Earlier this week I looked at my website statistics. The blog post that has got the most views (after the Home page and the Archives) is Fishbones Dreaming from August 2019. Every other day someone views the post. Here is the link.

The children’s poem Fishbones Dreaming is by Matthew Sweeney. It is four years since he died on the 5th of August 2018, aged only 65. The poem uses a gradual flashback technique and a refrain.

Prompt

Here is a prompt that Matthew gave on the course he ran at the wonderful Almassera Vella, Spain in 2006.

We were just to sit quietly, clearing the head from clutter and then to slowly run through the letters of the alphabet until one letter gave some energy, sound or resistance.

I was sitting on the loggia, looking out over the terraced fields and the small white chapel in the distance. Once we got the letter, we were to run through some nouns until one noun spoke….potato, parsley, parchment. Pliers came from that prompt, and it was my first blog post.

Pliers

A museum dedicated to pliers
opened last month in the old part of town.
Pliers, collected from the five continents,
are displayed in rows on walls and glass cases.
Most are made from metal, shiny or a rusty red.
The curator, a small Belgian, Jan de Smets,
exiled from the Congo thirty years before,
found the earliest exhibits on expeditions
to empty houses, garages, sheds and shacks.
Pliers have also been donated by retired
plumbers, old builders and master carpenters.
Six toy pliers are on permanent loan.
Where pliers are missing from a boxed set
the white outline of their shape remains.