Not that I've mastered a great deal. I don't seem to have many followers and have a long way to go before I become a quasi-religious cult and lead them all to salvation on the Blessed Waun ( pronounced 'wine', but no relation).
I began in a surrealist political mode, but have rapidly lapsed into political commentary and ecstatic reactions to the Championship play-offs. Pretty soon, I will be commenting on my struggles with flatulence and the woodlice in our bathroom, judging by the prevailing subject-matter.
In search of enlightenment on Twitterdom , I decided to 'follow' a few of my musical heroes (all sounds a bit too much like stalking). The ridiculously under-rated and amazingly talented singer-songwriter Thea Gilmore was having serious problems unblocking her toilet. Where was her guitarist partner Nigel Stonier with his plunger?
More disconcerting, the completely unique American singer-songwriter (see a pattern here?) Sufjan Stevens appeared to be tweeting only the opening lines of his songs! I thought he'd got a form of cyber-dementia, till I discovered that Sufjan's site was actually controlled by his fans.
Trying to catch up with legendary.......you got it......singer-song-writer Tom Waits proved more fruitful however. The tweet from Tom made welcome reading, when he said - ' I never get on the radio. Marcel Marceau has more air time.' Typically witty.
Yet I quickly found out the power of the ubiquitous tweet. I read comments on the election eagerly and one struck me - 'The electorate have spoken and they have said.........'Erm...' When Ian Hislop repeated this word-for-word on last Friday night's 'Have I Got News For You' as if it was his own invention, I soon realised there was no copywright on these twitterings.
My older daughter warned me not to use Twitter to be poetic, yet I follow a number of observations about low-flying clouds and birds singing to annoy insomniacs. Friends would probably argue that I've twittered for far too long anyway and ex-colleagues would merely state - 'Haven't you got anything better to do?'
Well, sometimes things are beyond a tweet,especially the cockerel up the hill -
Rooster and Cowboy
The rooster knows no better
‘What-a-day-for-me!’
he calls across valley :
the sun’s already downing west,
he shouldn’t be so cocky.
The boy by the fence leaning
ever-watchful, his bike
a steed in shallow ditch :
on look-out over grass the colour
of sand, for a single movement.
Can’t see him, only hear his loud
doodle-dooing: imagine his strut,
his crest rising in the wind
among so many hens, his wings
flap-fluttering in dalliance,
his cries of always dawn.
On his bike riding down the lane
gun held aloft, a cowboy
in baseball cap and hooded jacket,
he shoots at something there
in the bushes, misses
a solitary swallow reaping air.
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