guitar shop, to virtuosic frenzy or the majesty of a symphony, Grace Notes is endlessly inventive, clever and heartfelt. What I love about this book is that it’s so friendly and inviting you hardly notice it playing your heartstrings or lighting up your brain like a mixing desk, and before you know it you’re part of its score. Touched and ruined by genius or calloused from a punishing practice regimen, its players are hard-bitten, ecstatic and singular. But like music, it’s for everyone: study and intuition; you can just tap your foot, or you can dedicate your whole mind and soul to it.”  - LUKE KENNARD