The wordsmiths putting your relationship and midlife crises through a social media filter
If you’re a purist, you might want to keep scrolling. But if Sylvia Plath, TS Eliot and Shakespeare were with us today, then who’s to say they wouldn’t be basking in the warm glow of their smartphones, tapping poems into their Notes about existential crises over Snapchat stories or Tinder dates gone wrong.
Poetry made its way off the printed page a long time ago; message boards and GeoCities sites (RIP) have all played their part in digitising the poem. But it’s now more accessible than ever – not to mention shareable, screengrab-able and more poignant for the 21st century. So (I guess) in honour of the looming presence of Valentine’s Day this Sunday, why not tune into a bunch of wordsmiths using their character counts for something worth reading. Below are five of my faves.
QUARTERLIFEPOETRY (@QUARTERLIFEPOETRY)
Poetry for the emoji generation from a self-described “reluctant 25-year-old’s words & illustrations of the quarter-life #struggle”. The daily mid-20s grind, illustrated, of course.
SOSADTODAY (@SOSADTODAY)
Mmm, OK, this one’s not on Instagram, but it’s only a hop-step-search on Twitter. Occasionally bleak af but pretty much on the nose every time, in fact, occasionally so depressingly true that you might need to skip past these posts if you’re having a bit of an off-day – when you need nothing but white lies, unicorns and a bucket of Prosecco (see: most days).
excited to get over you by being obsessed with someone else who doesn't want me
— so sad today (@sosadtoday) February 12, 2016
NOTES2MYSELFIE (@NOTE2MYSELFIE)
@jillyhendrix AKA @notes2myselfie is poetry for the social media generation. It’s that account that you can’t scroll through without tagging your mate, because @note2myselfie is actually your inner thoughts before you’ve even had time to think them – before you’ve even thought about thinking... about anything. Written on her iPhone’s Notes app, recent faves include: “it’s not a midlife crisis if it happens every week”, and, “the main thing I look for in a guy is his bed’s proximity to an outlet”.
HELLO I AM A FEMINIST (@FEMINISTTINDER)
We could hardly leave this one out when constructing a list like this so close to Valentine’s Day. Love is a battlefield, Tinder is a warzone – and watching men blunder their way through pick-up lines that range from clueless to outright misogynistic is the name of the game on this one. If you’re feeling a little sad about being alone this February 14, just remember you could have snared one of these guys instead.
RUPI KAUR (@RUPIKAUR_)
Rupi Kaur might be notorious as the Instagram artist who was banned for posting an image of her blood-stained pyjama bottoms, but her work is more than just a headline. A self-described ‘poetess’, she shares excerpts from her book Milk and Honey on her feed. NB: Kaur’s crushing honesty about heartbreak is not for the faint-hearted.