Answers to the question “what would you like your poem to be about?” never fail to surprise me.

They are a delicious gateway into the never ending buffet of human brains.

I’ve been asked to write about all sorts for people over the years. Here are just 8 examples proving that poetry can be about anything and everything.

1. “I want a poem for my wedding day. Wind my hubby up by using the C-word as much as you can.”

This was one of my favourite ever briefs. I was writing poems for strangers as a part of The Poetry Takeaway at the National Wedding Show at Birmingham’s NEC.

A group of ladies – Prosecco in hand, Prosecco on breath – came stumbling over. The one with a crossed out L-plate on her chest explained to me that she was getting married for the fourth time and wanted a poem to surprise her man with on the big day.

She told me that the wedding was also his fourth, so she didn’t want anything too serious as “we’re not soppy buggers”.

She asked me to take the micky out of his thinning hair, the leather shorts he wears playing drums for his band, and to use the C-word as much as possible.

When she returned 15 minutes later and I read her the poem – hitting all of her notes – she grabbed me in a tearful embrace and said, “The stupid C-word is gonna love it.”

2. “My brother is a huge Coventry City fan. We’re top of the league right now and his 60th birthday is on the last day of the season.”

During the BBC Contains Strong Language Festival, I was approached by a few of Coventry City Football Club fans.

It was the end of September and the team were flying high at the top of the Championship table.

A woman approached me and said, “It’s my brother’s 60th birthday on the last day of the season. I think it would be funny to hand him a poem on that day that celebrates his birthday poem and Coventry winning the league.”

“What if they don’t win the league?” I asked.

“That’s what would be funny.”

So I wrote a poem weaving the history of Coventry City with the history of the brother’s life. I named his birthday candles after their centre forwards. I compared the birthday boy to the manager and his kids to Coventry’s defenders.

The woman was delighted with the outcome.

Eight months later, Coventry finished 12th in the league and I can only imagine the bloke had a terrible birthday.

3. “I plan to oust my CEO one day. Write me something to read in the mirror every morning before work to pump me up to take his job.”

Not a day goes by that I don’t think about this lad.

I was writing poems for a strangers at the launch of a new branch of a particular building society that is, um, nation-wide known.

A young cashier, after patiently letting customers get their own poems throughout the day, grabbed me at the end of my shift to tell me he wants to run the whole place one day. And to inspire him to achieve his goal, he wanted a motivational poem.

I went to town on it. I made him feel like a Richard Branson in the making. I stuffed the poem with encouragement strong enough to jump off the page and slap him in the face.

He asked me to read it to him while his colleagues stood around him in a circle and he bounced up and down as he spoke like Brad Pitt in Fight Club.

4. “I’ve got a new bike. I love my new bike. Write me a poem about my new bike?”

Bikes, dogs, houses, cats. I get many, many requests for poems about new things in someone’s life.

It’s easy to churn out the same poem and swapping the names. But that’s not the way I like to do things.

It’s of the utmost importance to me that people receive a unique poem, no matter how generic their order.

So, with this particular bike enthuiast, I tried my hardest to ask her bespoke questions.

Carl from ‘I Will Write You a Poem’ writing a poem for a young lad who loves trains at the reopening of the Station Agent’s House, Manchester. Image by Jo Bell.

5. “An ode to our Employee of the Year.”

This one does what it says on the tin. And I loved it.

The nature of ordering a personalised poem from a poet, who has never met the recipient, means the poet needs to ask questions:

• What does this guy have for lunch?
• What in-jokes does he have with his team?
• What’s an embarrassing moment he’s had at work?
• What is his biggest success this year?
• What would the company do if he ever left?
• etc

By asking this type of question, I got the opportunity to find out what the employer really thought about their Employee of the Year. And the more I knew, they less I had to rely on platitudes like, “He works hard, he lights up the office.” I got to use the personal, unique information that meant he felt seen before receiving his award.

6. “My daughter doesn’t know how special she is.”

Oof.

I shan’t go into too much detail, but this order was from a dad who noticed his teenager daughter was regularly talking about herself in a negative way.

The joy of the man’s face when I ask him why his daughter is so special, what she’s into, what she was like in the past and what he thinks she’s capable of in the future, was a joy to behold.

7. “I wish I was Rapunzel and had the courage to escape.”

After asking a few questions, I was pleased to discover the person ordering this poem was not trapped in a tower by a scary woman.

But she was in a job she no longer enjoyed and felt like she couldn’t quit.

The joy about this kind of brief is the person has a natural flair for the poetic. The Rapunzel line gave me an instant hook, and my job was literally a case of reordering the profound lines she gave me about her situation and showing her she had courage all along (ssh, I know that’s the Wizard of Oz).

8. “I’ve been out of prison for six months and haven’t touched booze or drugs since. I want a poem that celebrates me!”

I met this guy working at an event in Stoke.

His whole head was a smile. We chatted for a good 30 minutes about how a decades-long drug and alcohol addiction lead to choices that resulted in him going to prison, and how the last six months had been the best in his life.

He’d moved in with two other sober guys he’d met in prison. They took it in turns to cook for each other every night. They played card games. The went for long walks. And accompanied each other

I’ll never forget the moment he returned with his two pals with a proud grin the entire time I read the poem I’d written him.

If these examples have sparked an idea in your beautiful brain, get in touch to order your very own poem today.