Reading in Reading

Writing poetry is fun. That’s why I’m the house poet at Sunday Assembly High Wycombe – I write poetry at their monthly events and read them out at the end of each assembly. Apparently, people like it – which is why I was invited to do a little something at Sunday Assembly Reading. Here’s what I came up with…

 

Cheque this out

and forget it!

Check ignition;

our engines are ready

and raring to go,

stuck in traffic

and circling the city,

one half marathon

and nowhere to go.

I wasn’t expecting

rockets.

Blast back off

beneath green seas

in a yellow submarine,

where everything seems clean

and easy,

full steam ahead

in the back of

The Purple Turtle.

This isn’t half a marathon,

it’s a full quick sprint

with a drink at the end,

something to think and live

like an instinct,

people to meet

and sing with.

It’s time to tell yourself a story;

it begins with the who and the what,

the how and the why

and the where the hell

did the last five years ago?

Six-year-old Anna’s

in an art class,

drawing fish and things

with older kids

listening in

and looking on

in judgement –

if nothing else

it’s a lesson in

adversity.

Read life has dangling modifiers;

it has potholes and bad dialogue,

unsuspended disbelief,

slow pacing and

spelling mistakes

and there’s no such thing

as the 8-point story arc.

Stories bring people together;

they fly off the page into the brain,

they make us the same

but somehow different,

each story is another life

you live through.

Youv’e still got time

to change the ending.