Mike O’Brien

In my opinion it is good to go at things from an unusual angle. Otherwise you run the risk of just presenting bald statements of fact, which is terrible poetry, even worse if in rhyme. Best not to be too cryptic though. You can go at a slant and still produce something that is clear to read.

41. Owner's Manual ...being a celebration of the fact that when you have absolutely nothing else to read, poetry can be found in totally unexpected places

RTFM! They say, with brows furrowed by irritation. I love a good owner's manual, so no-one has ever said it to me. Even better, I enjoy a manual that has been badly translated. This manual isn't badly translated — I wrote it myself — in English. I wrote this intro myself too. Despite the em dashes.

Ohh, when you mention how beautiful my eye thorns are, I blush, because the timber-built patio sun trap extending from the forecourt of each of your eyes is truly breathtaking.

But if you make a deal with Bed World, you have a 14 day cooling off period. To sleep on it.

Is that Raymond Williams or Raymond Williams by any chance?

That’s a great poem and a lovely concept Bill. I want to put some posters up in my neighbourhood now.

Perhaps if I hadn’t virtually given up on listening to the news, I would have got the reference. But these days one browse of the paper is all that I can stomach. Radio 4 has given way to Radio 3 in a morning.

Ahh yes - too right. The phrase 'heartless mathematical utilitarianism' threw me off course. I had never looked at it like that.

Margaret's collection Black Dog Sit is available at blackdogsits.weebly.com

A watercolour painting of my Wife, Judy outside the beach huts at Filey, North Yorkshire

Some other beach huts, with my wife sitting outside of them, playing with her phone.

30. Margaret Whittaker A lifetime of self expression through poetry

Heres a small collection from someone who has been writing #poetry for over seventy years.

Go on. I'll reveal my ignorance... what exactly are you referring to? Decimalisation? Brexit?

Poetic Windows An encounter with a lovely Sheffield poetry group.

I had a great time in Sheffield the other week, running a #poetry workshop with the Spammers poetry group. It all culminated in their having their own page on #SixtyOddPoets Perhaps you might like me to do the same with your group. Drop me a message, maybe we can sort something out.

2.35 The Missing Link The Piltdown Man - Bringing the Cradle of Civilisation to the Home Counties.

Imagine being so convinced of English exceptionalism that you could be convinced that the first human beings lived in the home counties? In 1912, many eminent geologists and paleontologists were taken in by a few bits of bone "discovered" by a fanatical fossil hunting con artist. #History #poetry

udm14.com: An easy-to-use shortcut for an AI-free Google search. (Try it!)

udm14.com

tiger in the water light produces light

I’ve read some terrible things about Substack. I’ve read some terrible things on Substack. But as long as I can find writing of this quality there, I’ll stick around.

Bluesky should open a longform branch.

But I’ll bide my time for now.

Food for thought - but as yet I don’t see the absolute cess pit of disinformation, pettiness and hatred that Twitter became. I may start backing stuff up as a precaution. But to be honest the algorithm on Facebook gives me more right wing nonsense than Substack. I know it’s more about money, but

Someone is going to have to explain the problem with Substack to me in really simple terms.

Lovely - you need to illustrate it now and get it published!

It wasn’t to be They were made for each other But he wanted a woman who looked like Ginger Rogers And she looked more like Fred Astaire They would have been great together But she wanted a man who looked liked Errol Flynn And he looked more like Boris Karloff Crossed by the stars in their eyes.

#PoemsAbout #StarCrossed

That’s a really good image. It says so much in just one brief snapshot.

Excellent. We need more Science Fiction poetry in our lives.

I love a silly poem. Thank you.

40. Feedback Form ... being a feedback form appended to an examination of what feedback forms are all about - mostly presented in the voice of a person who desperately needs feedback.

Ahh, the joys of the feedback form. After the training session, a little piece of collaborative #poetry that you must complete, Without it there will be no evidence that you ever attended. We all like a bit of feedback. The course facilitator is only really asking for likes, comments and shares.

A section of the 1611 painting School of Athens by Raphael with assorted philosophers scientists and mathematicians. It looks rather like a gathering of the Sixty Odd Poets in Mexborough

The Sixty Odd Poets had a great time at the Fox Gallery in Mexborough last Sunday. Here is an Artists impression of us all in the Hall. I was a bit weary after a morning in the garden, so I read my poems from the steps near the entrance. It was a lovely afternoon where great minds met one another.

Downloaded and enjoyed very much. Particularly the Pizza poem and the Authentic achievable realistic one, but they were all good. Thank you!

I read it again, straight off. Only posing to put the Raindrop Prelude on the speakers. Well done. A lovely poem.

29. Carol Special Fuelled by thirty years experience of nursing and teaching

The unique #poetry of Carol Special was featured on #SixtyOddPoets in June last year. This month she was one of the six poets published in An Eighth of Sixty, the latest print volume of the Sixty Odd series (bit.ly/3GVujqd)