Don’t Worry, Be Yappy. By Bethany Watson-Wilkes.
Applying for uni at 23 years old, aware that friends had crossed the stile five years previously and now wore lanyards and were getting endorsed on LinkedIn by people they didn’t even know – was an unexpected new chapter in my life. I had told a barista on my way to my first day at Northumbria that I was starting a degree at 23, and she countered with, “Oh, that’s quite late, isn’t it?”
I had always doted on words, from jotting down poem fragments on drinks order pads as a spa lifeguard on the sunrise shift to imagining short stories based on a quirky mannerism picked up over the phone at 111 from a patient in a farmhouse in Wiltshire. Through every page turn of my life book thus far, poetry and creative writing have always been the spine.
You hear of societies and extracurriculars to boost your CV before you get to university, but I could never have contemplated something like this. This opportunity, pulsing in my email inbox, to intern for The Butcher’s Dog poetry magazine. As a locally sourced human to the North East, I was already aware of the mag’s presence in our enchanting city of Newcastle upon Tyne, but I wasn’t aware of just how far that dog lead could stretch.
I’ve spent 10 weeks in the doghouse, and I never want to leave. Alongside Nadia, our other lovely BD intern from Northumbria Uni, we have had our hands on everything Butcher’s Dog from the tail up.
Jo made it clear from the off that she wanted us to gain something from our time on the internship, skills and experiences we can take into our no-so-far-away professional futures; and she dideth not lieth. We’ve created social media assets and shot content for the magazine all across Newcastle and beyond, where onlookers scrunched their faces at the pipe cleaner that was my body trying to catch the sunlight right at Central Arcade. We’ve created Instagram reels, Twitter videos, and Youtube graphics from scratch to show the mag is just as good moving as it is standing still. We’ve tried printing, packaging, and pencil editioning by hand. We’ve travelled to Tynemouth market, made big decisions over bigger cups of coffee, and even got to unbox mags hot off the press!! (Always wanted to say that). We made upcoming event teasers, ate Malteasers, and watched Issue 17 grow and glow from the editing and selection process all the way up to its fully-formed, colourfully angular glory. The launch of the issue brought with it one of my favourite experiences BD gifted to my summer; the Issue 17 launch party…
As much as Zoom brings back memories of lockdowns gone before us, this was the first time since the pandemic I’ve clicked “join with computer audio” with a smile. I was greeted by the gorgeous faces of the names that had spent their summer in my 11oz cotton tote bag, and it felt like meeting old friends. Poets read beautifully, readers listened intently, and everyone vibrated with the same energy and love for the magazine I had already felt through social media, but to feel it (almost) in person solidified why it’s so important that independent magazines like BD exist.
Speaking of love for BD, I have to show off my favourite of all favs, Issue 10. Unlike other forms of creative writing, poetry does not need to be justified by a happy ending, and this issue unremorsefully sings of uncertain and darker times without a night light or promise of anything more. I’m always drawn to poetry that is full in its feeling, even if that feeling is sad or horrifying.
The poem I have read and reread endlessly is ‘What Thought Did’ by Martin Malone. Martin immediately snares the reader’s attention by begging us to wonder what thought did do simply from the title. The poem has 14 lines, each evoking a feeling of separation or stretching, one entity from another. ‘Undivides black from its star // dissolves salt from days’. Martin provides a gorgeous extended metaphor of change and uncertainty, married irreversibly with loss and change. His poem sets up an umbrella of liminal imagery: ‘between sleep and ourselves’, ‘while everything is ours // or was or shall or may be’. Nothing feels certain, a lot like the elusive concept of ‘thought’, there is no physicalness to grasp or comprehend. I adore the fact this poem has no rhyme or set metre at all, so instead the enjambment carries the reader line to line and naturalistic image to image, painting a non-existent but also very relatable backdrop of a world that is evolving into something it does not know. The images of washing your hair in a mountain stream and having a berry-stained tongue translate the human being’s perpetual relationship with nature and, in my opinion, brings the poem full circle: people and nature are forever changing, and it’s within that change that we live every day, a change we can fear, or embrace.
From the moment Jo Clement welcomed me in with open paws, I was gorgeously unnerved at how such a canny little mag born in a canny little city had flooded the entirety of the poetry world with its brightly hued dust jackets, unwavering egalitarian warpaint, and words that taste so good, you forget you’ve ever eaten.
Unheard of-ly (let me have it), Butcher’s Dog has been running for 10 whole thought-provoking years with zero funding. This is nothing but absolute testimony to the Butcher’s Dog team, to its loyal readers, and to the magazine itself. The very much alive, very much living, breathing thing that is every issue of Butcher’s Dog, beating away on your shelf or coffee table as we speak, spilling its glorious juices into our eyes, ears and brains and setting up shop for eternity.
To anyone considering studying at Northumbria University, do it. To anyone with an issue of Butcher’s Dog sitting in their virtual basket wondering if it’s all going to be worth the postage, do it. To anyone about to say “It’s grim up North” and chuckle with ignorance… SHHH. We all know you’ve never really been. Because, if you had, you’d still be here. With us and our wagging tails and drooling jowls and little paper pockets of perfection.
Thank you Northumbria University for this priceless internship experience. Thank you, Jo, MD of BD, and all round lush human, for gifting me your time, and more valuable treats than a dog could ever wish for. Finally, thank you Butcher’s Dog, eternally, for being a haven of diversity, dactyls, and damn good poetry.
To the barista that first day of university… apparently you can teach an old dog new tricks.
Northumbria Englishes 