V. Press is very very happy to head into the autumn with news of forthcoming titles and a £500 donation to The Woodland Trust.

This is our second donation to the trust since we began publishing (2013 for a single chapbook anthology, then 2015 for our first solo-authored titles).

As a small press, one of our guiding principles is to operate as fairly and sustainably as we can within our limited resources. Many of our titles are print editions, using card and paper made from trees, hence our donation to a cause that looks after trees. (We also use recycled paper for our collections and FSC accredited paper for our pamphlets).

The photo above is V. Press’s six titles for this year’s Michael Marks Pamphlets Awards at the top: Powerless Rangers by Jack McGowan, The Human Portion by Nicola Warwick, bed by Georgia Gildea, Braised in Wine by D.D. Holland, Dancing in Babylon by Elaine Baker and (m)othersongs by Sarah Doyle.

The base features two full collections out in October and November this year: Not Enough Rage (October) by Gram Joel Davies and Turn Around When Possible (November) by Martin Zarrop. Brother by Sheila Lockhart is our final pamphlet for the year (out at the end of November 2023).

More information about these titles can be found by following the links, and details of our two most recent and our three forthcoming titles can also be enjoyed below.

RECENTLY RELEASED

DANCING IN BABYLON

“Situated in the city of the apocalypse, and arranged as a play, this is a gentle and haunting sequence of poems. Within an anxiety-infused landscape of constant peril, Baker’s skillful narrator offers a counterbalance to the darkness of uncertainty. What ultimately triumphs here is the light, joy and beauty of what it is to love and be loved. These graceful, musical and emotionally resonant poems beautifully unfold their story of hope.” Vanessa Lampert

“These poems are startling in their emotional clarity. They capture the surreal disconnection of lockdown as well as celebrating what a joy it is to be together once more. They are filled with a quietly powerful sense of wonder that is both passionate and melancholy. From tango dancers to taxi cab drivers, they draw us into a world that is heart-breaking in its beauty.” 
Aoife Mannix 

Dancing in Babylon is very elegiac and very cathartic.

ISBN: 978-1-7394122-0-3

36 pages    

R.R.P. £6.50

More information, endorsements, a sample poem and ordering can be found here.

(M)OTHERSONGS

“(m)othersongs is a moving, visceral exploration of the othering nature of un-motherhood. Body-shame, medical misogyny and grief are exorcised in shape-shifting forms with veins of pain running through them, in which everything from cloud formations to sea gooseberries on a shoreline speak of the changing seasons of the human body. This is a world where ‘wooden babies’ and rag dolls are born in place of children, and the womb – a ‘special bedroom’ haunted by endometriosis, fibroids and myths of creation – is surrendered with the mantra – ‘it’s only a pocket, and one you’re not using’. Both heartbreaking and strangely transporting, these are powerful and necessary poems.”
Polly Atkin

 “(m)othersongs is one of those rare examples of a collection of poetry that is both moving in content and accomplished in form. Each poem is expertly crafted, with a skilled use of structured form alongside beautifully crafted free verse. This textured and vibrant collection does not hold back, it faces the pain of endometriosis and infertility and holds that pain up to the light as valid experience of womanhood. The poetry world is enriched by this collection, and I shall return to it.”
Wendy Pratt

(m)othersongs is very meteorological and very moonlit.

ISBN: 978-1-7398838-6-7
32 pages
RRP £6.50

More information, endorsements, a sample poem and ordering can be found here.

A poem from (m)othersongs is also being featured on the Mary Evans Picture Library here.

NOW AVAILABLE TO PRE-ORDER

NOT ENOUGH RAGE

“It’s rare for me to recognise, and feel kinship for, a lot of contemporary poetry. I recognise and feel kinship with this. Not Enough Rage is like a series of controlled explosions. Trembling houses. A burning voice. Experience dismantled and sewn back together with glowing needles and a mouth full of stars.”

Bobby Parker

“Like a Dylan Thomas of the age of mental illness, Gram Joel Davies leaps and flies through the world with dark exuberance. These are speakable poems, full of love for unlovable places and impossible people. In touch with but not tied to rap's rhymes and rhythms, this collection, for me, shifts the modern world into the painful focus of real poetry.” 
Peter Oswald

Not Enough Rage is very heady and very gutsy.

ISBN: 978-1-7398838-7-4
62 pages
R.R.P. £10.99

More information, endorsements, a sample poem and ordering can be found here.

