Sugar Criminals

Sugar Criminals

Paul Conneally & The New Parks Poetry Machine

New Parks Library, Leicester, 2014

Sugar Criminals is a shreadlines piece - headlines from a particular newspaper on a certain day are cut up and put in a bag. Each line of the poem is written by picking out five bits from the bag and using at least three. The shreadlines process was developed by Paul Conneally in 1999 and though different comes out of Tristan Tzara method for creating a Dadaist poem:

To Make A Dadaist Poem

Take a newspaper.

Take some scissors.

Choose from this paper an article of the length you want to make your poem.

Cut out the article.

Next carefully cut out each of the words that make up this article and

put them all in a bag.

Shake gently.

Next take out each cutting one after the other.

Copy conscientiously in the order in which they left the bag.

The poem will resemble you.

And there you are — an infinitely original author of charming sensibility

even though unappreciated by the vulgar herd.

TristanTzara 

Yes 'the poem will resemble you'!