Poetry / Deanna Rodger
Bristol performance poet Deanna Rodger develops new WECA-funded project on motherhood
Annually, the prestigious Clore Leadership Fellowship programme bestows awards on over 20 “dynamic change-makers” working in the arts, culture and heritage sectors, all of whom are demonstrably capable of using their talents to make a positive impact on society.
Acclaimed Bristol poet, Deanna Rodger is a recent graduate from the programme. Having first made waves in the poetry scene at 18 when she won the UK Poetry Slam, Rodger has gone on to work as a poet across five continents, with multiple major brand commissions including the BBC, Disney, Adidas, St Paul’s Cathedral and Nationwide to her name.
At Tate Modern, for a special event celebrating Clore Leadership’s recent 21st anniversary, Rodger was selected to perform her poem LIQUID | SOLID | GAS | MOTHER to an assembled room of 500 leaders from the national arts and culture sector.
is needed now More than ever
Its subject matter was an apposite one to explore during her fellowship journey, which coincided with Rodger’s pregnancy with her third child. She recalls the conflict in piecing together a new identity; a time during which she was wrestling with how to balance motherhood and ambition:
“When I became a mum, I was so scared that ‘Deanna’ would disappear, so professionally, I held tight to the form I’d become so good at and refused to move through the cycle. It felt too messy, too precarious for a freelancer who had moved to a new city. Something had to stay the same.
“So, even when the system around me needed me to evaporate, even when the temperature dropped and tried to get me to freeze, I would not change, I would not. I would not become what the environment imposed on me. But what is an ice block on the beach? Rain cannot return to the cloud as droplets. Steam must accept itself as light.”
Deanna Rodger – photo: courtesy of the artist
In 2025, Rodger is continuing to explore motherhood through an artistic lens. In a WECA-funded project that she is currently developing, she is working with creative mothers in and around Bristol and asking the question ‘how do you do it?’
LIQUID | SOLID | GAS
MOTHER (extract)
There is always a choice.
To give
or to take.
To rise or to fall.
To walk or to run.
There is always change.
Years ago, I went to The Falls
To visit the great crash of water
To feel small and in awe.
I did not have to travel so far.
I could have stood in a puddle.
What is it that you need to know in order to become what you are?
The thing that you are.
Breathe in.
There is a stillness if you let it.
Breathe out.
There is a stillness before the turn.
Deanna Rodger
Deanna Rodger in performance – photo: courtesy of the artist
Find out more at www.deannarodger.co.uk or follow @deannarodger.
Main photo: Jade Anouka
Read next:
- Vanessa Kisuule on fandom, fame and finding Neverland
- Tom Stockley, aka T.S. Idiot: ‘Bristol has made me the artist I am’
- Sidney & Eden hosts regular spoken word open mic for writers
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