Some of you reading this will be familiar with Banana the Poet, sometimes also known as Michele. She has a series of poetry books being released, and has organised a “blog tour” to help publicise them. This post of hers describes the success of one of her books, and more details are available on her blog:
http://banana.blog.co.uk/2009/11/03/what-do-you-think-of-it-so-far-banana-s-book-blog-tour-7296953/
Some time ago, she asked me to send her some interview questions. I did so and she has answered them in her own style, even writing a special poem for number 7. So here we are, 10 questions and 10 answers:
(This picture is by my partner Helen)
1. If a picture paints a thousand words, how many words paint a picture?
I try for as few as possible. because I'm quite lazy and get bored quickly.
2. What remarkable things have you found in unexpected places?
I find remarkable things everywhere; never in unexpected places because I expect to find remarkable things everywhere and I'm always looking, so I'm trained like Inspector Clouseau to always be ready for that "Not now Cato!" moment.
3. What do you wonder about?
Everything, all the time.
4. How would you organise a successful revolution?
I couldn't organise myself out of a wet paper bag
This blog tour has stretched me to my organisational limits. I'm more the sporadic subversive type who throws ideas out there recklessly and leaves the 'doing anything about it' to other people.
5. Would you rather be a novel or a poem? Why?
I'd definitely rather be a novel. They last longer. Poems are lovely but short and quickly read. I'm emphatically on the side of lasting longer when it comes to my own existence.
6. Is writing about music like dancing about architecture?
I've never danced about architecture although I understand the druids did a bit of that around Stonehenge and other stone circles. Yes I suppose so. Both are methods of self expression and can be artistically employed to convey feelings and other esoteric opinions regarding either music or solid structures.
Very large structures have historically inspired people to dance around them for various reasons; large fountains for example will cause a certain jigging motion in those who need the loo and I have no doubt that when the Eiffel Tower was completed there must have been some dancing involved as a celebration of the event.
7. Why are manhole covers round?
Holey Moley.
Consider the lowly manhole
beneath you on the ground;
It gets no accolade or prize
yet there it's always found.
With lorries trundling over
anonymous and brown;
Ignored by all except the blokes
who use them to climb down.
I'd not thought much about them
til quizzed by Seaside man,
and then I thought I'd write a poem
about the hole that's prefixed man.
Why is a manhole round he asked?
At first I was perplexed;
So I thought I'd ask my man
as it's a hole named for his sex.
I was not much surprised
that he had an answer;
I married him for his know how
well it wasn't for his 'skill' as a dancer!
'Why manholes are round,'
he told me with a grin,
'is it's the only shape of cover
that cannot be dropped in.'
'A rectangle or a diamond
or star shape or a square
could be somehow inverted
and slip through without much care.'
Then I looked at Wikipedia
and found some other reasons,
and found a non-round manhole
from the land of pizza - four seasons.
In the ancient capital from long ago
Italians then called home
there were rectangular manholes
which no doubt did fall in Rome.
So does deep in some ancient sewer
lie a corpse amongst the moles?
Bonked to death by the cover
of an ancient Ro-manhole?
8. What would be the title of your autobiography?
I would have liked "On the Other Hand" - but Fay Wray had it first. Maybe I could have "On the Other Other Hand"?
9. "Less is more only when more is too much" - true or false?
True
10. What question would you least like to be asked?
"Do you recognise this body?" asked as they whip the cover off a cadaver.
----------
I’m sure you will all join me in wishing Banana the greatest of success with her blog tour and with her books.
Cheers, Tom.



















































