CALEB PARKIN
Poetry. Play. Possibilities.
FACILITATOR MANIFESTO
Why do I do this?
Includes my Safeguarding, Child Protection, Diversity and Inclusion Policies
I BELIEVE
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all children, young people – and all human beings – have a voice and a right to be heard
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writing for wellbeing can be gardening, as well as weeding
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writing should make language once again peculiar and special, helping us treasure the magic of language (and it is magic)
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writing should value the skewed angle and the unexpected narrator
TO FULFIL THESE BELIEFS, I WILL:
SAFEGUARD
Always take steps to safeguard the physical and emotional wellbeing of all young people (and all people involved in our activities)
STAY UP TO DATE
Keep an up-to-date DBS certificate with Update Service to facilitate more efficient background checking on projects or placements
FAMILIARISE MYSELF WITH POLICIES
Familiarise myself with a school or establishment’s own Safeguarding and Child Protection Policies, where they exist.
BE AWARE
Be aware of the signs of physical, emotional, sexual abuse, and neglect – (in both children and adults) and report all concerns or disclosures to the appropriate person (LADO or member of staff, depending on context) in a timely manner.
POETIC MANIFESTO
What am I up to in my writing?
MY POEMS
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are sites of serious play, worlds where funhouse mirrors are held up and not always flattering (including to myself)
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are sensuous, humorous and furious
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are an invitation to puzzlement, to moments where the mundane flips over and we see the mud under lawns
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strive towards a queer ecopoetics which divests of purity narratives
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invite a critical, somatic re-engagement with environmental and social justice
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embrace decoration, as peacock spiders embrace it in their dances, as bowerbirds do in their elaborate abodes
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are amphibious and evolving, spiny and scaly, fossil and future
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try to remake the category 'man'
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embrace their own failure
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love men tenderly in our remaking
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edge towards as silhouettes
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become experiments in language, testing my courage towards its edges
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weaponize camp, clowning and foolishness.