Development
Normally. when I am inspired to write a poem, it comes out quite quickly. I have the idea and the words swim through my brain and out onto the page or the computer screen. There are usually some small revisions as I try to get the best words in the best order but after a day or two the deed is done and by then the tide of my inspiration has receded. With "Stanage Edge" I am deliberately doing it differently, putting reins on the emerging poem and sometimes leaving days between my tinkerings and final word choices. You may recall that I first shared my little scheme a month ago in a blogpost I titled "Incubation" . I want to do justice to this poem because Stanage Edge is so special - not just to me but to lovers of the outdoors in this northerly region of England. When my late brother Paul was studying biological sciences at Liverpool Polytechnic at the end of the 1960s, he was a member of the rock climbing club that visited Stanage Edge several times and whe...