Poetry review – SUNBATHING WITH FISHERMEN: Emma Storr admires the strength of feeling in Penny Sharman’s poems whether they are dealing with pain and loss or joy and pleasure
Sunbathing with Fishermen
Penny Sharman
The Hedgehog Poetry Press 2024
ISBN 978-1-916830-35-6
pp.86
It is difficult to do justice to this extensive collection of poems that Penny Sharman describes as ‘a reverie’, a reflection on growing up in the 50’s and 60’s. Life was clearly difficult when she became pregnant as a teenager and was sent away to an unmarried mother and baby home. The themes of loss, grief, and abandonment dominate the poetry and prose poems. However, there is plenty of joy expressed too in the comfort and beauty of the natural world and in enjoying many sensual pleasures. Sepia photographs and Penny’s paintings scattered throughout the book add to the evocative imagery and the emotional content of the poetry.
The poem that gives the collection its title, “Sunbathing with Fishermen”, paints a picture of children on the cusp of puberty. The phrase ‘We’re the girls’ is repeated at the beginning of several lines, emphasising the youth of ‘me, Christine and Susan’, who sit, watch and wonder on a summer picnic. On the river bank, men are fishing, joined by Aunty Marg who banks ‘a fat eel’. The phallic nature of this creature is implicit while the girls speculate about menstruation and how many babies they will have. Expectation, mystery and excitement are conveyed in a few short stanzas.
Childhood is curtailed all too quickly when the speaker becomes pregnant although in “Museum of Dancing” she maintains dance as an important way of expressing herself. In this poem we move from girlhood to teenager to womanhood and:
a mother’s way of soothing
a child’s misery to sleep
the sway-sway of her hips
The pulse of new life within the speaker is linked to her need to twirl and listen to her own rhythm ‘over and over and over again’.
The speaker’s fertility is celebrated in “Ode to the Uterus” on the facing page to “Museum of Dancing”. I loved the way this poem addresses the womb directly, each of the four stanzas beginning with a different image:
Oh, pear shaped sea monster…
Oh, small closet…
Oh, sensible entity…
Oh, fallopian brain…
The uterus is given agency and knowledge beyond that of the speaker. The ode ends with a lovely image:
how you tingle inside
give hope to cradles
Several poems have plant or flower titles such as “Moonwort”, “False Sedge” and “Cuckooflower”. Sharman uses these in original and unusual ways. For example, “Cuckooflower” reads like a prayer for freedom and the chance to:
….let me hear
the wind blow sadness away,
let me dance with queen Mab,
hear the cuckoo’s song.
Perhaps there is a link to a lost child here as cuckoos notoriously leave their eggs in other birds’ nests to be reared by them. In the following poem “Milkwort”, subtitled ironically “Sister of mercy”, we learn about conditions in the Mother and Baby Home where the nuns ‘didn’t smile much or hold anyone’s hand’. They had practical skills and ‘were trained to take away your baby, leave you alone / to dream of a new life.’
More dancing appears in the poem “Practical Lesson in Hypnotism”. This poem is a series of instructions to avoid exploitation and abuse by men. The speaker reflects on her innocence and the way she has been mesmerised into believing in romance, only for it to end in violence. The poem concludes ‘It’s about being savvy, being queen of the rumba’.
Sharman is particularly good at mixing physical details with the metaphorical in her poetry. “To Write a Love Letter is More than a Day’s Work” exemplifies this skilfully. The abstract is interwoven with the specific:
It’s about handmade paper
from pulped rags, the shredding
of syllables and patience,
the boiling and washing, to find
a white page for scribing love.
Sharman delights in detailing the fashioning of a quill and the ingredients required to mix up the ink that will conjure ‘sighs and kisses from the air’. Love is conveyed not only in the words on the page but also in the care taken to fashion paper, pen and ink.
One of my favourite poems is “On Magdalen Bridge” in which the speaker is powerless to resist love and lust on a starry night, under a ‘cerulean’ sky:
I fall overboard. I fall for you.
….I’m ready to jump into dirty water.
The repetition of ‘fall’ and ‘falling’ throughout the poem and the willingness to leap into dirty water emphasise the risk involved as well as the excitement.
It is sometimes difficult to know whom the speaker is addressing in the many poems of longing and loss. This could be frustrating but in many ways it is effective because losing a relative or friend is such a universal experience that we can identify with the sentiment without knowing the exact circumstances. “Searching for a Ring Tone” and “When I Write to You” are two poignant examples of Sharman’s skill in this area and might refer to an absent child or sibling but could also be a plea to a distant lover.
The collection includes a number of dated poems which were clearly written during the pandemic and lockdown. Sharman is a close observer of the natural world and cleverly weaves the beauty of plants, birds and sunlight with the emotional burden of confinement, uncertainty and fear. In “Forgetting”, the speaker allows herself to escape the ‘pandemic world’ and walk the length of Whitesands Bay. She is alive to sounds and sights, perhaps with heightened sensitivity because of the deprivations caused by previous periods of lockdown. The poem ends:
Forgetting
is to sit in silence on our wooden bench with no thought of next week.
