A Fly on the Wall Poem -Alan j Wright

I am here to share a narrative poem and taking the opportunity to celebrate the frequently heard idiom- ' I'd like to be a fly on the wall.' I had a chuckle to myself while writing this one...

I must come clean here and reveal that Ronny Wunders, a character central to this poem is based on two of my childhood friends. He is a composite of two people and has featured in several of my previous poems. He is what is referred to as a recurring character. He does some heavy lifting for others who remain anonymous.

There is in fact a real Ronnie Wunders out there somewhere, as well. Allow me to explain...

Some years ago while walking through a large department store, an announcement rang out for someone called, Ronnie Wunders. I thought, what a great name- and the rest is history. I adopted Ronnie Wunders, in name only!

Ronnie's been having adventures in my poems ever since, along with Cliff Edges, Shirley Birley and others.

Ah the machinations of a poet's messy mind!

A Fly on the Wall

My friend, Ronny Wunders

Rang me and asked me to come round to his place

I’ve got something to tell you, said Ronnie

-It’s kind of a secret…

So, gobbled down my breakfast, climbed on my bike

And zoomed round to his place.

Ronnie was waiting at the front door

And waved at me to follow him

He was acting like a character from a spy novel

The day felt strange and it was only 9.00 am.

We went to his room where he closed the door behind us

And began speaking in a raspy whisper

Asking me to promise not to tell anyone

About what he was going to tell me

So, I promised not to tell anyone about something I hadn’t yet been told

Which felt weird

-And then I waited to hear Ronnie’s secret.

But before he could spill the beans

I noticed a fly on the wall

I felt I must point it out to Ronnie, just in case

Okay, says my friend

I’ll tell you later when there’s no one hanging around

-But he never did tell me his secret

And I now realize flies don’t have ears

So why do people say

Ooh, I’d like to be a fly on the wall

when they talk about that?

Alan j Wright

It is once again, Poetry Friday and this time our host is Tracey Kiff Judson who does a deep dive into figurative language with some great insights.

Poetry Inspired by Images and Objects

There are many ways pictures and photographs can be conscripted to support the writing of poetry. Allow me to share a few ideas with you: Old photographs are a great source of inspiration. Cynthia Rylant explored this idea with great success in her book 'Something Permanent' where she employed the Depression era photographs of Walker Evans to add a new voice to the starkness to the lives of people experienced under extreme circumstances. I have used this strategy to spark many individual poems. In ' I Bet There's No Broccoli On The Moon,' I used a photo I had taken in 2004 while living in New York to inspire a poem. The poem was based on a story related by a friend who grew up in New York. I regularly combined poetry and pictures in my writer's notebook, drawing on inspiration from the photograph and my personal memories. We can also utilize existing cartoons and illustrations to create ekphrastic poems. I frequently use the illustrations of Jim Pavlidis to co...

Peter Dixon -Teabag Poem

Today I'm highlighting the poetry of Peter Dixon. Peter Dixon was not just a poet. He was a performer, educationalist and artist. He grew up in London during WW2, and as a boy his schooling was far from successful. He struggled with spelling and the understanding of word, form and grammar, so he tended to write secretly at home, drawing and writing of things largely ignored by schools. Despite this difficult phase of his life, Peter eventually became a school teacher and then a senior lecturer in education. It often mystified him as to how all of this came to pass. As a teacher, he strived to be unbiased and did not neglect the children who experienced learning challenges. Peter Dixon became a full time children’s writer and educational consultant. His first book was published in 1978. Whilst living in Winchester, Hampshire, with his family, he contributed to over 100 poetry anthologies and had seven collections of his own work published including Grow Your O...

Poetry Friday 'Storm On The Island' Seamus Heaney

Given the fact that we recently celebrated St Patrick's Day, it seems appropriate that I take this opportunity to continue the Irish focus and recognize one of Ireland's leading literary figures... Seamus Heaney was born in County Derry in Northern Ireland in 1939 and died in 2013. He became a multi award winning poet. His first collection of poems, 'Death of a Naturalist' appeared in 1966 and helped to establish Heaney as one of the major poets of the 20th century. From that first anthology, I have chosen 'Storm On The Island.' This poem tells us about the stoic resistance of people and structures to an incoming storm. The island is not named. Poetic scholars believe this is a poem that can be taken literally, as a monologue on the life and attitude of island people facing a storm, or it can be understood as a metaphor of political struggle on the island of Ireland. Heaney knew both worlds. The poems of this first collection are grounded in the soil...

TraceyKJ23 October 2026 at 13:37
Ronny Wunders! I am so happy that you snapped up that name when you heard it. Your story sparked my curiosity, so I had to google about flies for a while! : )
Anonymous23 October 2026 at 14:26
As usual, finished off by asking a searching question. And what was ‘the best thing’ before sliced bread?

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