Along with his talent in art, Nick was also an excellent poet.   One of his poems, Painting Hamsters Blue was made into a short animation entitled Blue by the Cambridge Graphics and Animations Society.  Nick did most of his writing in the middle of the night when everybody else was in bed, but many of his poems and cartoons were also written in school exercise books when Nick evidently wasn't paying attention in class.  Nick never thought he learnt anything worth learning after leaving primary school, and he said everything useful he knew was self taught, such as his art, poetry and computer programming.

Nick memorised a lot of poems that he liked, such as "The Lady of Shalott", "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" and "The Walrus and the Carpenter". Nick greatly admired William Blake, who was also both an artist and poet.  Another favourite of Nick's was the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám.

The Tyger, William Blake