Chris,
I never had a doubt...congratulations to you, Glenys, and Natalie for the work you all put in.

See you there.

Comment is about ThePoetry Spoke is back Fantastic NEW Venue - (blog)

Original item by Chris Co

An also within all this political debate there is a really tight clever little poem that gets its point across. Well done Steve

Comment is about £10 million for this? (blog)

Original item by steve pottinger

They weren't by any chance trying to sell Margaret Thatcher annuals at the time, were they ;?

I've read that Ray Bradbury book and can't for the life of me remember a thing about it - it must have been good.

Glad to hear that a free press is just that. Congratulations all, on raising it from the ashes.

Comment is about Write Out Loud regulars in collection supporting fire-hit bookshop (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Does poetry make us ruthless? Mmm. Now there's one well worth mulling over.

Comment is about Vive la difference: Tennyson's heirs and Thatcher's children (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Alex the foto is of my blood on the bedroom floor- after an epileptic fit.

Comment is about How do women escape? (blog)

Original item by Tommy Carroll

Félicitations Laura pour ton inclusion dans l'anthologie !

Interesting and informative article - good job!
Thank you for sharing :-)

Comment is about Write Out Loud regulars in collection supporting fire-hit bookshop (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Good luck everyone
with the theme
of a good
old political rant
Tories too right
Labour hard left
stuck in middle
miss a turn
till you make
up your mind
on second thoughts
you May not!

Comment is about Stockport WoL (group profile)

Original item by Stockport WoL

Letting Go

Notes of sin
stuffed in handbag
open the window
let them go
wind of change
will blow hard
scattering far away
from the bed
of emotional scars.

Comment is about The last night remembered and spent (blog)

Original item by Katy Megan

I'm reminded of Ray Bradbury's book 'Fahrenheit 451', especially as the book contains 45 poems!

Nice one Laura!

Comment is about Write Out Loud regulars in collection supporting fire-hit bookshop (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Hey Richard, Cheers for your comments on TWO a.M.-nice one mate!

Comment is about Richard Alfred (poet profile)

Original item by Richard Alfred

Bookshop burning sends a shiver down my spine. Too reminiscent of what we thought was a bygone era. Great article Laura. I hope we can help through this.

Comment is about Write Out Loud regulars in collection supporting fire-hit bookshop (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Just a quick note, Mays Night will be the usual fourth Sunday but due to a prior booking Junes will be the 30th.

Review is about Write Out Loud - Middleton on 28 Apr 2013 (event)

I occasionally get the impression that performance poets would like to have been rock stars, but never learned to play the guitar. Just occasionally.

Comment is about The Word on the Street: Paul Muldoon, Faber (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Short and savage, every character a victim, even the eye witness. The title is excellent - that electric fencing between wishes, needs and action.

Comment is about How do women escape? (blog)

Original item by Tommy Carroll

Saleema, I am only trying - to catch the spirit of your verse, its sincerity. I know poetic traditions differ, especially in cross languages. I am trying,in so far as I understand English poetry, to make your ideas catch the imagination of the average English reader. English styles vary hugely. One major difference, I think, between Western and Eastern poetry, is the use of repetition. One tradition uses it hugely and the other very little. It's a major hurdle in cross-translating. Neither one is wrong or right - that would be sheer idiocy.

Comment is about link

Fantastic Harry. Really like the simplicity of this and the way it tells such a complex story full of emotion in so few words. Classic!
Ian

Comment is about Posthumous (blog)

Original item by Harry O`N eill

Poets are often also good musicians so the two seem to go hand in hand although, sadly, not in my case.

Comment is about The Word on the Street: Paul Muldoon, Faber (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Love this! Great audio! Take care, Tony.

Comment is about Drunk (Spinning Wheel Blues) (blog)

Original item by Ian Whiteley

Thanks Greg! I'm just really glad to be able to help out in some way. Massive credit to Alex for all her hard work and the idea in the first place.

Comment is about Write Out Loud regulars in collection supporting fire-hit bookshop (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Thank you Cynthia! What a lovely thing to say :)

Glad you enjoyed it. I noticed that your brilliant poem Dreamfooter was in BoMP - was delighted to see it in there, remember loving that poem when you first put it up

Comment is about Cynthia Buell Thomas (poet profile)

Original item by Cynthia Buell Thomas

Hi Connor - I like your poem. Welcome to WOL - hope you will enjoy the site and put a poem on the blog section - more people see them there.

Comment is about connor.may.cm@gmail.com (poet profile)

Original item by connor.may.cm@gmail.com

Hi Graham - welcome to WOL. Be nice to see some of your poems on here. Hope you enjoy the site!

