Are Songs Poetry? - Yes

 Are songs poetry?

 That’s a broad question and something that my late friend and poet Christo Heyworth had an ongoing gentle debate with. It was concerning the songs of the Moody Blues, both Christo and I being ‘experts’ on their work. I was ‘yes’ because I find the lyrics to most of their songs poetic, depending on the writer, and all of their albums contain a poem by the late Graeme Edge, drummer and a founder member of the band. Graeme’s poems were performed or recorded as the spoken word set to music and often by Mike Pinder. Graeme’s poems which became actual songs include ‘I’ll Be Level With You’ from the Octave album. I showed Christo my prized copy of one of Graeme’s poetry books. As for songs being poetry, he was a definite ‘no’. I couldn’t persuade him otherwise, but we had some great conversations about it at poetry evenings. We discussed other things too, like the paintings of L.S.Lowry and Christo’s visits to poetry events in Much Wenlock, Shropshire. Christo was always excellent company with lots of interesting topics to share. I wonder what he might have thought of my other poetic song choices.

The lyrics of The Smiths, Morrissey, Oasis, Liam and Noel Gallagher, I can read as poetry. Their creative use of language appeals to me and really makes me listen. Liam’s ‘Paper Crown’ and Morrissey’s ‘Every Day is Like Sunday’ are just two examples of what would be a very long list. I was about sixteen when I first saw Raymond ‘Gilbert’ O’Sullivan on Top of the Pops singing ‘Nothing Rhymed’. There he was, an odd looking bloke with an over-sized cap, sounding a bit like George Formby. He captured my attention with the poetry of his words.

Not all songs can work as poems but poems can work as songs, and I don’t just mean The Song of Hiawatha by Longfellow – I can still recite the part I had to learn by heart in the first year of high school, but I’ll spare you that. I will complain that schools don’t include learning poetry by heart or even reading a whole book, from what I can gather. Anyway, that aside, Robert Burns wrote ballads and sang them, ‘My Love is Like a Red, Red Rose’ and ‘Auld Lang Syne’, two that come to mind.

Radio DJ and musician, Mike Read, wrote music to accompany some of John Betjeman’s poems. Quote from Wikipedia, “…Thirty of these songs were recorded by artists including Cliff Richard, David Essex, Gene Pitney and Marc Almond for the 2006 various artists’ album Words/Music, and subsequently re-released in 2008 as a double CD titled Sound of Poetry. Read’s production of the musical ‘Betjeman’ based on the above has occasionally been staged for charities, including the Royal Marsden Hospital and Children with Leukaemia.”  One of my favourites is David Essex singing Myfanwy.

With an apologetic nod to Christo, though I'm sure he wouldn't mind and would even expect it, I'll finish where I started with the Moody Blues. This time, John Lodge with 'my song', and to me, a poem.

  

One More Time to Live  -  John Lodge

Look out of my window
See the world passing by
See the look in her eye

One more time to live and I have made it mine
Leave the wise to write for they write worldly rhymes

And he who wants to fight begins the end of time...
For I have riches more than these
For I have riches more than these

Desolation
Creation
Tell me someone why there's only confusion
Evolution

Tell me someone that this is all an illusion
Pollution
Tell me someone
Saturation

Tell me someone
Population
Annihilation
Revolution

Tell me someone why this talk of revolution
Confusion
Tell me someone when we're changing evolution
Illusion

Tell me someone
Conclusion
Tell me someone
Starvation

Degradation
Humiliation
Contemplation
Changes in my life

Inspiration
Elation
Changes in my life
Salvation

Changes in my life
Communication
Compassion
Solution

Look out on the hedgerow
As the world rushes by
Hear the birds sign a sigh

One more tree will fall how strong the growing vine
Turn the earth to sand and still permit no crime
How one thought will live provide the others die
For I have riches more than these
For I have riches more than these

(From the album Every Good Boy Deserves Favour, 1971)

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Purple patch.

Good afternoon readers.
This week on the blog it has been all things purple. We've had colour inspirations, critical analysis and funny examples of found purple prose. This all leaves me in a bit of a cul-de-sac for ideas and so, as I like to post a Sunday poem, I've found inspiration in the over-elaborate dreams my girlfriend has been sharing with me. I think this may also double as chemical writing advice.

Purple.

My girl is quitting fags again
She is showing me the way
She is mad and stressed and I confess
I'm being careful what I say.

On her arm she wears a magic patch
A steady stream of nicotine
It helps her cope but there's a catch
She is having purple dreams.

