<p class="ql-align-justify">In later life, while living in London, George Claessen returned to poetry, often interrogating the same metaphysical themes he explored in his abstracts. The fruits of these endeavours resulted in a number of volumes, including, <em>Poems of a Painter</em> published in 1967, <em>Poems about Nothing</em> (1981), <em>Collected Poems</em>, (1995) and subsequent inclusion in various poetry anthologies. &nbsp;</p><p class="ql-align-justify"><br></p><p class="ql-align-justify">Describing his desire to use poetry as a creative alternative to his visual artistic work, he memorably said that it was, <em>'...the outcome of an urge for expression in another form - a phenomenon not uncommon in painters, just as the same would and does apply in reverse to essential poets'.</em></p><p><br></p><p><br></p>