Magic Bus / 1

We begin at the beginning, which was long before the Heat Dome Event of Late June, in the cold and wet of Mid April, when the Arts Collective asked me in for a long-overdue chat. Would I be their Writer in Residence for the first week of the Essex Book Festival, they asked, and could I teach a group of students to write a poem whilst A Poet In Every Port was in town. It sounded easy enough.

In the interests of full disclosure, it was the pay that sealed the deal. The last time anyone up front offered me a fee like this was back in 2019 when The Poetry Society coughed up expenses for travelling to perform at their venue. Right up until about 5pm on Saturday that was still a potent motivator. This morning, all I can think about is how I'll never quite experience the like of yesterday ever again.

Yesterday was as close to an epiphany as I've had since my first publication.

This picture isn't telling the whole story of my Showcase. People were standing at the back, there was a glorious swathe of ages and accents and demographics. The poetry on Saturday night was so, so diverse and compelling and I didn't mind being on last because not one person left. For the second time in this building, a complete stranger came up to me afterwards and raved about my set.

Then, yesterday, for two hours (which honestly lasted for about ten minutes) I taught an adult group how to create a poem from scratch. At least three people around the table had their own work on phones or in notebooks, so really I was there for those who had never thought about the process before, and ALL of them left with work. One person wrote a poem which I will carry with me forever.

It was about marbles, and Grange Hill, and winning, and it was PERFECT.

I think it is a foolish person who goes into situations and doesn't plan for the unexpected. I spent a lot of time last week making sure I knew what to do if things did not follow my anticipated path. In the end, all the extra effort became the unexpected reward, because it was and absolutely continued to be an utter joy watching people who have stories within them find the means to share them.

The best bits of the day however were the ones where I was able to watch what happens when you give people the opportunity to be curious. The kids were amazing (as the library had poems for them too) and the curation that was on show makes me smile just typing this out. Fellow local poets, including my own pamphlet, sat next to legends, were part of a collective body of work.

Validation is a potent motivator as we all know, and it absolutely works.

It's going to take me WEEKS to unpack all of this, if I'm honest. There simply won't be time to do so properly until the Trail is done (which officially starts Saturday, so strap in) which means until I have, we will leave this weekend to percolate without disturbance. I have a LOT to say in official feedback though to The South Bank, mostly on the importance of legacy action.

It is still amazing to me that on any given day I seem to be the only person in my life that lives and breathes poetry. This weekend has reminded me that there are a lot of other people out there, doing the exact same, and maybe if we gave them MORE opportunities that weren't gatekept behind ISBN numbers and used as ways for other people to make money, the World might benefit for good.

Maybe the true point of poetry is to free voices from restriction.