Fleshed out in vivid detail
Whilst clutching at the quilt
She sleep talks about lizards
Coming for her wearing stilts.

The alligators swim the floor
She mans the Enterprise
There are walking, talking Russian dolls
And jars of fireflies.

It brings out a kind of madness
Such surreal thoughts in her head
So when stuck for inspiration
Wear a purple patch to bed.


Thanks for reading,
S.

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Totally devoted to green

Totally devoted to green

Oh Green,

I am so hopeful,

That the fields and the trees will stay,

And fill my vista for mile and miles,

Evoking the medium wavelength triggers of the M cone cells in my eyes everyday.

Oh Green,

You are not blue.

More a Mixture of cyan and yellow in the subtractive colour system in print,

One of the three additive lights of screens,

The colour of a spearmint.

Oh Green,

You so lovely,

As de Bono's creative thinking hat.

The shine of Jade and Emeralds,

The probably glow of Schrödinger’s cat.

Oh Green,

I am so jealous,

Of your soft warm natural hue.

And in the continuum of colours of visible light,

You are located between Yellow and Blue.

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Very superstitious.

Morning all,

The theme this week is Superstitions, a subject that never fails to throw a divide down between believers and cynics. Now, I'm no authority on the subject but, one thing I do know is that superstitions are complex things. I have them. I don't believe in them. I am though, a football supporter and as every fan can tell you, this leads to the strangest things taking on a value.

Four years ago, as Blackpool climbed League One to gain promotion, I had a lucky pen. It started here. A pen I took to the games became a pen and a lighter, a pre-match ritual of cheese on toast, lucky pants, socks, notepads, gloves. If you could keep it the same from one week to the next, I did.

Since that season I have had a badge, a coat, boots, trainers, four or five tangerine lighters and, new for 2011, a five pound note. All of these things hold a lucky value to me, a superstition if you like but, on the whole I think they all come down to changes- or lack of them.

I should, given that I don't believe in them, throw these tokens away. The £5 note has been in my wallet for weeks now- since the five goal drubbing of Leeds away. Something about it just screamed 'good luck' and it has been in there ever since. Maybe it is the "Jesus Is Lord" stamp that covers the Queen's head on one side, maybe it is the "God is so Good" stamp on the other. Thinking about it like this, it frightens me a little.

That some fanatic could have spent the time and effort to stamp and recirculate these notes is one thing. For me to hold on to one as if it were a blessed charm is another. The barista at my local coffee shop (supporter of a rival team) confiscated it last week and actually chewed it. I still have the sodding thing.

As a writer I am becoming increasingly aware of these everyday traits people have. I see them in myself. In people tapping their hands, touching wood, clicking pens... It is these kinds of details that make the worlds we create come to life. I've been thinking a lot about writing fiction- character development and so on, and these little things are really starting to ask and answer my own doubts about the plot as a whole. It is in the thought processes, the details and the reasonings behind those choices that we discover the most and so, reader, your task this week is to have a think about three different superstitions you have. How can these find a way into your own characters? How do they make you feel? When did they come about? Why do they happen? What do they mean? Really get your teeth in.

I'm going to give this a go myself as well just to see how many things I notice about the world when I actually look for them. As I said at the top, I still don't really believe in superstitions in general but they are very much a part of the world we live in and as yet another 'in' into the landscapes and relationships we create not only in prose but in poetry too, they are proving a most useful resource. One thing though- it sucks you in. I've started worrying about 'the change in an unexpected direction' that my horoscope warned of...

Touch wood, I'll still be here next week. Until then, thanks for reading.

S.

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Finding Inspiration.

I'm not here.

I'm not here to make a half-arsed remark about the demise of the Murdoch empire, the weather over the weekend or even the things that inspire me, with poetry. In fact, there is every chance I am still a little drunk- I'm at Latitude.

Last night I saw Saul Williams and Jo Shapcott. I hope they were amazing. On Friday I saw Linton Kwesi Johnson and Saturday may just have seen me squeeze in Tim Key. Don't be rude. I've seen other things too; probably music, cabaret, groundbreaking new theatre, woodland art, a couple of film stars and the usual array of festival novelties not really worth a mention on a poetry blog.

So there we are. I haven't really blogged at all. You aren't really reading this and, by the time I come back from the festival, I might think of something worth telling you- in which case I will post a further comment. Those of you that don't bother reading titles will not know that this week's theme is Finding Inspiration (chosen by the lovely Lara) and so for that, I feel I am letting the side down a little. The truth is, last minute as ever is probably all about finding inspiration for me. The idea that pops into your head just when you're already running behind... There is so much to do before Latitude, I'll leave you with this:

For me to write down,

All of the stuff in my head.

