Alastair Swinnerton

Dear Facebook

I thought I would write to let you know that after years of thinking (and even talking) about it, I am finally going to leave you later this year, probably on or around Easter, definitely before the summer.

You won’t really miss me. I was never one for posting photos of my amazing holidays or beautiful children (though they are, naturally) or thousands of awards and shortlists for my poetry (there haven’t been any) or arguments with other poets (ditto) or photos of the jam I have just made or that weekend living in my van.

I used you to spread the word about my blog, which I still love and feel wholly committed to in spite of everyone telling me blogging has died since Twitter. And, to be fair to you, you were good at that: getting the word out, helping me to get noticed, talked about…