{"id":513,"date":"2010-01-13T12:58:00","date_gmt":"2010-01-13T12:58:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=513"},"modified":"2010-01-13T12:58:00","modified_gmt":"2010-01-13T12:58:00","slug":"david-mac-says-poetry-is-a-basic-thing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/david-mac-says-poetry-is-a-basic-thing\/","title":{"rendered":"David Mac says poetry is a basic thing"},"content":{"rendered":"

Basic Thing<\/span>
 <\/span>

The poem is just like everything else:<\/span>
you eat<\/span>
you drink<\/span>
you breathe<\/span>
you shit<\/span>
you make love<\/span>
(if you\u2019re lucky)<\/span>
 <\/span>
you live and you die<\/span>
 <\/span>
It\u2019s vital, essential<\/span>
instinctive<\/span>
necessary<\/span>
and beyond that too<\/span>
 <\/span>
It\u2019s basic in its element<\/span>
this thing<\/span>
 <\/span>
how it comes, how<\/span>
it flows through<\/span>
no questions asked<\/span>
 <\/span>
You write the poem as you live your life<\/span>
You live your life as you write the poem<\/span>
 <\/span>
If you want to stop<\/span>
well, that\u2019s up to you<\/span>


* David Mac<\/span>'s work has appeared in <\/span>Ambit, Mud Luscious, Monkey Kettle, Clockwise Cat, This Zine Will Change Your Life<\/span>, a few poetry anthologies, as well as soon in <\/span>Erbacce<\/span> and<\/span> Urban District Writer<\/span>. He describes himself as “a rare and mythical creature who resides in a blue bunker underground, somewhere in the Bedfordshire hell!” (Bedfordshire is not that bad …Ed. No, on second thoughts it is.<\/span>)<\/span>
<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Basic Thing The poem is just like everything else:you eatyou drinkyou breatheyou shityou make love(if you\u2019re lucky) you live and you die It\u2019s vital, essentialinstinctivenecessaryand beyond that too It\u2019s basic in its elementthis thing how it comes, howit flows throughno questions asked You write the poem as you live your lifeYou live your life as you write the poem If you want […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-513","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/513","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=513"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/513\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=513"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=513"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=513"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}