Blogging poetry in a time of Covid

I couldn’t finish my coffee without dealing with the houseflies circulating above the table. I just didn’t want them there. I got out a towel and starting at one end of the room and continuing to the open french doors on the opposite wall, I did a reasonable impression of a helicopter flying out of control with the kitchen towel. The plan seemed good, they were scattering, and I reckoned most of them would flee to the grander world outside. I closed the doors, returned to my coffee, and practically all of them returned to the place above my head.

That, of course, was a declaration of war. I got out the hoover, put on the small nozzle attachment and went after them with Miele know-how. They scattered in every direction, but not one disappeared into the hose, and so I’ve retreated into another room and am distracting my anger with this piece of prose.

Of course, none of this would be an issue if I wasn’t retired. For not quite a year now I have been an altered character; my role on this earth changed dramatically: I have become an almost full-time blogger poet. If I am not writing, I am considering what I might write about; I look at my surroundings and life as a reservoir for topics. I go searching for ideas like someone who was lost their keys in a meadow; I construct and abandon lines continually; re-envisage, re-edit, reword; sometimes resurrect some old poems, repackage, rework and on it goes. With all that time, I’m posting at least every second day (and that’s a rate I’d have advised against, but now writing is the wind in my sails, and I’m keeping them full).

So I sit in this room with all its windows, looking at a sizable swathe of County Donegal and beyond. It suits me very well, this life away from the demands of others, many of which didn’t sit very well with me. Alone with my thoughts congealing on the screen, particularly now, with the pandemic raging like an invisible storm. The blog prompts me to consider my experiences in a deeper way, particularly nature which now fills my view. A consideration of my recent poems shows the extent to which nature has filled my recent life, indeed, at times almost to the point of being overgrown.

Chunks of time spent in my own company, even without the restrictions due to covid, are, of course, necessary for  this writing. That’s the way it must be for poetry, a shortage of direct acclaim that explains why many poets crave live performance. I mention it because, in the grand spaces of time I now have, I would welcome feedback, comments and opinions; I would like other people's reactions to what I've written or how others might have reacted to the same sights and happenings. For me by the window, your comments might be a source of ideas and encouragement, an education in alternative views i.e. a widening of my perspective, and of course company.