We are in the sun’s light and watch oystercatchers and herring gulls
strut over sand and pebbles, watch waves fierce enough to surf.
I love the passion expressed in this collection, whether it is for love and life or for pain and loss. It’s an impressive ‘reverie’ and a fascinating collection of poetry I hope many people will enjoy.
Mar 29 2025
London Grip Poetry Review – Penny Sharman
Poetry review – SUNBATHING WITH FISHERMEN: Emma Storr admires the strength of feeling in Penny Sharman’s poems whether they are dealing with pain and loss or joy and pleasure
It is difficult to do justice to this extensive collection of poems that Penny Sharman describes as ‘a reverie’, a reflection on growing up in the 50’s and 60’s. Life was clearly difficult when she became pregnant as a teenager and was sent away to an unmarried mother and baby home. The themes of loss, grief, and abandonment dominate the poetry and prose poems. However, there is plenty of joy expressed too in the comfort and beauty of the natural world and in enjoying many sensual pleasures. Sepia photographs and Penny’s paintings scattered throughout the book add to the evocative imagery and the emotional content of the poetry.
The poem that gives the collection its title, “Sunbathing with Fishermen”, paints a picture of children on the cusp of puberty. The phrase ‘We’re the girls’ is repeated at the beginning of several lines, emphasising the youth of ‘me, Christine and Susan’, who sit, watch and wonder on a summer picnic. On the river bank, men are fishing, joined by Aunty Marg who banks ‘a fat eel’. The phallic nature of this creature is implicit while the girls speculate about menstruation and how many babies they will have. Expectation, mystery and excitement are conveyed in a few short stanzas.
Childhood is curtailed all too quickly when the speaker becomes pregnant although in “Museum of Dancing” she maintains dance as an important way of expressing herself. In this poem we move from girlhood to teenager to womanhood and:
The pulse of new life within the speaker is linked to her need to twirl and listen to her own rhythm ‘over and over and over again’.
The speaker’s fertility is celebrated in “Ode to the Uterus” on the facing page to “Museum of Dancing”. I loved the way this poem addresses the womb directly, each of the four stanzas beginning with a different image:
The uterus is given agency and knowledge beyond that of the speaker. The ode ends with a lovely image:
Several poems have plant or flower titles such as “Moonwort”, “False Sedge” and “Cuckooflower”. Sharman uses these in original and unusual ways. For example, “Cuckooflower” reads like a prayer for freedom and the chance to:
Perhaps there is a link to a lost child here as cuckoos notoriously leave their eggs in other birds’ nests to be reared by them. In the following poem “Milkwort”, subtitled ironically “Sister of mercy”, we learn about conditions in the Mother and Baby Home where the nuns ‘didn’t smile much or hold anyone’s hand’. They had practical skills and ‘were trained to take away your baby, leave you alone / to dream of a new life.’
More dancing appears in the poem “Practical Lesson in Hypnotism”. This poem is a series of instructions to avoid exploitation and abuse by men. The speaker reflects on her innocence and the way she has been mesmerised into believing in romance, only for it to end in violence. The poem concludes ‘It’s about being savvy, being queen of the rumba’.
Sharman is particularly good at mixing physical details with the metaphorical in her poetry. “To Write a Love Letter is More than a Day’s Work” exemplifies this skilfully. The abstract is interwoven with the specific:
Sharman delights in detailing the fashioning of a quill and the ingredients required to mix up the ink that will conjure ‘sighs and kisses from the air’. Love is conveyed not only in the words on the page but also in the care taken to fashion paper, pen and ink.
One of my favourite poems is “On Magdalen Bridge” in which the speaker is powerless to resist love and lust on a starry night, under a ‘cerulean’ sky:
The repetition of ‘fall’ and ‘falling’ throughout the poem and the willingness to leap into dirty water emphasise the risk involved as well as the excitement.
It is sometimes difficult to know whom the speaker is addressing in the many poems of longing and loss. This could be frustrating but in many ways it is effective because losing a relative or friend is such a universal experience that we can identify with the sentiment without knowing the exact circumstances. “Searching for a Ring Tone” and “When I Write to You” are two poignant examples of Sharman’s skill in this area and might refer to an absent child or sibling but could also be a plea to a distant lover.
The collection includes a number of dated poems which were clearly written during the pandemic and lockdown. Sharman is a close observer of the natural world and cleverly weaves the beauty of plants, birds and sunlight with the emotional burden of confinement, uncertainty and fear. In “Forgetting”, the speaker allows herself to escape the ‘pandemic world’ and walk the length of Whitesands Bay. She is alive to sounds and sights, perhaps with heightened sensitivity because of the deprivations caused by previous periods of lockdown. The poem ends:
I love the passion expressed in this collection, whether it is for love and life or for pain and loss. It’s an impressive ‘reverie’ and a fascinating collection of poetry I hope many people will enjoy.