The Power of Poetry

The Power of Poetry ©

By

Michael Casey

I was taking a leak last night, and I casually thought what should I write tomorrow. I’ve written over 1200 pieces according to some counts, or 1,102,014 words according to yesterday’s log, that’s 3500 pages over 14 books now. This piece will appear in 15 Down when I have written enough material to fill it. So why did Poetry spring to mind, was it the sound of my own spring? Or was I just thinking I’ve written a few easy flippant pieces so why not try a bit of poetry for variety? I never know what you the reader, singular, like as Terry Wogan used to say. So if you are sitting comfortable still sobering up after your Morticians and Beauticians Annual Ball then I’ll begin.

Poetry is for Lovers and Mathematicians, because its all about balance and equations with scoring at the end. The 3 best individual pieces of writing I’ve ever done are poems. I may have only ever written 6 or 7 straight poems, so how have these poems come about. One The Dead and The Living emerged in Nov 1987, I was on a bus on a Sunday going to work at my computer room. I had just started writing my first novel, a few months after I had started writing in pencil on scraps of paper. I wanted something tender to talk about the dead, Percy Frost the undertaker was a poet, so that Sunday on a bus the poem arrived in my head. Its in The Butcher The Baker and The Undertaker my comic novel. Actually Chapter 9 is up on my site right now, so have a look before I cycle it off my site.

Years later, maybe 2007, 20 years later I wrote Let My Tears Be My Words or the alternate title Let There Be Light. This really touched my wife’s vicar. She follows the CofE, I’m a catholic from the nipple by the way. I also wrote a love poem called You Are Never Alone When You Are in Love. Or in front of a mirror if you are Donald Trump, but you can substitute any other name, just for balance.

I wrote something else called The Light from a Candle, I may paste them all in at the bottom of this piece. I was thinking of writing a new poem by way of illustration, but I’ve ended up explaining poetry instead of writing a new one, but I can write a new poem another time.

So what is it with words, with poetry? I don’t know,I remember studying poetry in English Lit and it was really difficult. They make you suffer, before explaining it, that’s if they do explain it. A poem is a formula of words that when the equation is finished unlocks the love, rather like a key to a chastity belt. Now as ever I put an idea in your head to both amuse but also to educate, no not that kind of eduction Boris, but you will remember what I said always. When you are being picked on for being a girl for reading poetry you will quote back my phrase, and you watch while the rugby team runs to the book store on campus to buy Poetry.

A poem is never a straightforward piece of writing, it is like a mirror with a crack in it, or a fairground mirror that distorts, but at the right angle normalcy returns. A poem has a reveal moment, just like the new Dr Who walking in the forest, the hood is removed and a smiling face smiles out at you. I’ve used the latest news item by way of illustration, I hope it works. I am not an Oxford Don explaining poetry, I’m just the fat silver haired self taught writer from Birmingham. If you want a poetry teacher then you’ll have to look elsewhere.

A poem can be like a strip tease or like a 9 course meal from your local Chinese, if your girlfriend is Chinese and works at the local takeaway then that is poetry in itself. So a poem a tale using fancy language and maybe metaphors galore. It can be serious and it can be comic, one does not exclude the other. We have Roger McGough over here I’d say go read his stuff. And now I’ve written enough, as I have to hang the washing out, or the wife will give me a clout.