Comment is about Graham Rhodes (poet profile)

Original item by Graham Rhodes

Hi Carol - a very warm welcome to WOL. Hope you will enjoy the site and taking part too :)

Comment is about Carol Robson (poet profile)

Original item by Carol Robson

We'll be keeping an eye out for the results, Lettie. Looking forward to more contributions from you in the future. Greg

Comment is about Deadline nears in voting for Saboteur spoken word awards (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Thanks for this piece, Laura, and congratulations on your inclusion in this anthology, in what looks like a very competitive field! I will order my copy soonest. Greg

Comment is about Write Out Loud regulars in collection supporting fire-hit bookshop (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

I Like this, Ian.
I'm teetotal these days but have vivid recollections of watching the walls slide away and then putting them back again; then they slide away again.
I like the circularity of it and the roundabout music suits it so well.

Comment is about Drunk (Spinning Wheel Blues) (blog)

Original item by Ian Whiteley

I didn't realise that you'd already doen a 100 lines on the subject, boy! No one likes a smarty pants :-)
I think we may well have attended the same skool based on your observations, although those teacher's names don't see familiar.
Ian

Comment is about Skool Daze (blog)

Original item by Ian Whiteley

In the video Muldoon's look reminds me, a little, of Dylan from his Blonde on Blonde era. I understand that he has argued for a reconnection between poetry and song. For someone, like me, who is always interested in the point where music and poetry meet, this sounds like an interesting development in his work, Frances.

Comment is about The Word on the Street: Paul Muldoon, Faber (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

please Sir...may I give my praises
to you for the great combination
of poem itself,the title
and the fantastic photo

sorry I was late in doing so Sir
but I have been busy behind the bike shed.

Also me Muvver asks could you read my poem
on the same subject
titled-Wilde'skool days.

I'll go back to me place in the corner now Sir.
Oh-have you got a larger dunces hat?
cos I aint got a kids 'ed anymore.xx

Comment is about Skool Daze (blog)

Original item by Ian Whiteley

lively, informative interview there Lettie. Thank you.

Comment is about Deadline nears in voting for Saboteur spoken word awards (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

my endless wows are yours!x

Comment is about The last night remembered and spent (blog)

Original item by Katy Megan

Shades of Zagler and Evans' song, In the Year 2525: Everything you eat, do and say/was in the pill you took today.

Comment is about Checkpoint (blog)

Original item by Kealan Coady

Hi Mike
Thanks for reading On the Block
It's not a condemnation of the youth of today just an observation. This was only the fifth poem I wrote. Since then I have written a couple with a more sympathetic view of our young people. Blame was not the intention. Thank you for your comments though Mike, much appreciated mate.
Cheers
Pete The Bus Driving Poet.

Comment is about Noetic-fret! (poet profile)

Original item by Noetic-fret!

Brilliant! I for one can really understand this piece more than many know. Even in our waking hours it seems there 'are' controllers that abuse us on a different level than our current conscience mind perceives, only the other day, I had the very real feeling of being Scalped. It is one of many incidents that defy 'most' people's level of understanding. These experiences have been happening for a long time for me. I have considered the possibility of voodoo at work and all manner of theories. My best theory though, is that we can be manipulated by 'other' forces. Forces at work keen to cause upset and mayhem. These experiences are so difficult to deal with on a daily basis, and it has been going on for years. I have had feelings of amputation, castration and beheading and I actually feel the pain and sometimes involuntarily move because of them. I also go through stages of shock because of these experiences. Since my days in the forces I have gone through a great deal of suffering and many don't understand how it affects me. I am sure you have an understanding of this kind of phenomena by the words you have written here.

Very intelligent piece that would scare many, but be welcomed by those who know of these kinds of sufferings.

Personally, I think the whole planet is susceptible to this.

Nice work.

best wishes,

Mike

Comment is about Checkpoint (blog)

Original item by Kealan Coady

It's an angle! A good angle but here I have to have some empathy with our young people. Without saying too much, they have only ever known doom and gloom. Back in our day things were more optimistic, we had Glasnost and Perstoika, we had The Berlin Wall come down, we had Nelson Mandela freed and the end of Apartheid and White Minority Rule in South Africa, the Cold War became over and generally there was more optimism in the world. What do our school leavers have to look forward to when they leave? It shouldn't happen I know, but what they have grown with is a society that's losing it's fabric. Nevertheless a good read, you can empathize with the family, but it does sound a little bitter and places blame where it may not necessarily lie.

As Mike says, good stuff at the end of the day.

best wishes,

t'other mike

Comment is about ON THE BLOCK (blog)

Original item by Pete Slater

You write well Fiona, I would even suggest perhaps in the not too distant future you venture a publisher to look at some of your work. It is certainly better than some who are in the shops.

This piece leaves me wanting to read more.

Thank you

Mike

Comment is about Days (blog)

Original item by fiona sinclair

The festival organisers made me very welcome, Julian; and I'm sure they would welcome you, too. David Andrew came to hear me read on Sunday night, and to take some pictures - thanks, David. Laura says she is interested in coming along. Maybe we can have a Write Out Loud works outing to Cheltenham next year!

Comment is about Vive la difference: Tennyson's heirs and Thatcher's children (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

I am jealous, both of your superb way with your dispatches, and of the fact that you are there and me here; although I suppose it is the quality of the former that creates in me the latter. Brilliantly done, Greg.

