Matthew Francis

I'm tired of the film cliche whereby characters greet each other by just saying a name. It's a principle of writing dialogue that you should leave out empty formulae like "Hallo", "How are you?" but we need to know the names, so "Hi Joan, how are you?" becomes "Joan." But it sounds so artificial.

I had a theory about Mahler at one time that, having realised that the ending is always the best bit of a symphony, he decided to write symphonies consisting entirely of endings.

I know, I did that a few years ago. This year I'm following Prue Leith's tip: cook the peeled and cored apples in a microwave and freeze to use later.

Glut.

My contribution to next year's @faberbooks.bsky.social Poetry Diary, from my forthcoming collection The Green Month.

Shooting Star

Magnesium streak running from nowhere to nowhere
spat out of a corner of the night sky
to end in a mute fizzle –

a shy firework, scuttling
across the dark when

no one’s looking.

Today I lost patience with Word's tortuous logic and googled "how do I get pictures to go where I want them?" The answer was bizarre, but it worked: "Select the Behind Text option from Layout". So that's solved, even if I have no idea why.

I'm unable to read more than a few stanzas of Spenser without falling asleep. Thought this was just an undergraduate phase, but a few years ago I was sitting in the front row at a seminar on Elizabethan pastoral poetry, and couldn't keep my eyes open. Very embarrassing.

Just back from a wonderful cruise up the Norwegian coast.

New novel by my former student Stefano Teatini, his first in English.

Let's face it - the scientists have just reinvented T.S. Eliot.

Wonderul poem!

Diolch yn fawr!

October.

The cover of my forthcoming #poetry collection. I am delighted with it. Brilliant work by the @faberbooks.bsky.social designers.

Someone on the radio today referred to President Pump. I'd been thinking it's about time we declared a moratorium on that man's name, and his photograph, too. If in future all White House decisions were publicly ascribed to President Musk, that might have the bonus of causing a sacking.

My shortest poem:

EMPIRE

It is remote here.
Send marmalade.

From a forged New Testament text: Jesus tell his disciples about the place where there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth. 'But, Rabbi,' one asks, 'what will happen to those who have no teeth?' 'O ye of little faith,' Jesus replies, 'for those who have no teeth, teeth will be provided.'

Resemblance to a well-known modernist poem not a coincidence, I suspect!

You've given me a task with which to grapple.

Just written a stanza in which I rhymed "orange" twice! Had to tell someone. #poetry

Having to postpone it a bit - writing poetry instead!

Thanks for the review - I'm delighted!

Lovely review of my novel Nocturne with Gaslamps on the Historical Novel Society's website: "a Victorian theatrical melodrama on the page".

Very true, unfortunately.

Are you doing a launch?

Crazy phrase from a P.G. #Wodehouse novel: "You start the day with the fairest prospects, and before nightfall everything is as rocky and ding-basted as stig tossed full of doodlegammon.” Borrowed from a baseball report, as explained in this delightful article: www.madameulalie.org/annots/pgwbo...

#AI - the systems will fail, and there won't be a backup when they do. The fingerprint and facial recognitions on my phone have never worked. I waited months to bypass the computer and reach a human when getting compensation for my delayed train. And I can't authenticate my Barclaycard on Amazon

I can see how #AI might improve productivity. The AIs can hold strategy meetings with each other and give each other 97-point action plans, while the humans get on with the work.