Kay Seeley's poetic prompt

I'm sure this fun poem by Kay Seeley will raise a smile from anyone who's ever attended a writing group. There are some great characters who could well be used in womag stories.

Kay tells me this group has now disbanded – there's probably a story or two in that!

A Tale for our Time

Writers come in all shapes and sizes,

Race and Religions and different disguises,

The quiet as a mouse, the blatantly loud,

The cautious, the reckless, the shy and the proud.

The weary, the dreary, the lustful and leery,

The hopeful, the doubtful, the dour and the cheery,

Into the library each Wednesday we troop,

The disparate members of our Writing Group.

Slowly but surely the writers drift in,

Here comes old Molly, still smelling of gin.

Next comes the man who’s convinced he knows best,

Sitting next to the girl with the ginormous chest.

Mad Mick the bouncer, who’s brilliant at verse,

Sits down next to Sarah, the Community Nurse,

We’ve got novelists, poets and screenwriters too,

From writing for children to something quite blue,

You’ll never get published, they mutter and moan,

Tales of rejection make everyone groan.

‘I hear that Romance is doing quite well,’

‘Oh no it isn’t, it just doesn’t sell.’

‘How about Sci-Fi, I’d give it a shot,’

‘Oh no,’ says another, ‘most certainly not.’

‘How about crime or historical thrillers,

A bloodthirsty saga of latter-day killers?’

‘You’d have to add zombies, vampires or ghosts,

But Celebrity stories are what they love most.’

‘Write what you know,’ they cry with one voice,

I know very little, so that limits my choice.

They grumble and mumble and twitter away,

Deploring the state of the book-world today.

If they can’t get published, then what chance have I?

I sit and I ponder as the minutes tick by.

‘What’s that I hear, no it cannot be real,

Old Jeremy’s landed a seven-book deal!

It’s out with the Champers, the biscuits and cheese,

Then back to the laptop and pounding the keys.