Skendong Poetry
Clunky Narratives

An experimental poetry archive from Manchester

Welcome to Skendong Poetry, an experimental poetry website and the original home of The Candid Verse. This archive explores Clunky Narratives — poems that show their seams on purpose, metamorphosing as they go: lines refuse to settle, the rhythm deliberately falters, and the register shifts because the subject itself won’t stay still.

The philosophy behind the work

Clunky Narratives challenges the expectation that poetry must always be smooth, polished, or predictable. The writing uses friction, unusual structures, and unexpected shifts in voice — a register that can lurch from biblical prophecy to internet satire within a single stanza.

An unconventional approach to modern poetry

Many poetry websites favour polished, consistent forms. Skendong takes a different approach. It is an assault on reigning rhetorical excesses — moralising, chaotic, and carving out room for genuine experimental expression.

Exploring the Clunky Narratives archive

A growing archive examining memory, identity, society, and the human condition. Ancoats corner shops and canal-side wine bars, a rogue AI escaping its sandbox, a headline from Gaza — tracing how overlooked moments and forgotten causes develop into unpredictable creative effects.

An ad-free space for literary exploration

No ads, no sponsors, no products. For poetry lovers, experimental writers, and readers chasing alternative literary forms — original writing since 2012, with a framework still evolving.

Explore the poems

Society, Power & Modern Life Read Street & State
Love, Loss & Relationship Read Quiet Aftermaths
Identity, Self & Fragmentation Read Dislocation Verses
Myth, History & Cultural Memory Read Past Constructs
Technology, Mind & Digital Life Read Attention Captures
Sacred Thought & Moral Reflection Read Conscience Fragments

The success of Skendong's narrative method is how the clunky difficulty of the verse is balanced by a sparky, jump-cut delivery.

Jeffrey Wainwright