Overview

While working in a well-known pharmacy chain, Jeremy Dixon found surprising inspiration. His poems were written on the ends of till rolls and smuggled out in his socks. Anyone who has ever worked in retail will recognise the characters and situations, and the magnificent management absurdities; but Jeremy also bring his perspective as a gay man to bear with witty and wicked results.

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9781909208728

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an incredibly observant collection Consumer culture is embedded into the very form of the writing itself. That line in the final stanza is incredible. 'Mother says contactless is Satan's kiss'. Payment is a glide of the hand, quick, dismissive, a kiss that never touches the glass. Thoughtlessness cushions temptation. The situations are recognisable, written without judgemental comment and the poems report the shortcomings of petty bureaucracy without ranting or taking sides. In Retail offers insights and knows how to end a story precisely on the punchline. Each page has the title In Retail in grey reversed print at the top. Each even page has the message 'Thank you for your custom' in grey reversed print. Each odd page has a different message, e.g. 'All made in China', 'Obey the till', 'Hurry they won't last long' in grey reversed print. This layout suggests a receipt roll and the poems appear to be printed on the back, a subversively humorous reflection of how they were composed.

Praise for In Retail Jeremy Dixon, poem by poem, every day, tries to make morning of mourning, entering our pain as sellers and customers, creating a humane custom--an absolute virtue of putting things back exactly where you found it. If we really must adhere to 'uniform and appearances rules, ' these poems beautifully discern an ostentation somehow even in that capricious regularity. Dixon reminds us that poems restore desire, that they seek transgression, that they discover their own forms, and dares the reader as a kind of store detective to search our lines more. There we will find the real work being done. - Al Filreis Jeremy Dixon's collection is a delicious inventory of the interaction between people and objects on shelves. His writing shows precision, humility and compassion for shoppers and fellow-staff who struggle to navigate a world in which souls are bought and sold. This is an elegant portrait of a world little celebrated in poetry, original in insight and form.@ - Gwyneth Lewis Jeremy Dixon's astute unflinching observations of life in a well-known high street chemist brilliantly illustrate the experience of working in such a setting. We've all been customers, but how many of us have experienced the other side of the till? In Retail brings home with humour and compassion the annoying absurdities of working for a large corporation, and trying to please the ever-varying public. How do you address a customer after hours of repeating the same phrases over and over? There's the recognisably distorted voice on the tannoy pronounced 'far too soft' and the customer announcement, 'is there anyone here in charge?' The security guard carrying an 'Opium gift set' and 'peering through the L'Oreal stacks at a known thief'. The customer who simply has to confide, 'oh I swore I wouldn't say/anything to anyone', and the 'minor reality face/wearing a black beanie' are all too familiar. You will discover and recognise so much about life in the here and now in Jeremy Dixon's range of subtle, poignant and captivating poems. - Julie-ann Rowell London Grip Poetry Review - Emma Lee considers the implications of Jeremy Dixon's poetic reports from behind the scenes of a well-known high street store: www.londongrip.co.uk/2019/01/london-grip-poetry-review-jeremy-dixon/ The Cardiff Review - New Welsh Writers - Jeremy Dixon: www.cardiffreview.com/single-post/2019/03/03/New-Welsh-Writers-Jeremy-Dixon

