Simon Haines

Simon has written ten collections of poetry:
•  Safe on the Head tonight
•  Mumbled word
•  Share!!
•  Beachsome
•  Enjoy the dance
•  This is not a baguette
•  Quietly Quaking
•  For the meek
•  Sea Planes and Seed Trays
•  It’s Nuts

I’ve always written songs and poems though very few have seen the light of day until now. Lockdown gave me more time to write and more subjects to write about.  Several of my poems have been included on the Poetry Wivenhoe website. Some of these are included in three of the group’s  printed collections: Tales Told By Birds, The Last Hotel and Different Days, Different Desires.  I have also had poems printed in Suffolk poetry’s Twelve Rivers, Acumen, Dream catcher, The Morning Star, Culture Matters and a compilation, We are all Palestinians.
But the story actually goes further back than this. When I was about 7, I went in for a national poetry competition for primary school children and amazingly won second prize. We had to write an extra verse to Old Mother Hubbard. I was too scared to go to London to collect the award, but I was pretty chuffed, even though the prize was only a book token. Sadly I didn’t keep that extra verse.
I think it was probably at this point that I decided I wanted to be a writer. My parents used to ask me regularly what I wanted to write. My answer was always “I don’t know yet.” But, ever since then, I’ve always been busy writing something: songs, poems, magazine articles, children’s stories and for the last 40 years EFL textbooks.    
If you’re wondering about the accordion in the photo, I play in a number of folk music groups and a band which composes and plays music for English poets Martin Newell and Blake Morrison.

Simon Haines