Introducing Kathleen Swan...

...poetess, mum, step-mum and nurse.  Hi Kathleen, thanks very much for taking some time out of your busy schedule to be here today.  So, tell me more...

Becoming a stepmother is a challenge, undertaking it in my twenties was perhaps lunacy but that is what I did.  I took on my husband’s four children, three girls and one boy, a large town house and a husband with a busy career.  I think I spent the first five years permanently tired and never quite seemed to finish the list of jobs in a month never mind a day.  However, there was tremendous satisfaction in being part of their lives as they grew into young adults.  But if you want to complicate the situation further have a baby of your own why don’t you!  Well that’s just what we did and of course there was no shortage of attention and people willing to wheel the baby round the park.

I had been an only child until I was nine and being part of a busy family was a new experience.  I didn’t drive so walked miles to brownies, guides, school events and when I got a bike with a baby seat on the back I found freedom.  I could fit in even more in a day!  Of course there were days when I could have given it all up and run away but I started to write down some of the frustrations and turn them into magazine pieces.  I began to look back on my upbringing and the lives of my parents during the 1950s when money was tight and we had to make do and mend.  I gained a greater understanding of myself and what I wanted to do when I finally had the time. 

Coniston from Brantwood

After the children had grown up I had a busy working life in the NHS for 26 years and looked after my parents in their later years.  However, when my husband asked me once what I was going to do with my retirement,  I answered very firmly that I was going to write and in particular I was going to write poetry.  So I started to pick up my habit of scribbling in a notebook and signed up for courses to help me understand more about how to write well.  I found that my instinct was to write about the people and places I knew best so that is what I have been doing for the last eight years.  I have gone back to my emotional roots in the Lake District and written about characters from my childhood and places which left a lasting impression on me.  I think being a step-mother taught me tolerance, perseverance, which battles to fight and how to time things to my advantage.  All valuable in writing and getting work published.

In 2019 I was selected to work with a young composer to produce a song which was performed at the  International Leeds Lieder Festival.  I firmly believe that poetry is at its best when it is performed and through belonging to Yorkshire Authors I had the opportunity to take part in The Ilkley Literature Festival last Autumn.  Having had poems published in books and magazines, I finally got round to gathering my work together and Ripples Beyond the Pool was published by Coverstory books  last summer.

about the author and the book… Kathleen was brought up in rural Cumbria and now lives in North Yorkshire.  She spent her working life in the NHS and, since her retirement, is able to concentrate on family, gardening and studying and writing poetry.   Her poetry embraces relationships with family and friends and reflects a love of rural life and characters.  It also takes us on visits to other countries and cultures.  Her poems are published on-line, in anthologies, magazines and her first collection is “Ripples Beyond the Pool.  

You can get the book on Amazon

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