This week in three poems
Football, hot and found
First Football
The Women’s Euro’s are on right now and every tournament the quality of football and level of support levels up. True grit and better investment (still more to do on the £ side) has led to this levelling up and it is exciting to watch. It opens possibilities to young girls who may see themselves on that pitch one day in the future.
I was never a great team sports player. I don’t mind moving, dancing, ice skating, roller skating. Exercise without instructions. As soon as I was told I couldn’t move when I miraculously caught the damn netball, I mentally checked out of the class and eagerly waited to be sub’d off the team I was reluctantly picked for.
That doesn’t mean I don’t admire people who are skilled at team sport. I do. If anything it means I am all the more impressed. They are doing something I could, literally, like, never. So when I overheard a man lay into women’s football with verbal viscousness it really did rile me up. His cronies laughed and women around him looked away uncomfortably. They could sense the risk of encouraging his venom through saying something as mild as ‘I don’t mind really’. They mainly wanted him to stop, which was a piece of body language he was well practiced in ignoring. I was not part of the group of people he was addressing. But I knew he was saying that little bit louder so people who were not part of his group got the message.
Instead of getting mad and arguing with a stranger about something he really wanted a fight over, I wrote a poem. There and then. This is it:
My god it has been hot…
Having heard a parody of WH Auden’s Funeral Blues on a podcast 1earlier in the week, I decided to write my own about how horrible the heat is. I love sun and some warmth but I am melting!
Found poem
In a thread (which I rarely use but wanted to try) I asked people to drop a sentence they had overheard to create a found poem. No other context other than the sentence. And honestly, there were themes that could create a short story. I kind of love it! Thanks to everyone who took part.
Thanks for reading this weeks edition of Poems & That where I usually write about what I have learned from poetry beyond the poems. If you would like to explore more of my writing you can buy my book here, or listen to some of my work here. All royalties from my book go to Choose Love and Refuge.