I’ve known David for a very long time. We were at school together, King’s School, Chester. We weren’t close then, four of five years apart, a huge difference at that age. David, the elder of us, wrote shimmering poems for the School Magazine, full as I recall of Greek mythology and other allusions. I was very impressed. It’s no exaggeration to say that David Selzer is one of the major influences on my becoming a writer of sorts myself. Though I knew him he would not at that stage have known of me. That came later, first around the bar of Chester Little Theatre, and again much later when I discovered this site. By then I had written half a dozen screenplays for cinema, as well as a number of poems, short stories, flash fiction and life writing. Novels remain beyond me. But here’s a small selection of the shorter pieces.

1) PANAMA REACHES: Life Writing – the title of the piece will become clear in the reading. This is a farrago of things that have interested me in my long life, things I have experienced, and over which I have pondered. There is a gossamer thin linking thread almost hidden within the seemingly arbitrary diversions.

2) POET DYING: Short Story – at its core a sad tale but with some fun and games along the way. A tale for all those who have spent too much time drinking in pubs at four o’clock in the afternoon when only the committed foregather.

3) SEVENTH CHILD: Poem – my variation on an old trope, this one perhaps about (authors not always being the best interpreters of their output) parental affection and intimacy in a less fluent time.

4) PALIMPSESTS: Poem – this was written to order for a Holyhead writing group as part of a project linking various ports on either side of the Irish Sea. Towards the end I fear it becomes a little boastful about the place, like a town crier in the marketplace. But poems are written for various audiences, and this, a recent exercise, confirmed at least that I could still string portentous words together – and at speed. No mental lingerings as with the others – this was turned around from concept to full realisation within 24 hours.

©Ian Craine 2023