Poor Phraser

(per)verse and poetry.

heather-and-hollyhock asked: Hello. I'm in no doubt that you've heard this before, but I must say that I very much like your works. Are there any tips you could give to a budding young writer? Also, how did you discover your talent? Thank you, sorry for the questions.

I have no great, original insights; but all these points, which you probably know already, have kept me warm over the years:

1. All poetry from the heart is worth writing, but not all poetry is worth reading. Ask yourself, is it poetry or just a diary entry?

2. Don’t post immediately, give it the overnight test. Edit. Revise. Get it shorter. Say what you want to say succinctly, where every single word counts.

3. Listen to criticism that will ultimately make your work stronger, even if it hurts at the time. Ignore unhelpful criticism that doesn’t ring true to you. You will know the difference. If one person calls you a donkey, that’s just their opinion. If 20 people call you a donkey, then take a look at yourself: you’ve got long ears and a taste for carrots.

4. Write every day if you want to be a writer. Practice makes perfect. That’s a cliche but it gets the thought down to the fewest number of words. 

5. Check your spelling. If you don’t have enough respect for your reader to smarten yourself up as best you can, then why should they respect you by reading you. Besides, anything which confuses or distracts from the ideas or images you are creating interrupts what you are trying to express.

6. Don’t write to get famous or rich or be popular. Write because you want to communicate or express yourself. If you write something well and no one else reads it, you will still feel a sense of achievement in saying what you wanted to say. 

7. Be accepting when someone takes a different meaning from what you wrote and intended - Publish and be damned. You cannot control how people interpret your work. Once it’s out there, it may get twisted and viewed in ways you wouldn’t have imagined. 

8. Read others. Read the greats. Experience writing at its best. You have to be inspired before you can be inspiring. 

9. Only swear in your writing if it’s really fucking necessary. 

Mouse Activist

If you know someone with cancer, then click like

or you know Allah is the answer, then click like

If you want to end starvation, then click like

If Obama’s ruining the nation, then click like

If you want to save the ice caps, then click like

If you’re concerned about the wage gap, then click like

If you’re against abortion, then click like

or you think tax is extortion, then click like

If Jesus is your saviour, then click like

or you hate someone’s behaviour, then click like

If  you’re against pro-lifers, then click like

if it’s a cause you’d almost die for, then click like

If you’re not a fan of rape jokes, then click like

Know how racist talk provokes? then click like

If you’re against this damn war, then click like

If you don’t like what you just saw, then click like

If you want to close the power plants, then click like

If you’re not too keen on immigrants, then click like

If you want to raise awareness, then click like

or you’re against unfairness, then click like


And that’s that, you’re done

you’ve spread the word to everyone

You’ve done your bit, the problem’s solved

there’s no need to be involved

and see it through, get up and do,

that’s for someone else, not you


but

if you really, really, really care

do more than just press ‘like’ or ‘share’

Got a Kindle? Then get my book. Yes, my book. Well, ebook. 60 of my bestest scribbles have been collected into a Kindle edition with fantastic illustrations by the talented chris bARTon.  It’s as cheap as your mum was on prom night. It’s practically free.  If you have a Kindle, or the Kindle app for smartphone/tablet then take a peek. 

Got a Kindle? Then get my book.

Yes, my book. Well, ebook. 60 of my bestest scribbles have been collected into a Kindle edition with fantastic illustrations by the talented chris bARTon. 

It’s as cheap as your mum was on prom night. It’s practically free. 

If you have a Kindle, or the Kindle app for smartphone/tablet then take a peek. 

MEN WHO WRITE ARE SEXY - inspired by jayarrarr's blogpost

See original blogpost here: jayarrarr:

Men who write are sexy.

There, I said it. Saying it gives it power; gives them power. Men who write are sexy in the same way musicians are sexy. In the same way you see him playing that guitar and know that’s the same face he makes when he comes. In the same way falling in…


Men who write are sexy

Because you can tell the way they write

is the way they fuck.

Often alone.  

Often in short bursts.

Often wishing it was easier.

Men who write are sexy

Because you can tell the way they write

is the way they fuck.

Happy they have lead in their pencil.

Happy to reach the middle and the end. 

Happy to not use a rubber and leave it to someone else to clean up later.

Men who write are sexy

Because you can tell the way they write

is the way they fuck.

Desperate to fill any holes they find.

Desperate to impress you with their technique. 

Desperate to be enjoyed by as many people as they can reach.

Men who write are sexy

Because you can tell the way they write

is the way they fuck. 

Normally thinking about it every minute of the day.

Normally getting down to it late at night or early in the morning.

Normally with the light on so they can see what they are doing.

Men who write are sexy

Because you can tell the way they write

is the way they fuck.

Because it’s a compulsion. 

Because the act of doing it is just as much fun as reaching the happy ending. 

And because it’s the way to a woman’s heart, for a little while at least, before she puts you back on the shelf and moves on to another writer.



MODERN NURSERY RHYME


It’s raining it’s pouring

The debate is getting boring

The evangelist said ‘This is Armagedd’

But Gore is sure it’s global warming




For anyone in the UK or Northern Europe living with constant rain these last few weeks/months. 

WRITE A POEM ABOUT ME, ME, ME


‘Write a poem about me’, she said

‘About my life and what my plans are’

but her muse has killed my art stone dead

She’s not worth a single stanza
 

‘Write a poem about me’, she said

‘Do it now, please, get straight on it’

but she inspires rude four-letter words

and not enough to fill a sonnet
 

‘Write a poem about me’ she said

‘Write an ode to my great beauty’

But the ode for her is ‘Odious’

and I won’t write out of duty
 

She’s a dreadful, superficial girl

She’s self-obsessed and smug and thick

with an noxious air of entitlement.

