“Look, thanks” he says, “but poetry isn’t really my thing, you know.
The whole sonnets about frolicking in the countryside. It isn’t me”
He slides my flyer back over the bar.
Dear Birmingham,
I’d like to tell you about your poetry scene.
And though it’s not my thing
comparing stanzas to landscapes
I’d like to give it a try.
You might not think it’s poetry otherwise.
Let’s see this metaphor through.
At poetry nights, like in the countryside,
you can put miles between people’s minds as they cram
bum-to-bum in the extra rooms of public Brum.
Where similes stretch the roof as blue as the room outside
and the space around your brain booms with the quiet
of just the right line break. And the hush of the cliff hang
that lands on audience members
when they aren’t too sure if the poem has ended.
I’d like to tell you about your poetry scene,
but see, you might not even hear it
because it’s the quiet people come for.
Who needs the peace of frolicking in fields
when you have that open mic etiquette
that silences mobiles harder
than any poor signal in the wilderness?
Now let’s see how far we can stretch this metaphor.
Poets – bear with me – are like the sheep.
Yeah. From afar they’re all lofty and propped up
in the higher altitudes of Brummie culture, right?
From afar, they’re woolly. They knit inwards.
From afar you can see them flock to tradition.
And sure, we shouldn’t be ashamed
to use the old-fashioned meters and forms,
but maybe these sheep chase the old protocols
for the sake of it.
Strange. Last time I was close-up with a sheep,
it didn’t so much as follow me…
I was stuck in a snow drift in the Peak District.
It was late, and when you lose the path, it’s hard
to walk through snow that plunges up to your thighs.
As I waded through white noise, trying not to panic,
I found these hoof prints cut into the ice like bite marks
as if they knew where to go to find the human path.
I mean what maniac makes those tracks in the first place?
Sheep do.
Yes, please point out the irony.
I know you can make a whole new cliche
out of the fact that I followed the sheep
to the road.
I followed a sheep.
Birmingham, I want to tell you about your poetry scene.
But you think that us poets graze
off the landscape of arts grants and charities
all for an ageing, outdated activity.
How easy is it, right? To put ourselves in the national trust
that our peaks – and our poetry – will be protected from time
by the kindness of conservation.
But trust me. It’s a cold climate out there right now.
That’s why I’ve seen sheep need to cut new tracks
like bite-marks in ice.
Likewise, let me tell you about your poetry scenery.
I’ve seen your centre Hit Words Up into Jam
whilst the outer areas Howl, take Grizzly Poetry Bites
out of the city skyline.
You make your own landscapes.
Come to an event with me and sweat.
See how we have to forge our own footpaths
just to get to the mic stand, those nights
when the overgrowth of beanbags and knees
– fed and watered by urban coffee –
forms a perilous canopy over the lower half of the store.
There is hot life in this open mic-rocosm
an echo system of natural feedback.
But I need to tell you about your scenery
by comparing stanzas to landscapes.
Cause I’m not sure you’ll think it’s poetry otherwise –
in which case, maybe we poets need to make the most
out of the molten state of spoken word
Let’s carve contours into the very dictionary definition of poetry,
swell the YouTube streams that groove gorges into cyberspace.
I mean what maniac makes those tracks in the first place?
Sheep do.
Dear Birmingham, amidst all the din,
do you know what it sounds like
when sheep become leaders?