Comment is about Vive la difference: Tennyson's heirs and Thatcher's children (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Context is subjective. How many times have you been stopped by the police for no good reason? How many of your friends have nearly died after being restrained (having never commited or even been accused a crime !) by those employed to protect and serve, then been paid off for their silence?

Who has failed to regret anything here? The significance to me of some of these events will be different to to yours or probably anybody else's. Should I regret all death's equally? Is there not room for a range of human and artistic reaction?

Why does my work have to be seen according to the context in which you see it? The answer is it does not.

You chastise me for writing about a well known case, suggesting the light must be shone on areas that would otherwise have been ignored, but choose to write about Maggie's funeral.

I am not arguing, simply discussing your ignorance and hypocrisy!

Comment is about One Of Us - A Stephen Lawrence Tribute (blog)

Original item by Mark Mr T Thompson

I am not the "enemy" - the enemy is the virulent inability to see the bigger picture and place such dreadful happenings in context -and to regret them ALL. That way - and that way alone - lies a healthy adjusted society that feels free from resorting to insult or abuse.
To argue is vanity - to discuss: sanity!

Comment is about One Of Us - A Stephen Lawrence Tribute (blog)

Original item by Mark Mr T Thompson

Thank you i will take your comments on board. you are all very kind. More poems to come as i have a mammoth task of rewriting

Fiona

Comment is about Days (blog)

Original item by fiona sinclair

I am reminded of an out of body story related by a previously cynical surgeon who had operated on a patient who had recounted that experience after a difficult operation. The surgeon in question was happy to go along with his patient's tale but was shocked out of his complacency when the patient described a surgical instrument the surgeon had used - something that the latter had only brought to the operating theatre AFTER the procedures had begun, with the patient anaesthetised - and "out of it". There's more to existence than we know!

Comment is about "Michael Seen Flora" (blog)

Original item by John Coopey

Powerful stuff that also does justice to other conflicts in which the single human spirit grapples with horrors almost beyond imagining in the struggle to survive and make sense, however remote at that time, of what is being endured. My late father survived the trenches of 1917/18, while a maternal uncle died in action in 1916. They would surely have recognised the content of this poem.

Comment is about Unto the Somme (blog)

Original item by Simon Austin

Hi again Shirley - thanks for taking the trouble to read "Dambuster" - and for the kind comment. It was a memorable experience sitting there listening to an actual participant from that legendary WW2 deed. Can you imagine how popular he and his pilot (the American Joe McCarthy) were with the other crew as they kept going around until satisfied that the bomb drop was accurate at that difficult to reach target? The other planes intended to attack that dam didn't do so for various reasons and the target, while damaged, stayed intact. "617" lost fifty three crew (nearly half their number) on that raid on three separate dams. Only recently have Bomber Command got their proper memorial here in Green Park, central London.

Comment is about Shirley Smothers (poet profile)

Original item by Shirley Smothers

It's strange how certain themes seem to cycle simultaneously through the group on WOL, with no apparent connection other than thought waves. Yes, I know DEATH is high on the charts lately with media coverage, but, still, the persistent coincidences are odd.

Comment is about The Candy Train (blog)

Original item by Cynthia Buell Thomas

Thank you sir, that's very kind of you :)

Comment is about Broken Alone (blog)

Original item by Simon Austin

Well, there you have it. I spent a long time on this, trying to adhere with honour to what I thought was the original intent. But I'm not sure. For example, I finally decided that 'death' was personified. If I'm way off track, I'm not quite certain what was intended. I did not use capitals for 'Him', although I think that would be more appropriate. To be honest, I believe this version reads very well. The question is: was this the idea intended?

To Souhad I offer my deepest apologies if this work is in any way annoying. I did not see the 'word for word' translation, and so may be more than one 'idea' away from the original. The intent is very powerful. That is what I tried to capture, and keep, as I perceived it.

Comment is about link

Ms Sinclair, you have power in your way with words, and your sly twists, equally. I find your choices of diction and arrangement suit me well, as I follow the lead of structured rhythm and assonance. If this is the result of instantaneous writing, I'm almost ready to lay down my own quill! The title 'Days' is brutal.

Comment is about Days (blog)

Original item by fiona sinclair

I like this, John. It reads 'rough' but very sincere. I think, with a little more 'craftsmanship', it would be a gem of both words and emotion. I make this comment only because WOL is a poetry site, encouraging our best quality writing.

I can just hear the howls of 'She's so insensitive!' But not true.

Comment is about "Michael Seen Flora" (blog)

Original item by John Coopey

I've only done a bedside vigil once in my life and found it deeply harrowing - though I wouldn't have been anywhere else.

Those closest to the dying do go without sleep for what seems to be humanly impossible periods of time and I suppose that could induce delusions - as your father suggested.

I will never forget the dog howling though - at the exact minute of passing over or extinction of life, if you prefer to believe that. It had placed itself well away from the bed and had been silent all night. It does make you wonder what happens that the human eye just can't see.

I liked the way the last verse is open to interpretation.

Comment is about "Michael Seen Flora" (blog)

Original item by John Coopey