Category Archives: words

the lamps are not lit
the end does not begin
the walls do not talk
the mirror does not crack
the drugs do not work
the scars do not hurt
the books do not burn
the fight is not won
the photograph does not fade
the best lies are never told
the bird does not sing
the dead are not seen
footsteps do not betray
I do not give my heart away

I wrote poetry when I was a child, probably from around the age of eight to the beginning of my angsty teens. Between my inability to critique my own poems & the dawning realisation that I was being an awful cliché, I resisted writing any more (you will never, ever see my childhood poems). But while I was studying at university, I sometimes found myself scribbling poems — some short, some very short. Still, I never thought of writing poetry to be one of my hobbies: I considered it a freak occurrence — a moment of weakness — a lapse of the brain. Yet I stumble across them every so often, all origins forgotten, and it seems a shame to lose them. I’m getting over my prejudice, I think — not to mention my good sense & self restraint.

So now-here there is a page called WORDS, under which you will find, should you be so reckless, poems of varying ages and a series in progress of cut-up poems. I think of them as book poems, which is not the most helpful name one might come up with but that is what my brainhead seems to have decided upon and by my brainhead I shall abide.

For a long time, too, if someone told me they wrote poetry, my reaction would always be something like, “O no! Keep it away from me!” (Not that I ever said that aloud, of course.) So I understand if you are similarly prejudiced. If you do read them, I’m quite touched & hope you don’t regret it later.