An impossibi...

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When you forget to consider your audience...

Disclaimer: The post that follows is fictitious, and any similarity with real events or people is merely coincidental. The views presented are not necessarily shared by the writer, but have been imagined so that the piece can achieve its purpose in the most effective way.

It’s a Friday night in Blackpool, and a tucked away coffee shop is full. Poetry is everyone’s reason for being there – for braving the stormy conditions that ride in on the Irish Sea, and rattle every hoarding in the seaside town.

It’s about halfway through the evening when a man (who’s never been before) is invited up to read.

Host: Our next reader is...

The host looks puzzled (as if he’s just been asked what (304 × 105) ÷ 12 equals), he scans the running order then stares at it. But the calculation, rather than becoming simpler, becomes more challenging.

Host: ...Please welcome Gandalf to the microphone

Hands clap. Necks stretch as a man in a purple velvet suit and matching hat weaves through the audience.

Gandalf: Yeah. That’s what I’m talking about. Appreciation when I’ve done nothin’. Like the dude over there said...

He points his finger and waves it like he’s about to cast a spell.

Gandalf: ...I’m Gandalf. Well, not really, but it sounds better than John. So yeah, don’t live here anymore – thank God – just visitin’ a poor sod that does.
Wrote this poem this mornin’ on the train and thought I’d read it. Don’t know what all the fuss is about, people always complainin’ that poetry is difficult. Rubbish. Piece of piss, if you ask me.

At this point, sets of eyes begin to glaze over – like parasitic symbionts have just crawled inside the audience’s ears and implanted themselves within the frontal lobe of everyone’s brains. John (aka Gandalf) fails to notice that he’s not only losing the audience, but also offending them.

Gandalf: Yeah, so bein’ in Blackpool and all, I thought I’d write about Blackpool. Not hard to come up with ideas really, is it? Even the title was easy to come up with - just came straight to me. Like I was bein’ charged by a divine force, or somethin’. So yeah, it’s called Blackpool...

The audience begins to fidget uncomfortably in their seats. A few people turn to those sitting next to them and whisper, ‘This is going to be bad’.

Gandalf: You’re Tracey Emin’s pop-tent,
absolutely shite.
You’re full of sluts with STDs
and pissed up stags at night.

The host, who seconds earlier had taken a sip from his Americano, splutters out coffee and proceeds to choke. But John (aka Gandalf) continues undeterred, speaking his lines with the same ease as which David Cameron spins a lie.

Gandalf: You’re week-old Chinese takeaway,
better in the bin.
If London’s streets are paved in gold
then yours are lined with tin.

The normally placid audience begins to slowly revolt, fists bang on tables and a chorus of ‘OFF, OFF, OFF’ attempts to drown out the slanderous verse. However, John (aka Gandalf) chooses to ignore the audience’s request and merely increases the volume at which he’s speaking.

Gandalf: You’re Tesco Value lemonade,
cheap but lacking fizz.
You’re certainly the weakest link
in every T.V. quiz.

The coffee shop becomes like the inside of a theatre at Christmas – filled with boos and hisses.

Gandalf: You’re the ‘crap’ in every scrapheap;
a town of utter hell.
You’re the tacky Poundland reject
that no bugger can sell.

Before John (aka Gandalf) has even finished reading his poem, the host leaps from his seat and grabs the microphone.

Host: Err. Thanks Gandalf, but I’ll take it from here...

The audience cheers.

* * * * *

RULE ONE (to being a good poet or performer): ALWAYS remember to consider your reader/audience.

Thank you for reading.
Lar

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Bombing out: The difficult second post.

We’ve all been there. It has been a great idea. The most heartfelt piece you’ve ever written- and it bombs.

Tragic? Yes, for the time being but, if there is anything I have learnt from writing and regularly performing /reading aloud, it is that the audience can change. A lot. Somewhere amongst the drunks at the end of the night (which obviously, as fate would have it, is your allocated slot), great lines can go unheard. A soft spoken voice can be muffled by the clinking and if, by some miracle, it is comprehended, is that the kind of person that is going to speak up in support of your new ‘best ever poem’? No.

Yet, in following that point through with minimal disagreement, you reader, yes, I’m talking to you, have just run the risk yourself of being heckled, ignored or simply put up with by the audience... You assumed.

