Written, Then Spoken

Poems & Prose by Paul J Burgess

Life. Love. Loss. Rage. Hope. And everything in between.

I’ve been writing for most of my life, although I haven’t always thought of myself as a writer.

Written, Then Spoken brings together poetry, prose, articles, lyrics and personal reflections written across many years and many different versions of me.

Some pieces were carefully written as poems. Others began as articles, Facebook posts or thoughts tapped into my phone because something had happened, something was bothering me, or words had simply arrived and demanded somewhere to live.

They wander through love and loss, family and friendship, queer life, veganism, ageing, anger, grief, survival, humour, activism and the strange business of simply being human.

I’ve deliberately resisted the temptation to rewrite Past Paul through the eyes of Present Paul. Apart from correcting the occasional spelling mistake or rogue apostrophe, these pieces have largely been allowed to remain where — and when — they were written.

I also write very much as I speak. There are pauses where perhaps a comma technically shouldn’t be. Some thoughts arrive LOUDLY. Others barely whisper. That’s how I hear them, and that’s how they’re meant to be read.

Hence the title:

Written, Then Spoken.

This collection is completely free to download.

There is a donation button for anyone who would like to support my writing and the work we do through Those Vegan Guys, but please don’t feel any obligation whatsoever. I’d much rather these words were read, shared and perhaps moved somebody than money ever got in the way of them.

So download it. Keep it. Pass it on.

And if somewhere amongst these 49 pages you find a few words that make you laugh, make you angry, make you remember, or simply make you feel a little less alone in something…

then I’m very glad I finally put them all in one place.

Paul x

Enjoyed it? You can support our work here

You know what I’m sick of reading. Things like this.

Paraphrased – “I don’t know much about politics but could someone explain why 17.4 million people’s wishes are being ignored”

The clue was in the first part of your statement. You haven’t been paying attention, at all.

Pie, Theory.

You may have heard me use pie as a tool for analogy many times over the years.

The usual tale being that I believe people who have lots of pie, too much for them to eat, should simply share the pie rather than letting it go to waste. It fits in with friends who don’t recommend you to people or for things you’d benefit from, as they want it all themselves, and stretches right up to the sickeningly rich, who gather around their pies like a bear around her cubs.