‘Lost’ by Chris Hubbard is the new Write Out Loud Poem of the Week. Chris, a retired academic originally from Lincolnshire and now based in Australia, took a creative writing course during his degree studies more than 20 years ago, and was “hooked from then on”. But until he discovered Write Out Loud, he had not published any of his creative work, and has not yet read at any open-mic nights. His favourite poet is Auden, and his favourite poem is ‘Fern Hill’ by Dylan Thomas.

 

 

What got you into writing poetry, and how long have you been writing?

Around 22 years ago, I began a bachelor degree in politics and government which had scope for optional first-year units. One of them was a creative writing course, with emphasis on poetry. I was hooked from then on, and have never really stopped writing it. That would have been around 1994.

 

Do you go to any open-mic nights?

I have thought about going to open mic events here in Perth, but somehow never did. As a retired academic (I started getting educated at the age of 40 and received my doctorate in 2001) I am not fazed by talking in front of large groups; I suppose I simply didn't have confidence that my material was good enough to perform. At my age, and with many years writing, I now have that confidence, although there is limited scope in Perth. Having said all that, I now remember that I did do some very shaky performances of the poetry I was creating during that far-off university poetry class. I recall that I received some positive responses to it at the time.

 

What’s your favourite poet/ poem?

My all-time favourite poet has to be WH Auden. I'll nominate my all-time favourite poem as Dylan Thomas' ‘Fern Hill’ because of its incredible lyricism and magical imagery.

 

You're cast away on a desert island. What's your luxury?

A computer with eternal internet access, and which never runs out of battery!

 

 

 

LOST

by Chris Hubbard 

 

Lost when your eyes are too wide,

lost when the sky

shouts high notes

when it should be whispering;

 

lost when the fires die.

 

Lost when complete strangers

give you the finger and grin,

or when the beer and the noise stop

and you can hear you own ears hissing;

lost,

 

when a mother-of-pearl sunset

in the corner of your eye flicks

into slate and steel,

lost,

 

when the car hits a roadblock

on the wide freeway

and I should care but don't,

and nobody notices;

lost

 

when good-looking people

with wide smiles and intelligent eyes

talk about their lives

like a slow dissolve;

lost,

 

when the rumble and shout

of city streets disappears

like the click of fingers

and turns into a silent film

of a silent city;

 

lost in the one-way system

in a wrong-way way,

and before you know it

it's four a.m., with the radio on ...

 

… and the stale smoke room

is also cold, like winter clouds,

and I must have been asleep,

but not you,

because your eyes are still wide,

and lost,

 

as I am when blank minds skitter

through discarded wasteland

with knives in their shoes

and graffiti in their eyes,

lost

 

because everybody's talking

and I'm listening to no-one but you,

avoiding eye contact in corridors,

banging fists on brick walls,

because they don't make a noise

like a wooden door,

 

a door which might open

and show the sticky floor beyond;

lost

 

when friends forget to call

and their machine's switched off,

and beyond the Frigidaire's compressor buzz

you can hear the V8s spin and growl

in their nocturnal walz,

 

beneath the billowing sky galleons

and big-drop showers,

back-lit by the Moon, angling

and rushing off Southern Ocean combers,

as down payment on next summer's survival.

 

Lost, because all this

squeezes my skull

tight around my brain

and my sight goes

and light becomes shadow,

or only blackness;

 

rips at my clothes,

tears my skin off,

leaves me blind and naked,

burning in the studio Klieg lights,

says “bless your heart”

and strolls slowly away, laughing quietly.