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James Mcconachie

@jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social

3.6K followers 4.5K following 3.6K posts

Poet, apparently. Forward Prize, BOTN and Pushcart nom. Occasional horseman, remote rural Spain. Words in blackbough, iambapoet, eatthestorms, Modron, Madrid Review, Bad Lilies, Dark Mountain project and more. https://linktr.ee/jamesmcconachiepoet

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Reposted by James Mcconachie

Emma Gee Flowers Music ☘️ @emmagee.bsky.social · 1h

Interesting high level piece looking at Spain in the 50 years since Franco's death.

www.realinstitutoelcano.org/en/work-docu...

Fifty years after Franco: Spain’s profound transformation, 1975-2025

General Franco died 50 years ago, but Spain bore no resemblance to the country he took over after winning the 1936-39 Civil War.

www.realinstitutoelcano.org

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James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 2h

Read this whole, beautiful Vaughan-Williams thread.

Paul Connolly @thepaulconnolly.bsky.social · 19d

This sort of art is as undeceived by the world as more explicit responses. A most austere palliative, sweetness edged to sharpness, softened with dust, it comes from battered hearts, tested in extremis. It doesn’t answer violence or make it stop, yet dares to meet it with a frail but enduring beauty

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James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 4h

Fog and rain means back up generator for off-grid peeps. Well bless the former me’s patience with servicing the janky little genny, which started 1st time and is purring like a cosy kitten. I rool.

James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 6h

He’s a keeper.

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James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 6h

‘A people hungering from birth,

grubbing, like plants, in the bitch earth,

were grafted with a great sorrow.

Hope rotted like a marrow.’

Helen Day @lbflyawayhome.bsky.social · 6h

“Farm workers follow where the spinner has passed and collect the potatoes in shallow baskets.
Picking up potatoes is back-aching work”
Writer: EL Grant Watson
Artist: CF Tunnicliffe

On a misty day in autumn, a group of mainly women follow a tractor to gather potatoes. The figures are hunched over and you can almost feel the back pain.

James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 6h

Really. It’s not the first time..a few years ago I went out to see my spawns cockerel fighting off a Bonelli’s eagle, which kept swooping at the hens. It’s the only reason I keep my current cockerel, who is intensely violent and hates me.

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James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 7h

I stepped outside to see/smell the rain and heard the unmistakable sound of a chicken in mortal peril. I ran over to the ‘henitentiary’ w/dogs to see a golden eagle lift up from the doorway and blitz through the pines. A young cockerel was trembling inside, uninjured. A fucking golden eagle.

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James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 7h

Living at the edge of a wilderness always has the potential for predation. Foxes v. noisy and close to the house..the wildcat who killed my favorite cat..but yesterday 1/

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Reposted by James Mcconachie

David Rosenthal @davidrosenthalpoet.bsky.social · 22h

Less than a month away!!!!

Listen to live Lit and raise funds for @translifeline.org.

Register now at:
beardedbardsofbluesky.weebly.com

Bearded Bards
Of BlueSky

Online readings to raise funds for Tans Lifeline.

November 8, 2025
Featuring:
Todd Dillard
Brian Spears
Matthew E. Henry
James McConachie
David J. Bauman
Jonathan Everitt

https://beardedbardsofbluesky.weebly.com

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James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 1d

It’s a triumph of decent modern pluralism that I had literally no idea Zack Polanski was gay. So that’s..something.

James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 1d

Ay Carmela..

Reposted by James Mcconachie

Jacob Wren @jacobwren.bsky.social · 1d

“If you do not answer the noise and urgency of your gifts, they will turn on you. Or drag you down with their immense sadness at being abandoned.”
– Joy Harjo, Crazy Brave

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James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 1d

youtu.be/R6qfgjJNHKk?...

Sarah Jarosz - Cattails (Big Thief Cover)

YouTube video by Sarah Jarosz

youtu.be

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James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 2d

Curses to the foolish former me, who thought buying a flashy sports car in need of attention was a great plan.

James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 2d

Are they gonna make a hames of live-streaming the Forward Prize again?

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James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 2d

Write a YA Romantasy

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James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 2d

‘Con Franco se vivía mejor’

James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 2d

If I sold the weed on my writing desk, I’d make more money.

Anne-Marie Silbiger @happimess73.bsky.social · 2d

Somebody just asked me if I live off being a published poet...

a person is sitting on a chair in the middle of a field with trees in the background .

ALT: a person is sitting on a chair in the middle of a field with trees in the background .

media.tenor.com

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Reposted by James Mcconachie

Victoria Spires @victoriaspires.bsky.social · 2d

📢 This is your final reminder... Happening tonight! 📢

Please join us to hear some exceptional poetry. Zoom link from me if you want to join 🙏🏼

#poetsofbluesky #poetrycommunity

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Reposted by James Mcconachie

Troy Nahumko @troynahumko.bsky.social · 2d

🔥 La ultraderecha lo ha conseguido en Extremadura: enterrar la verdad y blanquear el franquismo.
Derogar la Ley de Memoria Histórica no es política, es negacionismo.
www.bostonreview.net/articles/kil...
#MemoriaHistórica #Extremadura #NoPasarán #Democracia #Vox #España

Kill It with Fire - Boston Review

In Spain, ultra-nationalist efforts to rehabilitate Franco extend the global right’s war on memory.

www.bostonreview.net

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James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 2d

Jesus

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

US anti-fascism expert blocked from flying to Spain at airport

Rutgers University professor who published book on antifa was informed at boarding gate that his trip was cancelled

www.theguardian.com

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James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 3d

Keep breathin, keep smiling, @zackpolanski.bsky.social …then knock it outta the park. No pressure..

Joanna Hastings @joannahastings.bsky.social · 3d

Zack Polanski is on Question Time tonight, a lone voice in a panel of right wingers. It will be interesting.

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James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 3d

‘Just like the bricks…they are the linguistic palette of the land and its lingering traces. They are the raw material from which the words arise, passed hand to hand through Roman Hispania, or the Umayyad Caliphate of Cordoba, proudly Mudéjar’

open.substack.com/pub/jamesmcc...

Mudéjar

Bricks, tiles, colour and language palettes.

open.substack.com

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James Mcconachie @jamesmcconachie1.bsky.social · 3d

A similar distance : Tortosa to Barcelona…and I just rocked up and bought a ticket, return= €25

Reposted by James Mcconachie

Keith W. Dickinson @keithwdickinson.bsky.social · 4d

Today is a day when arts degrees are worthless, but the product of those degrees is so valuable it would kill an entire industry if they were made to pay for it.

The Verge @theverge.com · May 26

Nick Clegg says asking artists for use permission would ‘kill’ the AI industry

Paul McCartne, Elton John and others signed an open letter.

buff.ly

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