he will be there with a placard
it doesn’t matter what the protest is about
the words are always red on a white background
a picture of a quill
it started out years ago saying things like
“ban the bomb – legalise poetry”
“equality for women workers – legalise poetry”
“end apartheid – legalise poetry”
a little while ago it was
“say no to war – legalise poetry”
and recently in London
“free education – legalise poetry”
he argued that poetry was sort of illegal
people got very upset at
aiding and abetting distorted syntax
GBH on grammar
and they talk about things like
prose cut up into short lines
punctuation crimes against humanity
he wanted to know what they were frightened of
was it poetry that could be read and understood
by everyone
and maybe people having fun with it?
when he started out protesting
it was to have been “legalise pot”
but because he felt himself to be
a subversive
he added a few letters
and liked it so much he kept at
his one man campaign
he thought he might try taking it
to Bahrain
see how it went down there
he even started to prepare a placard
“free Ayat al-Ghormezi - legalise poetry”
for the first time
it seemed appropriate
© Jim Bennett
BBC World Service interview with Ayat al Ghormezi
Ayat al-Ghormezi blogs HERE.
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Author of 67 books and proprietor of Poetry Kit. Jim tours throughout the year giving reading and performances of his poetry and songs.
Editor's note: Today is National Poetry Day in the UK
