OK, so once again, don’t forget, tonight is the BDGP Open Mic Night and the theme is (funnily enough) children’s poetry. So usual arrangements apply, 6pm at Cafe No 5, Cedar Square, Blackpool. It’s time to yank out your inner child and see if she/he is still breathing!
It’s funny how poems we learn as children can still echo in our minds as adults. There are entire worlds in my head that I don’t think I’d ever be able to let go of inhabited by residents like My Uncle Paul of Pimlico (who, as Mervyn Peake informed us, had seven cats as white as snow), a vegetarian carrot eating lion belonging to Spike Milligan and a pig I was introduced to by James Reeves with the startling ability to fly me to foreign countries, small and big.
It’s like that fairy dust of Peter Pan’s. One little sprinkle and we never truly get it out of our system.
You see I have a dad who bankrolled all my drama lessons and books and then my mom who ferried me up and down for everything. But when it came to poems, books or even classical music, I had something not a lot of people get. I had a Ganley
Mr Ganley, otherwise known as the BFG, (now retired) was the kind of drama teacher who didn't force the heavy classics on a seven year old chatterbox who had just moved up from Liverpool. He teased interests and found writing that interested and excited a young mind into wanting to perform them. He found ways to establish ideas that, although weren't always understood then, often came back to me long after I thought I had outgrown being taught anything. Now I'm a twenty eight year old chatterbox and so much of what I do was inspired by those early days. It's a great privilege to have someone like that in your life and the best way to honor that sort of inspiration is to pass it down the line.
We’ve done a little experiment this week in passing on a tradition. After years of me standing up at every family event to recite or act whatever new piece I'd learnt for a festival, I decided to see how my six year old would take to a bit of recital
. Patrick has learnt a little four line poem called “Mother Alligator’s Advice to her Children” by John Agard and so long as nerves don’t strike, he will be getting up and speaking. Even if he doesn’t, we’ve had so much fun practicing and playing with poetry!It's been a joy to teach him. We have had fun with all sorts of poetry I have dug out of dusty storage boxes and I realised how lucky I was and how much I wanted to pass what I had learnt all those years ago in a small, book-lined studio from a towering giant with wispy hair and a knack for funny walks.In the meantime, something I've written! (Now I get what Standard was on about with the formatting - this took ages to sort!!!)
talking downthe thing i hate most in all the worldis when grown ups talk to you
like you’re a MORON.
or something.
just because we’re young,
doesn’t mean that we are stupid.
we see colour
where you see black and white.
we hear tinkling music
in the silence you create.
we dream the dreams
that will pick up
where your dreams left off.
so next time you look
down your noses
which are now sprouting hairs
and turning a little red
and before you correct us
shaking fingers
now old, dry and wrinkled
and before you halt our inventions
replacing them with tired old ideas,
remember,
remember that you were us once.
doing things your own way,
in spite of
or because of
those pain in the butt adults
who thought THEY knew better.
Thanks for reading, see you tonight!
L x