I’ve assumed and it isn’t nice when it all goes wrong. I’ve since started to consider just who my target audience is before getting down to writing poems. Back when I was reporting on the football, this was a given- a Scottish tabloid, not surprisingly, wanted all the juice on Mr Charlie Adam and so I wrote generally about girders, Glasgee and tough tackles amongst other things. Snippets of action and actual match facts amongst a blanket of pro-Jock hyperbole and rhetoric. Line after line of it, and they gobbled it up. The trouble I found is that, when facing the blank page, the easiest things to flow out are often the worst to read out.

With an event coming up, wit can be hard to come by and if, like I did, you are just starting out writing as a hobby, something fun can be the last thing you feel compelled to push a quill over. For a lot of people, poems aren’t the first thing to write in a moment of inspiration. They instead come at sombre times, times of importance to a person and often, with mixed feelings or in the heat of the moment. Some of the best work comes from here but also, we get these (of which I am frequently guilty):

1. Dead people- pieces from the heart, the crux of life and yet rarely all that popular at an open mic.

2. Emotions & Relationships- most notably, our old friend the sonnet. I’ve seen crowds turn faster than milk in student digs.

3. Protests- serious animal rights, contentious issues and religion. Really, I’m quite liberal. I’m bloody vegan but don’t tell me about dead bears and fur on a Friday.

In the right place, at the right time, 'proper poems' fly. I’ve had people coming up after quiet events to ask about lines (they obviously didn’t hear, did they). I’ve stood three weeks later somewhere different, read the same poem and had a room of empty faces not so much looking as facing back at me. In hindsight, visual metaphors were always going to be tough at the Blind Society but that isn’t the point.

As I’m on the first day of the theme, I’m leaving this post short of all the things I actually wanted to write about in the hope that, come Sunday, the marvellous team will have covered things like rhyme, form, meter etc but for now, I’ll just leave you with this.

We made a visit to Hodgson School on Thursday- 90 kids all high on pop and sweets and to be honest, we were fine. Interest remained strong, some even looked like they were enjoying being read to and afterwards, Lara, Vicky and myself enjoyed the rockstar treatment with teenagers queuing, yes, bloody queuing for autographs! I don’t know why I’m surprised at this though- Lar selected some of her most accessible lines, Vicky blasted in with wit and snappy haikus and I went with some tried and tested short pieces (even touching on some sentiment once they’d accepted me). All you doubters out there- we got through without a cock joke, racist slur or profanity in sight. A tough crowd it might have been- the point is, we’d simply considered it.

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Everything Starts with a 'Bang'

I could start at the beginning. There was a ‘bang’. A small, dense state that expanded rapidly. But in the shadow cast by such a creation, I’m almost certain to get lost. To be reduced to a condition of insignificance, like a single ant in a colony of millions. I would fail to communicate with you, the reader, about who I am, why and how I’m involved in this blog. And in the online scheme of things, it would seem that these are the important questions.

Words have the ability to be either crumbs or pheromones, and the writer has the potential to either create a trail that is easily erased (by hungry birds), or one that leads to a pool of raspberry jam – necessary, important and addictive.

I’ve always had a liking for words, a growing dependency to read the musings and imaginations of others, and a need – which is almost inarticulate – to place my own mind on paper. Generally, I write poetry, occasionally, I stray into prose but I always find myself wandering back to line breaks and stanzas.

In the beginning, there was a ‘bang’. A B.A. in English: Language, Literature and Writing at Blackpool & The Fylde College. A poetry group, that started in a classroom and expanded rapidly. In the end (which is actually somewhere in the middle), there was the opportunity to enrol on a Creative Writing M.A. at Lancaster University.

A year into the M.A. and I can already see a change in my poetry; a greater awareness of the reader, poems that are less opaque, less cryptic, and which seem to be moving towards something with real purpose. Hopefully, in future blog posts, I’ll be able to share some of the things that I have learnt (am learning) on the M.A., and discuss some of the issues / difficulties that I’ve encountered in my own poetry. I don’t claim to have all the answers; however, I do believe that instigating discussion allows different perspectives to be considered, and gives us the opportunity to learn something new. With six regular writers and a different guest blogger every Sunday, this blog will offer a range of opinions and insights – giving us all the chance to see poetry from a fresh angle.

At the beginning of all beginnings, there’s a ‘bang’. An explosion of imagination, and countless possibilities.

If you’d like to find out more about me, then please feel free to read my profile

Lar

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