About PoetJanstie
“Life is short and art long, the crisis fleeting, experience penniless and decision difficult”
~ Hippocrates.
As a young man, John was sporting and fit. It was then as much his recreational therapy as a cappella harmony singing, music, walking in the hills and writing is now. Playing Rugby Union for over twenty years, encouraged in the early days by a school that was run on the same lines and ethos as that famous Scottish public school, Gordonstoun, where our own headmaster had been as a senior master. This gave shape and discipline to a sometimes precarious early life.
His fitness was enhanced not only by playing rugby, but also by working part time jobs in farming, as a leather factory packer and security guard, but probably not helped, for a short time, selling ice cream!
His professional working life was spent as a Metallurgical Engineer, Marketing Manager, Export Sales Manager, Implementation Manager and Managing Director of his own company. Thirty five years spent, apparently in a creative desert, raising a family, pursuing a career and helping to pay the bills, probably enriched his experience, because his renaissance, on retirement, realised a hidden creative talent as a writer of prose and poetry. He also enjoys music, with a piano and a fifty-two year old Yamaha FG140 acoustic guitar. He sings bass in three a cappella harmony groups: as a founding member of a mixed voice chamber choir, Fox Valley Voices and barbershop quartets. He is also a member of one of the top barbershop choruses in the UK, Hallmark of Harmony (stage name of the Sheffield Barbershop Harmony Club), who, for the eighth time in 41 years, became UK Champions in 2019. He is also a would be (once upon a time or 'has been') photographer with drawers full of his own history, and an occasional, but lapsed 'film' maker. In his other life, he doubles as a Husband, Father, Grandfather, Brother, Uncle, Cousin, Friend and Family man.
What he writes is sometimes autobiographical, often political, sometimes dark and frequently pins his colours to the mast of climate change and how a few humans are trashing the Earth. In 2013, he published an anthology of the poetry (including his own) of an international group of poets, who met on Twitter in 2011. He produced, edited and steered the product of this work, "Petrichor Rising", to publication by Aquillrelle.
His sort of strap-line reads: “ iWrite iSing iDance iChi iVolunteer ”
PoetJanstie
My Poetry Library 
I still read this, often. So much truth in the words you write, which truly hurts…
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Time does not heal in that sense. But, even after all this time, I do appreciate that you took time to comment. Thank you.
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Thank you for dropping in and letting me know you have read this and appreciate it. Celia was(is) my sister; I am Poetjanstie. Sorry to have taken two months to reply.
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Thank you for dropping in and letting me know you have read this and appreciate it. Celia was(is) my sister …
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Thank you for dropping in and letting me know you have read this and appreciate it. Celia was(is) my sister …
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Thank you for letting me know you’ve read this and appreciate it. I appreciate you taking the trouble to do so. Celia was(is) my sister … sorry for taking two months to acknowledge.
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I still read this regularly, John. So much truth in the words you write. Painfully true.
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There IS only one Celia in your life, right? It resonates as such…
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Yes it is your Mum. A longer story, that I’ll tell you when I see you, why it took me 17 years to write about it.
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John, this is beautiful. Stunning actually. Thank you! Okay to share next Tuesday on my site?
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Brought tears to my eyes.
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Whatever it may be, it is the rock solid truth. Thank you, Jamie. Of course you may share it wherever you like. 🙂
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Yes! The honesty comes through.
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