Seamus Heaney on my favourite pen maker

I found this poem on the Fountain Pen Network (I really do collect pens but not I'm not a serious collector).

The Conway Stewart

"Medium," 14-carat nib,

Three gold bands in the clip-on screw-top,

In the mottled barrel a spatulate, thin

Pump-action lever

The shopkeeper

Demonstrated,

The nib uncapped,

Treating it to its first deep snorkel

In a newly opened ink-bottle,

Guttery, snottery,

Letting it rest then at an angle

To ingest,

Giving us time

To look together and away

From our parting, due that evening,

To my longhand

"Dear"

To them, next day.

The poem appeared in his 2010 collection Human Chain.

I have never seen a poem about  fountain pen before, let alone one about a Conway Stewart pen.Contributors to the Fountain Pen Network are of the opinion that the pen in question was a model 58...

Photo Hunt - Plastic

The theme for this week's PhotoHunt is plastic. This one made me rack my brain to come up with something and then I thought pens! I have a small collection of vintage and moder Conway Stewart pens, a British pen manufacturer that was in operation from 1905 to the 1970's and then from the late 1990's. Some pens were and are made of silver. gold or even casein ( the milk protein) but most are made from acrylic and are very attractive.

This pen is a modern Duro. Most modern Conway Stewarts are normally made in limited numbers, usually 1,000
This is a "Cracked Ice" pattern pen "28" from the 1950s. The cracked ice pattern is very collectable but I treat my pens as something to use rather than look at.