Luke
Luke is an English teacher, associate lecturer and writer.
His childhood friend Adam died in 2018 and his mum Cressida died in 2021.
“I’ve never been a poetry obsessive, but I like it when poems rhyme; when they’re song-like. I suppose that’s not fashionable.
I’d have too much freedom in free verse. I like to have a bit of structure, a straitjacket. It forces your hand a bit.
I didn’t really set out with the ambition to write poetry. The poems that I wrote in response to what happened to Adam and my mum - they just kind of popped into my head.
Both times, I had a fragment playing on my mind. I couldn’t let go of either until I’d wrangled them some kind of order.
I don’t know if I’ll ever write any other poems. Part of me hopes I never will.
Adam was a very private person, but I knew something must be going on. He’d say things like “They’re not sure what it is” or “They’re being cautious.”
For a while, he was seeing similar specialists to my mum - they could almost compare notes. I kind of suspected, but neither of us wanted to put too fine a point on it.
Adam was 29 when he died. I suppose when you’re in your 70s or 80s, people have a bit more experience. But we were shell shocked.
It was like, who’s going to take the lead? What’s the appropriate thing to do?
People turn to poetry in hard times.
When she was really ill, I’d sometimes read poems to my mum. And Adam’s parents had asked me to read a poem at the funeral - Nothing Gold Can Stay by Robert Frost.
Later, our group of friends met up in Sheffield. No one knew how to react. I stood up in the pub and said I’d like to read a poem. It was A E Houseman’s The Chestnut Casts his Flambeaux. I think I wanted to pick something myself.
It’s quite a rugged poem about two friends and life and death.
“The troubles of our proud and angry dust
Are from eternity, and shall not fail.
Bear them we can, and if we can we must.
Shoulder the sky, my lad, and drink your ale.”
“I guess I’m also trying to record him in amber as the person he was - at least to me.”
It’s like, the person is ill or the person has died or it’s a year later and the person’s still dead - which one of those is worse?
I suppose I’m a bit repressed. I’m not going to cry my eyes out and beat my chest. My way was to go away and produce something.
With the poetry I wrote for Adam, I guess I’m also trying to record him in amber as the person he was - at least to me.
With my mum, I didn’t feel the need to record her in the same way. I’m never going to forget her - she’s my mum.
In the poem I wrote for her, it talks about her being ill, which the Adam poem doesn’t mention at all. It’s been very therapeutic working through those feelings.
I sent Adam’s poem to his girlfriend and his parents and I think they appreciated it. It’s for them to do what they want with it, or to ignore it.
I posted them on Instagram and Facebook, too. In a way, it feels a bit dirty. Like “Oo, how much engagement are they going to get?”
But still, there’s part of you that thinks, “I want people to read this.” People who are maybe dealing with the same thing.
Mostly though, it’s for me. I put those emotions into words instead of not knowing what to do with them.
I don’t want them to disappear into nothing.”