{"id":839,"date":"2010-10-05T08:57:57","date_gmt":"2010-10-05T08:57:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=839"},"modified":"2010-10-05T08:57:57","modified_gmt":"2010-10-05T08:57:57","slug":"adrian-slatcher-revisits-the-poet-child","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/adrian-slatcher-revisits-the-poet-child\/","title":{"rendered":"Adrian Slatcher revisits the poet child"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Child Poet Revisited <\/span>

When I was seven<\/span>
They took my words<\/span>
And mounted them<\/span>
On purple card.<\/span>
 <\/span>
I gave them<\/span>
A picture of a dragon,<\/span>
A swarm of moths,<\/span>
A coloured box.<\/span>
 <\/span>
They said:<\/span>
\u201cThat\u2019s very good,<\/span>
Now go and do<\/span>
Something else.\u201d<\/span>
 <\/span>
*<\/span>
 <\/span>
I kept it up<\/span>
In little books, <\/span>
Just for myself,<\/span>
Hidden away. <\/span>
 <\/span>
They said:<\/span>
\u201cWe\u2019re worried about<\/span>
The things he says,<\/span>
The things he draws.\u201d<\/span>
 <\/span>
I gave them<\/span>
A picture of a dragon<\/span>
A swarm of moths<\/span>
A coloured box.<\/span>
 <\/span>
*<\/span>
 <\/span>
I gave them<\/span>
A picture of a dragon<\/span>
A swarm of moths<\/span>
A coloured box.<\/span>
 <\/span>
I said:<\/span>
\u201cThat\u2019s who I am,<\/span>
That\u2019s those I fear<\/span>
And that is my soul.\u201d<\/span>
 <\/span>
They locked me up<\/span>
To keep me safe,<\/span>
Far away<\/span>
From adult things. <\/span>




*Adrian Slatcher<\/a><\/span> lives and works in Manchester. This year he has published two poetry chapbooks, <\/span>Playing Solitaire for Money<\/span><\/a> (Salt Modern Voices) and Extracts from Levona<\/span> (Knives Forks and Spoons Press.) He also writes fiction and non-fiction and regularly blogs about literature.  He also records electronic music under the name <\/span>Bonbon Experimen<\/a>t.<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Child Poet Revisited When I was sevenThey took my wordsAnd mounted themOn purple card. I gave themA picture of a dragon,A swarm of moths,A coloured box. They said:\u201cThat\u2019s very good,Now go and doSomething else.\u201d * I kept it upIn little books, Just for myself,Hidden away.  They said:\u201cWe\u2019re worried aboutThe things he says,The things he draws.\u201d I gave themA picture […]<\/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-839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/839","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=839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/839\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}