Poetry Parnassus – The First Buddy Meeting

I am too excited to drink coffee. It will tip me over the edge. I stay away from the chocolate cakes (for the moment) and take my seat to learn from Bea Colley, Simon Armitage, the lovely Poetry Library staff and Casagrande what Poetry Parnassus will consist of and I mainly learn that it really is going to be an incredible happening.

Representatives of the Chilean arts collective Casagrande start to tell us about the history and future of the forthcoming Rain of Poems (Tues 26 June 9pm, Jubilee Gardens, Southbank Centre). It is such an overwhelmingly inspiring project and I feel totally honoured to be a part of the ‘rain’. I wrote the following whilst watching and listening to the presentation – come along on the 26th and write your own poem about what happened to you in the ‘rain’:

Smoke stings eyes

engines fly overhead

I can't hear what's being said

so I make shapes with my mouth

tweet the person next to me

where shall we meet if it goes wrong?

She breathes in her cigarette

breathes out

‘stand strong’ she says

stays near the flowers

but not on them, someone makes

sure we don't make dents

on beds of mud.

And then as I look up

I see hundreds and thousands

paper birds

sprinkled like custard desert toppings

stopping for nobody

no building

no think-tank

no law

no bank

not slowing down for the flash

of a sunset photographer to catch their flight.

Then light as rain it taps my shoulder, my hands, my feet,

my fingers pick it up to the air again.

A poem.