Simon Sweetman is a Wellington-based writer, reviewer, and broadcaster. The Richard Poems (Cuba Press, 2024) is his third book and second collection of poems. He published The Death of Music Journalism (Cuba Press) in 2020, and On Song, a collection of music journalism (Penguin), in 2012. He writes daily at Substack and is completing an MA in Creative Writing at the International Institute of Modern Letters in 2025. He is co-host of We All Float Down Here: A Stephen King Podcast, and host of the more occasional Sweetman Podcast. He lives in Aro Valley with Katy and Oscar and their dogs Bowie and Kendrick.
Sweetman comments: 'The Boys and Girls poem was inspired by seeing some teenagers conversing outside a swimming pool. It took me back to an exact scene—every town has one, every person has been in one—groups of people bashfully considering their next moves. The desperation to appear as anything other than what you actually are. I wanted to strip that moment down to what it actually was, what it always is. It sits inside my collection, The Richard Poems, as some of the background for a desperately unlikeable character (Him! Not Me! Promise!) But this poem, and the scene it describes, is its own thing—and though it is written as if it happened to me (because it did), it probably happened to you also, or you caused it to happen to someone else.'
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