AN entrepreneurial young poet from Enfield has come up with a novel way to publish his work.

Dion Power - aka "The Freewheelin' Troubadour" - is collecting donations from social networking sites to fund his first book.

Entitled "Freewheelin’ in Monument Valley & the American Offerings", the collection of prose and poetry is based on a three-month trip across the United States he took last winter.

Mr Power, who grew up in Durants Park Avenue, travelled from San Francisco to New York after he split up with his girlfriend, his work in care "dried up" and two of his band members left.

To recover from the series of misfortunes, he documented his trip in stories, verse and songs.

One story recounts a day spent in Monument Valley with Navajo Indians, while another is about a near death experience while climbing a notorious mountain, Hunt’s Mesa, at midnight with a Native American guide.

He has now taken nine pieces of poetry and prose from his travels and asked nine artists to illustrate a piece each, "letting art inspire art" and creating "a brilliant collective artwork".

Rather than offer the book to publishers, Mr Power decided to ask the collective, called "The Freewheelin' World", to raise money from their fanbases.

He hopes to raise at least £500 to publish the books, which will then be given away for free.

Mr Power, 25, said: "The idea came to me because at the moment I'm one of the only spoken word artists who performs live at gigs with bands in London, and I've always liked the idea of giving my words away.

"After years of blogs, which can only be viewed in one medium, I thought why not try and branch out and actually have free books to give to people?"

He added: "This book has not been offered to publishers and is instead going to be ‘published by the people’.

"It’s a way of incorporating as much talent as possible into one project, and showing people that we can be in charge of our own output and still be successful in our endeavours.

"Giving people a gift of our art, and them taking time to think about or feel something from consuming it, is payment in itself.

"We are all Freewheelers and we share our love for free."

The group is hosting a gig on Saturday, August 7, at The Victoria, in Mile End, to collect donations for the book. Artists performing include The Coolness, Those Handsome Animals and Ben Bailey – Thee Unstrung.

For more information about the project or to make a donation, write to the.freewheelin.troubadour@gmail.com or visit www.myspace.com/thefreewheelintroubadour.