Hello Poetry Lovers!
No don’t adjust your sets! It’s me, Sharron @rhymes_n_roses turning the tables on the lovely Heather Moulson because it’s time for her to take the spotlight!
Dougie switch the torch off! You’ll blind her!
You’re looking beautiful in that black velvet trouser suit my dear! Sorry about Dougie’s hair – Dougie Down!!
Don’t worry – Dougie and I are pals since our rehearsals in the garden last year – not much chance of that this Summer! Dobby says hello – she’s drying off at home.
Well, please pop that beautiful handbag down before the handle breaks, take a pew and we’ll get started.
When did poetry become a part of your life?
It became important to me at 11 when I was 
desperate to win a school prize. I wrote this piece about a modern house. I remember a line about central heating – a real luxury then.
Ooh central heating – best invention ever…
I know! Anyway, I won the prize – a book which I still have today – and then retired from being a poet and turned my back on it all. 
What a tragedy …
Fast forward many years later, when my friend Anne Warrington wanted to set up a regular poetry meeting in 2017, I got inspired to start writing again.
Thank goodness for Anne, she’s a treasure to us all
I know, Anne’s wonderful isn’t she?!.
I discarded writing about a house this time, and concentrated on nostalgic pieces. Then I couldn’t stop, the poet in me was unleashed! It must have been fighting to get back out all along! 
It’s hard to hold back once you’ve started isn’t it? And what a plethora of poems you’ve produced!
Tell the audience how the Booming Lovelies got together
Early March 2020 at the Cranleigh Arts Centre when we all naively thought that 2020 was going to be a good year! I’d already met Trisha Broomfield before but that was the first time I met you, Sharron. You made a good first impression. I recall us sitting together at a table.
Yes, we shared a packet of salt n vinegar – you were very restrained
Yes, for once! Despite the Booming Lovelies not really happening until 2022, at the Willoughby Arms, I think it was always there just waiting to be unravelled. With our love for a certain era and nostalgia and the older woman’s angle, how could it not come to light?
Definitely – we found our niche – Baby Boomers Rule OK!
Are you working on anything at the moment?
I’ve started several projects and they’ve just gone by the wayside. I would like to publish another pamphlet, as my last one Bunty, I miss you was published in 2019. I can’t believe how long ago that is now.
I LOVE your Bunty pamphlet – definitely a collector’s piece!
Ah thank you. Inspired by your’s and Trisha Broomfield’s new book, I would ideally like to write pieces with illustrations.
Your cartoons are A M A Z I N G – that’s such a good idea!
Remembering the blackouts and power rations as a teenager, I would like to concentrate on these.
Tell me about it! Obviously, I was a bit younger but I remember lighting candles at night.
Erm…I just wondered if…..
Yes of course you can pop out for a ciggie – please don’t let Dougie have one, he’s been banned from vaping
Welcome Back – I was wondering, what’s your favourite personal piece?
I really love Penfriend that I read during our Booming Lovelies act. It’s so true and makes me yearn for Ingeborg again. (Wherever she is!).
Think the other piece is Bloody Liar because I remember my school friend, Julie did that all the time!! And yet, I still fell for her lies! Why?!
They both always raise a laugh don’t they? (although my friend Julie was a bit upset about that one)
What’s the best gig you’ve ever done?
Definitely with the Booming Lovelies at Cranleigh Arts Centre in April. They were a great crowd and with us all the way. I also adored that dressing room.
Yes, our first Green Room – with a mini bar! Very rock n roll!
Wasn’t it great?!
From a solo view, I think it was at The Poetry Café in 2018 at Hampton Hill and Dorking is Talking in 2019. Isabel Morris set up poetry gigs in a Mediterranean restaurant with a great turnout, and the audience fell about. Exhausting but exhilarating. It’s a shame that died out. COVID ruined so many things. 
And what about your Worst gig?!
That’s hard to answer because I’ve bombed numerous times and they merge into one!
I suppose it was at the Torriano House in December 2022, I was so thrilled to be invited there and no-one turned up! Luckily, I took along my 3 pals, and the lovely Barney Ashton-Bullock came and cleaned up on the open mic.
Where would we poets be without our friends?
Yes, indeed. My pals were a bit nonplussed, to say the least. 
It was also lovely to read with the enigmatic Wendy Young, and I had the pleasure of meeting Pauline Sewards, a lovely intelligent poet, so it was a double-edged sword really.
I won’t ever forget that bleakness though and that there were eight of us in total on that dark Sunday night! Luckily, I’d brought some wine and crisps!
Well at least you were all treated to great poetry – and you got home early!
Speaking of which, I’m afraid I have to go now Sharron, I’m feature poet at the Surrey Poet Laureate’s Lounge tonight. Thank you and Dougie so much for having me.
Wow! Congratulations! You really are in demand Heather – and rightly so!
She’s off in that new blue car of hers – going places is our Heather. Now she’s gone I’ll open a bag of cheese and onion and write this up. She makes it look so easy!
Heather Moulson 