written and posted by members of Lancashire Dead Good Poets' Society

Monday 23 January 2012

Friendship needed for behind enemy lines...



Evening all.

I trust that here, amongst internet friends, I don't have to apologise too much for again posting up late. I know, it is becoming a joke but I'm a busy guy...

Anyway, the theme this week is friendship which, at first, seems an easy one. We all have friends, we all know what that means and we all know pretty much what an actual friend is. Pushing it further than that though (no, not friends with benefits) and it starts to go either a little soppy or a little bit 'do you remember the time...'.
I think I'm probably of the soppy variety lately- and am more than feeling guilty about still not visiting my BEST friend's near six month old baby as yet. Life being life though, a bit of space and that has become nearly a boundary now so this week I'll be sorting something with him. Here comes the soppy bit- I actually welled up in the car a couple of weeks ago as I was near his house. I got to thinking just as Elbow came onto the radio- cue Guy Garvey's lyric.

"gentle shoulder charge,
 love you man"

I don't know if it was how northern it came across, how simple it was or how we maybe just don't say it enough but it darn near got me. I played the track on repeat, just to try and set the frame of mind and forgot completely what it was I had initially wanted to say.

I've been trying to write something on this for a while now. Thursday night sees the bloggers shipping out to Preston for WordSoup (with Jo Bell) and behind enemy lines (which is anywhere with a PR postcode for me) I want something decent written. Is it being 'too close' to the poem? Is it trying 'too hard' for the poem? Is it just not having enough direction figured out for the poem? Preston calls and I don't like doing repeats, not at all so I'm going to try and write on a different subject for a day, see if it triggers something whilst I'm not concentrating.

Once again, apologies for the short, late post- work and the old block... I'll at least have a poem for you guys next week, promise. If it is just happens to be on this week's theme- well, friendship is a great theme for writing, isn't it. ;)

Thanks for reading, S.

2 comments:

Standard said...

Think we're all in the same boat this week aren't we? At least, not being a real poet, I don't know who Jo Bell is and therefore am blissfully unaware of the pressure! Think I just finished my poem for Thursday so just editing to go now. Will probably post a middle section or summat for Wednesday. Good luck Shaun, thinking of you, though the quality of your recent output makes me think you'll blow us all away anyway.

Ashley Lister said...

Shaun,

I can't wait to see you on-stage on Thursday.

Ash