My First Ever Published Poems – From 1986!

I always knew I’d one day write novels. But first came poetry and short stories.

My first ever writing successes were with poetry.

When I was about 10 years old, my teacher set our class the homework task of writing an original poem. Mine was about owls and hedgehogs. I was very proud of it… until my teacher accused me of plagiarism.

“You were supposed to write an original poem,” she told me. “Not copy one from a book.”

“I didn’t copy it. I wrote it.”

Not only did my teacher refuse to believe me, but now she accused me of lying. My parents were called into school and had to have a meeting with the headmistress. They assured her that I’d written the poem myself, and eventually my teacher apologised. To prove it, she put my poem on the classroom wall.

My next poetic success was in my first or second year of high school, in the form of a song. The lyrics involved various humorous depictions of classwork and teachers, inspired by a Home Economics class (which would now be called Food Tech) in which we all made a Swiss Roll. It became so popular a song that when my year group graduated years later, students still remembered it, and mentioned it in our graduation book.

Then, at 14, my English teacher somehow found out that I’d written an epic 77-stanza poem about an innkeeper’s romance with a cavalier, and she had me read the whole thing out to my class. My class was less amused by that creative work, not because they had to listen for a while, but because our teacher clearly hoped to inspire them to be creative too. But not everyone is creative with words!

For me, poetry was simply how I expressed my thoughts. When I was happy, when I was sad, when I was in love, when I was alone. As high school exams came along, my poem about stress resonated with so many students, it was published in the school magazine.

Poetry also lead me to appreciate just how important writing was to me. When I was about 21, I worked in a publishing company and experienced my first ‘theft from my person’. I’d been walking to the train station in the twilight, my bag slung over a shoulder. I’d written a poem at lunchtime and it was in that bag.

So when some young lad snatched it off me and ran away with it, I had no choice but to run after him – it was my only copy!

We raced through the streets with me yelling after him, “Take my wallet, just leave the bag!”

He ignored me, of course, and ran into a housing estate. He was getting away from me, but then a car drove by – I flagged them down, and before I knew it, they zoomed off after him.

After much shenanigans, the lad was arrested… because that car was driven by two undercover policemen, patrolling the area after someone else had experienced a theft from their person.

I got my poem back, and continued to write poetry at every opportunity – including when I returned to university at 22 to study law. I was particularly intrigued by property law, and the difference between fixtures and fittings when selling property. So of course I wrote a poem about it, called ‘Gnomes’, which was published in the university’s law periodical, ‘The Wig & Pen’!

As you can see from the above scans, I still have all of my poetry. Although the paper is yellowed and browned with age, the words are still clear and strong. The memories are too – whenever I read one, I’m immediately transported back in time to when I wrote it, the intense feelings or thoughtful insights that inspired me, and how I worked and reworked my words until the expression was, at least, closer to the experience.

Perhaps one day I’ll do something with all those words. But for now they just sit in the cupboard, evidence of an early writer’s persistence to become who they were always meant to be – and reminders that success can often be slow to rise. Just like a Swiss Roll!