She’s less than a limerick.

But she demanded verse, so here it is.

I don’t think that she’ll like it.

And if anyone else demands one too

I’ll just have to recycle it.

I Haight Ashbury



I Haight Ashbury

It’s Camden Market with a tan

I Haight Ashbury

The sixties are over, man

I Haight Ashbury

Whereas once the hippy dream made sense

Now it makes cents and dollars

Out of tie dye t-shirts and Grateful Dead posters

Jim Morrison placemats and Hendrix drinks coasters

You can buy bongs with your Barclaycard

This is shop counter culture

Disneyland for wannabe drop-outs

Where only tourists wear

Flowers in their hair

Yeah, I Haight Ashbury

Don’t ever bother going there

If you’re going to San Francisco

THE GLORIOUS REVOLUTION OF SIXTEEN HATEY HATE



William of Orange was married to Mary

Mary, a daughter of James the Second

When things in England began to get hairy

A hostile take-over for the crown beckoned

James the Second was Catholic, you see

And that wasn’t on for a British king

He wanted rights equal for christians R.C.

And that got the Protestants all panicking
 



The MPs in Parliament couldn’t agree

Some wanted James out or at least to stand down

But stopping a king isn’t very easy

One can’t simply walk up and knock off his crown

To replace the king, everything should be legal

Or if it’s not legal then you do it with might

Mary, his daughter was appropriately regal

And William, her hubby, was good in a fight
 



So a request was sent, to Holland, asking

Will and Mary to help England depose

James, and take over as queen and as king

to settle the unrest that constantly grows

William of Orange came with his army

James rallied his troops but few heard the call

The Protestant Lords drove the king barmy

By not turning up, so James took a fall
 



James ran to France to first save his own neck

Then raise an army to take back his throne

But as it took time, his chances became wrecked

And James was beginning to look quite alone

The fact that James ran, said the spin doctors

Is proof of the king’s dereliction of duty

His leaving’s a sign of how the king mocked us

So let’s give the crown to Will and his beauty
 



The Proddy majority seemed to accept this

As the legal and rightful and perfect solution

And ‘cos this coup d’etat was rather bloodless

It took on the name: “Glorious Revolution”

But it was bloodless in England only, this story

In Ireland and Scotland it’s much more bloody

To silence the Catholics, King Billy got gory

With many tortured and slain, as you’d see if you study
 
 

The Irish oppression and the Jacobite killing

aimed to stop support for James the Second

If everyone’s dead then there’s no one left willing

To fight for old James, or so William reckoned

And it worked very well, in the time of King Will

No more revolutions fought on British soil

But the scars remain fresh, there’s resentment there still

In Ireland there’s still hate for that Orange Royal

KEEP COMMERCE OUT OF ART

Roses are Raspberry Diva

Violets are Azure Fusion

This poem is sponsored by Dulux

Choose from 1,200 colours

Written, aged 19.

You mean nothing to me

yet everything to me.

I love you and I loathe you. 

I wish you were dead.

I wish you were here - with me. 

With me hurting your neck.

Breaking your neck like 

you broke my heart

which will always belong to you.








Some teenage angst from when I was a teenager, written after being dumped by the first ‘love of my life’. 

I got over it. I also got better at writing. I post it now because I came across it whilst clearing out some files. I’m embarrassed by the violent imagery, but that’s how deeply I hurt at the time. I do like the constant flipping between extreme emotions.

WHEN LOVE TURNS BAD

I’m glad that you left me

I’m happy I’m rid of ya

For you did me wrong

My darling Chlamydia

OLD MAN

Shirt starchly ironed

neat tie over top button

The remaining hairs side-parted with military precision

Sagging chin scraped daily 

by Wilkinson Sword

Tired shoes polished to a youthful shine

but who is it for?
 

That rosy-cheeked lass,

with the infectious laugh and pretty feet,

who you took dancing at the Palais

and who said yes that happy day

has been dead these six years.

The rattling chums you ran with

up the blood-stained beaches of France

on that world-changing day

have long since passed.

The nurtured proof of your sixty-year marriage

moved to other towns and countries.

Visits drying up like spittle on dentures:

grandchildren, grinning strangers on the mantlepiece.
 

All your stories sit in storage

waiting to be aired by someone willing to listen.

But they never come. 

Your best friend now is the black chappy

who sells you your morning paper.

So who is it for?

Even Death doesn’t bother to knock on your door

to reunite you with a world you’d recognise.

Yet, you still rise at six,

brush your blazer free of fluff

and straighten your cuffs

before stepping out.
 

But who is it for?

ABSENT FATHER’S DAY


This is a poem for absent father’s day.

It should have been here yesterday but something came up.

You know how it is. 

But hey, it will make it up to you.

How about it takes you to the zoo next week?
 

This is a poem for absent father’s day.

It’s going to have to take a raincheck on that zoo trip.

It’s got some business it’s got to take care of.

When you’re older you’ll understand. 

It’s got responsibilities. These things happen.

Hey, don’t look like that. 

What are you crying for?

Man up.
 

This is a poem for absent father’s day.

It’s liable to disappear for a few years now. 

But there’s not a day goes by that it doesn’t think about you.

But don’t hold your breath about getting a birthday card.

Or a phone call.
 

This is a poem for absent father’s day.

And one day in the future, it will look at you like a stranger.