TURN AROUND WHEN POSSIBLE

“Combining a scientific eye with a poetic sensibility (and a sharp sense of humour), Martin Zarrop’s work is thought-provoking and wry. These poems take the long view and they never shy away from difficulty, each expertly using form to amplify content. Turn Around When Possible is an enlightening, enjoyable read.”

Helen Mort

“Whether he is looking back fondly on the seemingly mundane details of a working-class childhood or exploring the vastness of interstellar space, Martin Zarrop’s poems are distinguished by their metaphysical wit, humour, and sheer accessibility. There is a mathematical precision to every poem in this collection, a focus on details, that leads inevitably and, with a minimum of fuss, to memorable insights into love, affection, the ineluctable passage of time, and humanity’s place in the universe. Turn Around When Possible is a delight from start to finish and shows Zarrop writing at the height of his very considerable powers.”
David Cooke

Turn Around When Possible is very uncertain and very quirky.

ISBN: 978-1-7398838-8-1
74 pages    
R.R.P. £10.99

More information, endorsements, a sample poem and ordering can be found here.

BROTHER

“Sheila Lockhart has created something special with this pamphlet. Brother is a poignant study of remembrance but one that manages to be almost joyful in its close observation of this lost life and the still-living world that goes on without it. It is special writing – clear, brightly configured, riven by pain, and perfectly formed.”
Niall Campbell

“These calm and clear-eyed poems are remarkable in their refusal to be afraid. Holding darkness and light in delicate balance, they move from suffering and loss into what comes afterwards and later, finding consolation in the dogged aliveness of the natural world and, no less importantly, in the patterns and shapes of language itself.  Sheila Lockhart has written a bold and beautiful book.”
Katharine Towers

The poems in Brother are a very heart-felt and very unflinching consideration of grief and healing after suicide.

ISBN: 978-1-7398838-9-8                                
36 pages
R.R.P. £6.50

More information, endorsements, a sample poem and ordering can be found here.

Launching (m)othersongs

V. Press is very very delighted to announce the publication of (m)othersongs, a chapbook/pamphlet of poems by Sarah Doyle.

 “(m)othersongs is a moving, visceral exploration of the othering nature of un-motherhood. Body-shame, medical misogyny and grief are exorcised in shape-shifting forms with veins of pain running through them, in which everything from cloud formations to sea gooseberries on a shoreline speak of the changing seasons of the human body. This is a world where ‘wooden babies’ and rag dolls are born in place of children, and the womb – a ‘special bedroom’ haunted by endometriosis, fibroids and myths of creation – is surrendered with the mantra – ‘it’s only a pocket, and one you’re not using’. Both heartbreaking and strangely transporting, these are powerful and necessary poems.”
Polly Atkin

 “(m)othersongs is one of those rare examples of a collection of poetry that is both moving in content and accomplished in form. Each poem is expertly crafted, with a skilled use of structured form alongside beautifully crafted free verse. This textured and vibrant collection does not hold back, it faces the pain of endometriosis and infertility and holds that pain up to the light as valid experience of womanhood. The poetry world is enriched by this collection, and I shall return to it.”
Wendy Pratt

(m)othersongs is very meteorological and very moonlit.

ISBN: 978-1-7398838-6-7
32 pages
RRP £6.50

 A sample poem can be enjoyed below.

BUY (M)OTHERSONGS NOW using the paypal options below. 

(m)othersongs (with p&p options)

(m)othersongs (with p&p for UK delivery) £8.25 GBP (m)othersongs (with p&p for Rest of the World delivery) £18.50 GBP

This has been the sunniest May since records began*

said the weatherman and every day my skin

absorbed the air’s hot butter; every day

through May, a barometric melt and swelter

until I was slick with sunshine. My eyes

ripened from green to gold, and freckles

swarmed my arms like fire ants. Helium

trailed in my wake, a shimmer of heat-haze

to burn out the dazzled retinas, as mercury

rose from toes to thighs to breasts. I blazed

with the fizz and pop of hydrogen,

a meteorological Midas making a yellow 

mess of everything I touched, spilling

from room to room like steam, hissing

and flexing on limbs of plasma. I was fat

with photons, my mouth a glary corona

flaring electricity wrought from a heaving

belly. Month long, I radiated, basking

in the glow of my own brilliance, alive

with convection and luminous to the core.

But May broke like an egg, the sun’s

ruined yolk puddling round my feet,

as I succumbed to clammy blue in the rains

and the hail and the thunder of June.

First published in Finished Creatures