This morning the air is delightfully fresh. I sense spring and I feel the contrast of what I breathe this morning with the city air I breathed at the weekend. It is wonderfully refreshing to stand still in the new day.
Alt text says this week’s photo shows a person smiling holding a book. It does indeed! And it is me, wearing a Stunt Girl t-shirt, holding a copy of Safety in Numbers.
Once when wearing this t-shirt I was asked by a stranger what my stunts were. I answered with, “I eat fire whilst unicycling.” This had them leaning in with, “Really?” before we both stood in a moment of disappointment as I admitted that this was in fact an untruth. This interaction, and the fact that I have also been asked if I am a trapeze artist, came to mind when I was writing the poem that I would submit to the Safety In Numbers project.
Each of the poets involved in the project, which was designed by Gill Connors, was sent a poem as part of a chain and asked to write a poem in response to it. I remember being excited when I saw that a poem had arrived in my inbox. I purposefully did not open the email until I had time to be at my writing desk with a dedicated time to think and write because I was keen to capture my response as cleanly as possible.
Firstly, I read the poem on the page in the same way that I read all poems that I am meeting for the first time. Then to increase my interaction and feel for the poem I read it out loud to myself. My usual way of starting the drafting of a poem when I know I am going to write is to use a fountain pen and a notebook. On this occasion I jotted down the parts of the received poem that resonated with me most strongly and let my mind take these thoughts for a walk. I found myself focussed on plate spinning, things imagined, and the passing of time. An idea began to emerge around the comments related to the t-shirt and the fact I had invented a persona that was beautifully fantastical.
Once I have ideas for a poem, I like to swap to typing into a word document so I can chop and change words and lines easily as the poem takes shape. Forming the whole on a clean page helps me think. I used this method to form a solid draft before rereading the poem I had received to find out if I could sense a link. I decided that I could, and that the evolution of a new poem from one read was happening naturally and in that sense, it was good to just go with it. After spending a little more time drafting and editing my work and reading it aloud, I left it alone overnight.
The next day when I returned to it I did my best to reread it with fresh eyes to spot any parts that did not flow or were in need of tightening. I wanted the person who I followed in the chain to be pleased with the response and to find something of interest in it. When reading my poem I could feel a thread that linked us, and yet the poem was definitely a Sue Finch poem that had been asking to be written. Pleasingly, I don’t think this poem would have emerged without me taking part in this project and I am very grateful to have been involved for that reason and because the whole set of linked poems is fascinating. Themes pop in and out in the different chains and that feels like a dance and a song all at once as you read.
Here’s Stunt Girl from the Yaffle Press anthology Safety In Numbers
Stunt Girl
She wore a t-shirt with that slogan.
Most people passed her by and said nothing.
But one day someone asked her
what her trick was. Her eyes sparkled
as she pictured all the circus acts she’d seen.
She knew she could throw axes,
yet her tendency for distraction might be fatal.
Wearing lycra to be fired out of a cannon
wouldn’t suit,
and her timing ruled her out
of the flying trapeze.
She wondered if she could tame a lion,
juggle five knives.
I eat fire whilst riding a unicycle, she replied.
She remembers vividly
the disappointment in their eyes
when they leant in for detail,
and she had to admit it wasn’t true.
I wear baggy trousers,
I’m a plate-spinning clown,
she thought to herself as her heart sank,
and I’ve been walking a tightrope all my life.
Sue Finch 