benjamin cusden

Benjamin Cusden is a published poet, sound healing facilitator, workshop leader and Zen practitioner.

His poetry has appeared in various UK publications including Acumen, Under The Radar, Ink Sweat & Tears, Prole, The Dawntreader, numerous anthologies, as well as publications in Europe, the USA, Canada and Brazil.

Benjamin has been shortlisted for: The Bridport Prize and Live Canon's International Poetry Prize. In 2020 he was chosen for The London Library's prestigious Emerging Writers Programme.

His first poetry selection Cut the Black Rabbit, published by Against The Grain Poetry Press, 2020, vividly explores the tragic end of Benjamin's successful television career, the subsequent years spent as a homeless man and his eventual return to 'normal life'. It has been included in The Poetry Book Society's Winter Selection 2020.

"I read Cut the Black Rabbit from start to finish. Totally riveting, illuminating, moving - very, very special. Thank you for writing it." Rachel Spence, poet. 

Benjamin is actively involved in poetry and sound healing workshops, festivals and events, organising open mic nights and reading at poetry events. He now lives in East Sussex, where he is currently working on his next collection and facilitating a series of writing workshops and courses inspired by Zen thinking. He facilitates a weekly sound healing meditation group in Bexhill-on-Sea and his sounbaths play along the South Coast of England.

If you would like Benjamin to speak at an upcoming event; find out more about his poetry, sound healing work and meditation classes; or take part in one of his Writing with Zen workshops, please feel free to get in touch at benjamincusden@hotmail.com (poetry) or moonwaterplanet@gmail.com (sound healing and meditation) or via his social media pages (see links below)

Note to the New Homeless

The ground is hard – always hard, always cold –
it doesn’t matter where you are, it’s un-giving.
Spread out an army of blankets, clutch of sweaters,
a murder of trench coats – it’ll still be hard and cold.

The Sun, The Moon. the circle of stars,
time is the freedom of doorways.

Bend poor person’s elbows and arms and stretch
to support the neck, this provides the position
to protect your head, keep eyes open  
or hair triggered shut – ready to jump.

The Sun, The Moon. the circle of stars,
time is the freedom of doorways.

Peer out through your covers – hoody and woollens,
remnants, your handouts, the trash you’ve collected,
newspapers, cardboard, polystyrene padding –
        be prepared.

A murder of doorways, The Sun, The Moon,
freedom is hard and cold.

Transience
 
Every day has ritual: make tea on the Gaz;
wash in the public toilets; steal loo roll;

each night, large pennaceous feathers spring like
seedlings along arms, sprout from boned coccyx;

unpack and pack – clean clothes on top with
dirty underneath, rearrange bits of yesterday
to be ready for tomorrow;

mouth, jaw and nose fuse and elongate, legs grow
thin and compress, feet become claws;

make sure the bag is balanced; tie bootlaces
tight – bunny ears in double knot;

with ease, tendon and muscle stretch and take flight
as cryptochromes behind eyes read the magnetic
routes of the Earth;

fingers count, recount coins in pocket,
head holds a mantra: 10, 20, 30 – desperate
to reach a hundred, 70, 80, 90 – 70, 80,90,
enough for a can of White Lightening;

some nights flying at the wedge-head of geese;
others lost in skeins of starlings; and often alone –
an owl kills its prey. Each route is open, without
boundaries until the shackles of morning’s
   t
      r
        a
     n
         s
              f o rmation into a mule again;
home, strapped to back with the past;
present held in vacant hands; future
shod with well-worn Doctor Marten boots.