David Bingham’s debut poetry collection The Chatter of Crows was published by Offa’s Press in October 2014 and in 2017 he was the winner of the British Haiku Society International Haibun Prize.

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His poetry appears regularly in a wide variety of magazines, including Blithe Spirit, Time Haiku and Presence and in anthologies, including Common Source, AWPS, 2000; Birmingham University Literature Anthology, 2003; Earthworks, AWPS, 2004; the Wenlock Poetry Festival anthologies for 2012, 2014, 2015 and 2016; Beyond Words, 2018;  and where silence becomes song, the 2019 International Haiku Conference Anthology.

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At different times, he was editor of both Borderlines and Blithe Spirit magazines and joint editor of Ripening Cherries, an anthology of haiku, tanka and haibun  published by Offa’s Press, 2019.

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He has read his work in arts centres, pubs, theatres, on local radio and poetry and literature festivals. His most recent readings have been at City Voices in Wolverhampton, Country Voices in Shropshire and as a member of Green Wood Haiku at the BHS International Haiku Conference in St Albans in June 2019.

 

As part of the humorous poetry double act Bingham and Woodall, he has performed at the Wolverhampton Lit Fest and Comedy Festivals in 2017 and 2018, and at the Ironbridge Festival in 2019.

 

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Two Poems by David Bingham: 

 

Sleight of Mind 

 

Some people need to know how he pulls the shining light bulbs from his mouth, levitates above the stage or escapes from a straightjacket.

 

Me, I like the mystery of it; the explanations are always so mundane. True magic lies in the imagination. Switching off the rational mind. Letting yourself go and trusting the conjuror.

 

I do it with words. Like how I brought you here. Even if you asked me, I couldn’t tell you how it’s done.

 

snowdrops …

mistaking ‘what is’

for ‘what isn’t’

 

(Winner of the British Haiku Society International Ken and Noragh Jones Haibun Award, 2017)

 

 

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The Old Woman, the Arthritic Dog and the Cock Pheasant

 

An old woman

walks through the countryside

with her arthritic dog.

 

She moves slowly,

leaning on a stick;

 

but stops frequently

to let him catch up.

 

They round a corner

and see a cock pheasant

close to the path.

 

It is spring

and a blackbird sings.

 

The sky darkens

and rain begins to fall.

 

There is nothing more

or less than this

 

and so I do not seek to explain it

or to give it meaning.

 

It is spring,

it is raining

 

and there:

an old woman,

an arthritic dog

and a cock pheasant.

 

 

(from The Chatter of Crows  Offa’s Press, 2014)