Are You Really a Writer?

A title like that was hard to resist. It popped up on Pintrest - a recent on-line discovery for me with lots of things for creative people to explore. The link led to the poem So You Want to be a Writer by Charles Bukowski an American poet who died in 1994.

The poem suggests that unless the words burst out of you, unless you never sit at the keyboard puzzling about what to write next or ponder how to turn your idea into poetry or prose, you really should be doing something else.

Bukowski suggests that being a writer means being chosen and for the chosen, writing is effortless. If it isn't, the poem maintains, you're not a writer at all.

My heart tells me he was so wrong. My inner critic isn't too sure.

What do you think?

Do leave a comment. We'd love to hear from you.

Heather Shaw

Robert Hoyle

It is with great sadness that we record that one of the core members of Moorside Writers, Robert Hoyle, died on 28th December 2015. A funeral to celebrate his life was held on Wednesday 6th January.

1st August 1953 - 28th December 2015

Weather Watch

Yesterday a proper darkness,

modest, semi-starlit. Not too showy:

no conflict between Orion, The Plough

and solar-powered 'nite-lights'.

A little light rain for atmosphere.

Spectacles spotted, sight altered,

I imagine myself

a sideways-seeing insect.

Now, in front of the houses,

those tangerine street lights

become imperious giraffes

processing, stately, aloof.

A Tesco delivery truck

creates sound-waves

that pattern pavements pewter,

re-direct droplets

in an anti-gravity movement

to shivering shed roofs.

And soon the sky lowers itself

in a bilious tumble

as if the heavens need antacid.

Elemental energy

seemingly indigestible.

Blithering snowflakes

huddle for security?

not knowing there is no safety

in the winds irascible blunder.

The bird-table wears ermine,

car is re-designed by nomadic snow.

I shine a torch, landscape

has become a Mexican wave.

It's time for boots and sensible gloves.

Clean breath is softer than new love.

Then , in the future,

polished moon,

a sky perforated with brilliance

from the long dead.

This is a time of spirit,

heart and sense,

not head.

Rob Hoyle

'First Tuesday' 2nd February 2pm to 4pm

 'Lovely Lists'

 Presented by

 Alva DeChiro

Chesterfield Library

'First  Tuesday' Meetings are held between 2 pm and 4pm every month except August and are suitable for anyone  who is interested in discussing and undertaking practical exercises in creative writing - prose or poetry

They are held in the Meeting Room Lower Ground Floor - Next to 'Browser' Cafe 

No booking necessary- just turn up