Verbatim found poetry is an intriguing collection of found poems. Poems found in ordinary, and not so ordinary places. Submit yours.
The dog Billy died
on a rainy cold evening.
He had stopped eating
and exploratory surgery
found a long cancer.
He fitted right in with us,
his stoic cautious cooperative self.
He was with us for 5 years, perhaps half his life.
It feels very empty here today.
We lit a candle and played the Requiem
by Mozart.
An email from a friend, around 5 years ago, on the death of their dog. Submitted by Karen Greenbaum-Maya.
This is just to let u know
I love u no less than I did at school.
Maybe it’s time we both moved on,
I will always love u
no matter how this ends.
From a text message that was sent, accidentally, to my friend Anita, 1 May 2012. Submitted by Lynda.
Gradually men rise up to confront them.
One of the bravest is
a teenage hairdresser’s apprentice.
Vidal Sassoon, the man who gave us
the Five Point Cut, the Asymmetric Bob
and Mia Farrow’s £2,500 haircut
was a street-fighting man.
“That popinjay Mosley.
Fascists preaching hate on every corner.
The same abuse that I remembered
from the 1930s,
I was too young to do anything about it.
The pictures we were seeing
from Auschwitz and Buchenwald and Dachau
changed the shape of our rage.
I went to work at the salon in Mayfair
with a badly scratched face
and this refined client said
Good God, Vidal, you look terrible.
What happened to you?
Nothing much, I said. I just fell over a hairpin.”
(From an Anti-Fascists Online report following the death of Vidal Sassoon. Submitted by Jo Bell)
A tanka
Urchins clustering
like barnacles to the stilled
rails. We wait. The
tannoy clicks on then clicks off
without an announcement. We wait.
Place Yutaka® Sushi Nori on a Yutaka® Bamboo Mat,
right at the edge
nearest your body.
Spread evenly with Yutaka® rice over about
two thirds of the sushi nori
with the uncovered part
facing away from you. Add your favourite fillings
a little off centre.
Roll up the bamboo mat
slowly
tucking the closer end of the sushi nori to start a roll
and press lightly with both hands.
Wet the final flap of Yutaka® Sushi Nori
to stick the roll together.
Remove roll from the mat, and cut
into six pieces using a
lightly moistened
sharp knife.
Taken from the back of a sushi rolling mat packet, found in the attic. Submitted by Christa.
Don’t be alarmed if your transfer isn’t completely perfect
Some work better than others and
You’ll learn a lot from experimenting
On different surfaces
The final image is meant to be imperfect
From ‘How to transfer a photo to fabric’ on A Beautiful Mess blog. Submitted by Bill.
A wet and cold start
This morning windy. Later
rain dying away.
The BBC Breakfast weather forecast, as delivered by Carol Kirkwood, March 2012. ‘The’ removed from the start of line 3. Submitted by Fran Isherwood.
went to my sisters last year
she had double
omg
said to greg
move over
taken all the bed
he said
im on the edge
im sure it wasnt a double
but we have a kingsize
and might go bigger
(Friend of a friend’s Facebook comment. Submitted by Ailsa Holland)
Plateau forests
Of ponderosa pine and Douglas-fir,
Cypresses that creep
Far into the water.
Under the sun that never sets
Below the smoke that thunders.
Taken from Rough Guide Ultimate Adventures, September 2008. The descriptions refer to the Grand Canyon, the Atchafalaya Basin and the Arctic Victoria Falls. By Harriet.
Any case
in which people pursue
a single great experience or accomplishment
that occurs infrequently
or perhaps not at all –
a Holy grail,
an impossible dream,
a brilliant model,
a great white whale –
is a case of
a positively skewed distribution
in which they may be
predicted to be
unhappy
most of the time.
From the book Social Comparison Processes: Theoretical and Empirical Perspectives (1977) edited by J.M. Suls and R. L. Miller. In the chapter “Pleasure and Pain of Social Comparison,” pp. 149-186. Submitted by Kate L.
Verbatim Poetry 
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