John Rety: poet, anarchist, legislator of society

JOHN Rety, poet and anarchist, whom I knew from the 80s, was one of those men who seem ageless.

When I heard of his death last week I still saw him in my mind’s eye as a youngish middle-aged man. 

In fact, to my astonishment, I discovered he was  80.

He looked and acted young because he was young in spirit.

He was the kind of free spirit, a muse, any society badly needs – without such men or women, it becomes sclerotic. He confused politicians and desk-bound officials because he couldn’t speak their language or follow their stilted thoughts.

For more than a decade he fought to keep alive his creation, the Torriano Meeting House, a terraced house in Kentish Town which he had turned into a hallowed oasis for poets who would meet on Sundays and recite their verse – some good, some 

not so good, some throwing off a shower of brilliant lights.

I visited the Meeting House several times – where else would it have been possible to hear the great anthologised John Heath Stubbs or Dannie Abse whom I heard reciting a poem in memory of his wife who had died only a few weeks before in a road accident?

He published several books of poetry over years, but the one he may have been mostly proud of was the Well Versed, Morning Star Anthology launched in the autumn.

Petty officials didn’t understand John and pursued him for rent for the Meeting House.  

They would tut, puzzled as to what he was all about. To them, the Meeting House project came down to cash and balance sheets. To John it was matter of keeping faith with poetry. As Shelley once said, poets are the legislators of society. John knew this.