Rooted in this dreary afternoon

There are the spells of wild imagination

That open doors onto the wider thought,

The things we wonder when we’re tired,

Ruminating on those frightening questions

On who we are and why we’re here.

Too big to deal with in the here and now,

We need to shrink, to boil it down

To something easy to digest, medicinal

And cures the common colds of mind.

They’re the stories that I need

To help me understand this world

Of complex joints and clockwork parts,

That no one really truly ‘gets’

No matter what they say.

I’ve self published a few books and it’s funny to see this element of magical realism that seems to thread itself through most of my work. I feel that might be for the same reason that I enjoy writing poetry: because I need to simplify the complexities of the world so that I don’t enter in on an existential crisis.

Whenever I teach symbolism and imagery to teenagers I get all excited because I feel like I’m going to open up a whole new world to them. Unfortunately, that never seems to happen.

I love to understand how the world works and how other people view it and I do like to think about what my purpose might be. I do think that we will have these questions answered at the end of it all. But while we are here, a bit of magical realism will help us to grapple with those ideas.

Now, I just need to find a way to get fourteen year olds to care about such questions. Ideas anyone?

Much Love

Rachel xx