Janice Fixter was born in Kent and has lived in South East London ever since. She has a BA in psychology from London University (Goldsmiths College) and a MA in Creative Writing, the Arts and Education and a D.Phil. in Creative Writing (poetry) from Sussex University.

Janice has been writing poetry and non-fiction since 1994 and has been widely published. Her poems have been broadcast on Premier Radio, LBC and Radio 4 as well as various local radio stations. She has read her poetry at a number of venues including the Troubadour and the Poetry Cafe as well as taking part in the Oxfam 7 Poets for 2007 series.

Janice has also written numerous non-fiction articles and two books on parenting – The Parentalk Guide to being a Mum Hodder and Stoughton 2000, and How to Succeed as a Single Parent Hodder and Stoughton 2003 with Diane Louise Jordan. From 2001 to 2007 Janice was a trustee of Parentalk – a charity which aims to inspire parents. During this time she contributed regularly to radio and television programmes

In 1997 Poets Anonymous published her chapbook Walking Away From The Shadows and in 2005 her pamphlet Walking the Hawk was published by tall-lighthouse. Her first full collection a kind of slow motion was published by tall-lighthouse in July 2007. Janice is training to be become a spiritual director. She is passionate about birds, bats and orchids.

WordAid is a recently formed collective of published poets working together to raise funds for charity. Its first project is Did I Tell You? an anthology of 131 poems in aid of Children in Need, which was launched in November 2010. To buy a copy of Did I Tell You? please visit http://wordaid.blogspot.com/

Wing Beats: British Birds in Haiku
published by Snapshot Press price £15.99
Hardback: 320 pages
ISBN 978-1-903543-24-5

]]> http://janicefixter.com/events/feed 0 http://janicefixter.com/may http://janicefixter.com/may#comments Fri, 01 Sep 2006 15:55:58 +0000 http://janicefixter.com/prognosis Circe’s granddaughter

Enchanter’s nightshade – small white flowers.
Gone before you can whisper their name.
These are my grandmother’s poison.

When the moon’s half eye is on me
and I can hear the sounds of shipwreck
ringing in the oaks, I go to the forest

and gather leaves and petals in my basket,
boil them with storm water over charcoal.
They squeak, hiss and chatter warnings.

My grandmother’s flowers roar and howl
when she brews them. She pours their animal
cries into bottles. I watch her

from a distance. And when the sun
is low, evening light, she casts no shadow.

first published in The London Magazine