SO this is the big day – the day I launch a poetry club for poor, old neglected Wallasey.
The inaugural meeting of ‘The Bards of New Brighton’ – as the club will be called – takes place at the Little Brighton Inn, Rowson Street, New Brighton, tonight (Mon 5 March 2007) in the sectioned off front bar, starting at 8.45pm.
After tonight’s launch the poetry club (which anyone can join, for free) there will be meetings in the same place, at the same time, on each first Monday of the month.
I am really looking forward to tonight's launch event, though also a bit nervous.

BBC Radio Merseyside gave my new club a stylish mention, on the Claire Hamilton on Sunday show.
I understand as a result of that the Little Brighton Inn has quite had quite a few phone calls from people intending to come and read their work tonight.
But apart from a couple of posters put up in shops, and one in Wallasey Central Library, there hasn’t been much in the way of pre-publicity.
Press information I sent to local newspapers failed to make it in to print, which is a shame, because I think that a pub starting up a poetry night ought to warrant at least a couple of paragraphs.
Anyway, one fellow who sadly won’t be able to make it tonight is Jim Lloyd, but he did sent me his poem The Overhead Railway, which tells of his exploits with a young pal many years ago to climb to the top of the long-gone Liverpool waterfront landmark.
I can quite understand the boyish exhilaration expressed in Jim's poem. As a young lad me and my pal Geoff Davies scaled the heights of the (then) new and massively tall floodlights at Springfield Park, the former home of Wigan Athletic FC. I can still remember how thrilling that escapade was.
So, here is Jim Lloyd’s poem (nice one, Jim, hope you can make it to future meetings)…

THE OVERHEAD RAILWAY

Two intrepid mountaineers with an old discarded rope,
Set out upon a mission with one enduring hope.

To climb the massive iron bridge, towering in the sky,
It was a snow-capped peak seen through a childish eye.

The beginning of this brave assault, mostly went our way.
As we reached the half way point, our limbs began to pay.

The last few thousand feet, got really, really tough.
My partner cried out . “I’m stuck, I think I’ve had enough”.

“Remember your training ” was my reply.
“We didn’t come this far just to die.”

He was trapped by the ice on the cliff’s outcrop.
I knew without my help he’d freeze or drop.

With faux contortions of frostbite face,
I struggled until I reached that place.

Some desperate swings from my trusty ice axe
allowed us time to relax.

Like a crack unit of a well-equipped army,
We broke out the doorstep sarnie.

As we shared our jam smothered bread,
Electric trains ran overhead.

We are famous now they’ll surely say,
For no one else would dare this way.

We scratched with a nail through flaky paint,
until we marked the steel.

On this fine day in ’56 stood heroes
… Jim and Neil.

Now, I leave you with one of my poems, Brave Little Poets, and hope all the free spirits and creative people from Wallasey and furhter afield turn up tonight – and READ THEIR STUFF!

BRAVE LITTLE POETS

Brave little poets,
Our insistent don’t-they-know its.
We need them now as never before,
Making sense of ‘Planet Superstore’,
Unshrivelling hearts dried up by the telly,
And feeding the soul instead of the belly.

Heroic little bards,
They piece together the shards
Of the looking glass shattered,
Of a world weather-battered,
And killing fields, blood-spattered.

Oh versatile versifiers,
You dizziest high-flyers,
With thoughts that soar free,
Invoking the huge ‘whoopee!’,
Or sparking in us the yearning
For the noble path of learning.

Those truly, madly, deeply writing,
Know how to make our lives exciting
If we listen and give attention
To truths to weird to mention
And the biggest bones of contention.

Oh most laudable laureate
Hottest debate’s own thermostat;
Our deepest thoughts you enunciate;
You’re popular culture’s counterweight.
Brave little poet … what’s your fate?

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