Write Out Loud - Poet Profile

Greg Freeman

Email: gfreem@ntlworld.com

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Last blog entry: 6 days ago

Profile updated: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 03:00:18 pm

Write Out Loud Profile: http://writeoutloud.net/poets/gregfreeman

Write Out Loud Blog: http://writeoutloud.net/blogs/gregfreeman

Biography

I'm a veteran newspaper sub-editor finding that I have more spare time now to write poetry. Below are a couple of samples of my work, although they're not typical of what I'm doing now: Dance On was placed first in Kingston University's Short Cuts competition in 2007. My poetic style? Not so much raging against the dying of the light, rather voicing a mild-mannered protest.

Samples

DANCE ON

My brother only dressed as a Ted
To avoid weekend dust-ups; he couldn’t
Stand rock and roll. At home, in his room,
He strolled forwards, then back,
Wearing a glazed, intellectual smile.

At night he belted home on his bike,
The last outlaw fleeing Henry Fonda,
Or maybe Henry Ford.
He’d run up to his room, slam the door shut,
And you’d hear that bass, and those train whistle chords.

Apache, Geronimo, Man of Mystery, Wonderful Land,
Straight to the top, till the Beatles turned up.
After that, things went bad. He teamed up
With a girl from the glassworks
Who always made clear she’d no time for the Shads.

The twang of the west, the horn-rimmed specs,
The Stratocaster’s echo across the plains,
Gone, gone; Hank B appeared in panto.
The marriage foundered, my brother rode miles
Over sleet-soaked moors, to hide his pain.

He gave in his notice, locked himself in his room,
Dug out the Dansette and his old 45s,
And waited for a sign; at dawn, on his bike,
He rode to the cutting, and lay on the tracks,
Expecting a train; but they had closed the line.

THE 21.53

The train was packed, I apologised for the pasty,
She said she quite understood:
“I know, you just couldn’t resist.”
Her first day back after taking time off
For a gallstone, extracted
“Where no man should go.” Very curious, this.

She confessed to dreams of starting an allotment;
I told her the tale of my gardening years,
Defeated by weeds. And also mentioned,
For no good reason, the price of cake
In National Trust cafes. “Me too,
Victoria jam sponge,” she agreed.

The guard came round, and I paid up,
The talk returned to the pasty.
“In trouble when you get home?” she inquired.
“Something waiting on the table?”
My stop was soon, no time to explain
All the ins and outs. “No such luck,” I replied.

I got up to go. She went
On to Aldershot.
“It’s good to talk,” she said,
By way of saying goodbye.

All poems are copyright of the originating author. Permission must be obtained before using or performing others' poems.

Last blog entry

Walking the Shore

Posted on Tuesday 20th July 2010 8:48 am

I follow your path along the white cliffs,

above the wartime bunkers and tunnels,

strings of ferries leaving the harbour,

faint outline of France across the water,

talking of poetry, pop music, and pensions;

footslogging for miles along the foreshore.

Sweet peas, scabious, red-hot pokers

flourish in the dunes and on the shingle,

escaping the confines of the garden.

We pass the point where Caesar landed,

see in a field the stranded, crumbling fort

once the Roman gateway to Britain.

You’re still interested in the office gossip;

who's gone bonkers, headlines

and deadlines, desktop vandalism,

late-shift laughs, hot metal days

Mid-life hesitations laid to rest;

we always walked together, career ups and downs.

I’ve started limping; there’s a blister coming.

You won’t tell me how far there is to go

Previous: Something for Everyone

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Comments

Chris Dawson

Sat 24th Jul 2010 10:57

Hi Greg - re tinkering - yes you can tinker all you like, they're your poems. Lots of people use the blogs to gauge the reaction to a first draft, sometimes they take it down and re-post when they're happier with it, sometimes not ... it's entirely up to you - how much, how little, how often etc etc you post.
Cx