Praise for In Retail Jeremy Dixon, poem by poem, every day, tries to make morning of mourning, entering our pain as sellers and customers, creating a humane custom--an absolute virtue of putting things back exactly where you found it. If we really must adhere to 'uniform and appearances rules, ' these poems beautifully discern an ostentation somehow even in that capricious regularity. Dixon reminds us that poems restore desire, that they seek transgression, that they discover their own forms, and dares the reader as a kind of store detective to search our lines more. There we will find the real work being done. - Al Filreis Jeremy Dixon's collection is a delicious inventory of the interaction between people and objects on shelves. His writing shows precision, humility and compassion for shoppers and fellow-staff who struggle to navigate a world in which souls are bought and sold. This is an elegant portrait of a world little celebrated in poetry, original in insight and form.@ - Gwyneth Lewis Jeremy Dixon's astute unflinching observations of life in a well-known high street chemist brilliantly illustrate the experience of working in such a setting. We've all been customers, but how many of us have experienced the other side of the till? In Retail brings home with humour and compassion the annoying absurdities of working for a large corporation, and trying to please the ever-varying public. How do you address a customer after hours of repeating the same phrases over and over? There's the recognisably distorted voice on the tannoy pronounced 'far too soft' and the customer announcement, 'is there anyone here in charge?' The security guard carrying an 'Opium gift set' and 'peering through the L'Or al stacks at a known thief'. The customer who simply has to confide, 'oh I swore I wouldn't say/anything to anyone', and the 'minor reality face/wearing a black beanie' are all too familiar. You will discover and recognise so much about life in the here and now in Jeremy Dixon's range of subtle, poignant and captivating poems. - Julie-ann Rowell London Grip Poetry Review - Emma Lee considers the implications of Jeremy Dixon's poetic reports from behind the scenes of a well-known high street store: www.londongrip.co.uk/2019/01/london-grip-poetry-review-jeremy-dixon/ The Cardiff Review - New Welsh Writers - Jeremy Dixon: www.cardiffreview.com/single-post/2019/03/03/New-Welsh-Writers-Jeremy-Dixon

Praise for In Retail: Jeremy Dixon, poem by poem, every day, tries to make morning of mourning, entering our pain as sellers and customers, creating a humane custom--an absolute virtue of putting things back exactly where you found it. If we really must adhere to 'uniform and appearances rules, ' these poems beautifully discern an ostentation somehow even in that capricious regularity. Dixon reminds us that poems restore desire, that they seek transgression, that they discover their own forms, and dares the reader as a kind of store detective to search our lines more. There we will find the real work being done. - Al Filreis Jeremy Dixon's collection is a delicious inventory of the interaction between people and objects on shelves. His writing shows precision, humility and compassion for shoppers and fellow-staff who struggle to navigate a world in which souls are bought and sold. This is an elegant portrait of a world little celebrated in poetry, original in insight and form.@ - Gwyneth Lewis Jeremy Dixon's astute unflinching observations of life in a well-known high street chemist brilliantly illustrate the experience of working in such a setting. We've all been customers, but how many of us have experienced the other side of the till? In Retail brings home with humour and compassion the annoying absurdities of working for a large corporation, and trying to please the ever-varying public. How do you address a customer after hours of repeating the same phrases over and over? There's the recognisably distorted voice on the tannoy pronounced 'far too soft' and the customer announcement, 'is there anyone here in charge?' The security guard carrying an 'Opium gift set' and 'peering through the L'Oreal stacks at a known thief'. The customer who simply has to confide, 'oh I swore I wouldn't say/anything to anyone', and the 'minor reality face/wearing a black beanie' are all too familiar. You will discover and recognise so much about life in the here and now in Jeremy Dixon's range of subtle, poignant and captivating poems. - Julie-ann Rowell London Grip Poetry Review - Emma Lee considers the implications of Jeremy Dixon's poetic reports from behind the scenes of a well-known high street store: www.londongrip.co.uk/2019/01/london-grip-poetry-review-jeremy-dixon/ The Cardiff Review - New Welsh Writers - Jeremy Dixon: www.cardiffreview.com/single-post/2019/03/03/New-Welsh-Writers-Jeremy-Dixon

Author Information

Jeremy Dixon was born in Essex and spent 45 year in rural South Wales making Artist’s Books that combine poetry and photography. He now lives on the Wirral. His poems have appeared both online and in print in Roundyhouse Magazine, Riptide Journal, Lighthouse Journal, Durable Goods, and Really System, among others. Arachne Press published his first poetry pamphlet, In Retail, and his first full collection, A Voice Coming From Then, which won the Wales Book of the Year 2022 Englsih Language Poetry Category Cherry Potts is the Director of Arachne Press, for whom she is editor of almost all our anthologies and runs the Annual Solstice Shorts Festival. Cherry is the author of an epic fantasy novel, two collections of short stories, a photographic diary of a community opera, and has had many stories in anthologies, magazines and online. Her novel of sibling hatred in the 1920s, The Bog Mermaid, won the Quill LGBTQ+ Prose prize 2022.

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