Odd Kid

I wrote a lot as a kid, encouraged by my parents and school. On Monday morning we had a lesson called ‘News’ and we were asked to write in our notebook what we had done at the weekend. I clearly had a colourful and unsatisfied imagination as I would embellish more and more each week. If we walked on the Malvern Hills I would write that we hand-glided from the summit all the way to sea, where we went sailing. I clearly had no fear (or possibly understanding) of these fantastic stories being investigated, because one day when my younger brother was off school with a cold I told my teacher and class he was seriously ill and in hospital. Even when our entire school said a prayer for him in assembly I didn’t worry about the consequences – I loved the sense of drama! This soon changed when my mum picked me up from school of course.

My earliest stab at a novel was ‘Noabra the sad and lonely dragon.’ I wrote the name before drawing the front cover, and with these two complete I quickly fleshed out a 5 page story about an orphaned dragon that had to fend for itself – eating local sentient animals that were inherently evil.

I wrote poetry too – and when I was 11 one was published in a book called ‘The Library Lady.’ This was an anthology of poetry by the young people of Hereford and Worcester. The other poems vary hugely, and although there are other similarly dark tales, I do wonder where this came from. I still love the twist at the end, and I’m sure a psychoanalyst would have a field day pulling out conclusions.

The Traveller
A large man stomps through a copse.
A tall collar pulled up over his ears.
Coat wrapped tight over his body,
Large heavy boots sink into the deep snow.
Eyes fixed on the path,
Face down,
Mind empty and blank,
The blustering wind whirls around him,
The bleak frost bites into his face,
He shakes off the cold and carries on.
A glimpse of a dim light in a faraway cottage,
Now it’s gone!
The muffled hoot of an owl in a tree,
White and invisible,
A tall gate post looks like a standing person,
Blanketed with white snow.
A wandering lamb bleats for its mother,
On, the dark figure goes past a stone wall,
Past a hedge piled high with drifted snow.
And then stops,
Like a towering building
Limbs stiff and frozen,
Starting on again past the gate,
There’s the light again clearer now.
A loud creak of a branch as the wind batters it’s trunk,
As the fields slope downwards,
He is aware of a light on the horizon.
Stopping once more he looks down onto a well lit village,
The sparkling lights and the smell of rich hot food.
He goes down and through the gates past some houses,
The fire light glares,
The warmth calls,
But our lonely traveller has no place there,
On he goes following the road,
Into the darkness again.