I’ve done this before and regretted it and I’ll probably regret it again and delete this post before anyone reads it so if you are reading this and you’re not me then I didn’t delete it. (As if you didn’t know that already.)
So the thing I do is to post half-baked works-in-progress that I find in dark corners of my hard drive.
There follows three such works
Something relatively innocuous to start, anodyne even.
Happy Birthday To Me
It’s a scratch on the wall
a step on the path
It’s my birthday again
another year’s passed
If years were seconds
there wouldn’t be many
not much more than a minute
The next two poems may not be suitable for sensitive ears . . .
All I want to do is paint a fucking crocus
All I want to do is paint a fucking crocus
All I need to do is paint one fucking crocus
Just one fucking crocus
And I call myself an artist
And I’ve got an unfinished canvas in the shed
Waiting
Waiting
Waiting
Waiting for me to paint a fucking crocus
One fucking crocus
That’s what I want to do
Need to do
Then I can paint more fucking crocuses
On the unfinished canvas
Then it will be a finished canvas
And it will be done
Maybe that’s the problem?
Maybe I don’t really want it to be done?
Maybe it should remain a work-in-progress?
Or perhaps I’m just lazy and useless
Perhaps I’m not an artist at all
Just a fucking bullshitter
A fat fraud
I dunno
What do you reckon?
It’s later.
I painted a fucking crocus
It’s not bad, but
There are another twenty-odd to paint
Before the painting is finished
Then I’ll know
Yes
Then I’ll fucking know.
This Country House (in Mid-Wales)
This House
if that’s a big enough word
is the sort of place
where I used to write poetry
Now I see it is,
or places similar are
The source of my
poetry
Why?
Because they are soulless or,
If they are not
their soul is twisted or
if it is not
it is filmed in a patina
of fakery, of self-loathing
of the acquisition of power and
wealth accumulated by
the people –
and here, just here –
that just happens to be
a bunch of smug-welsh-speaking-bastards
Wary of each other like
fighting cocks or
dogs chasing the same bitch
or perhaps heifers chasing the
same bulls
(I can’t help it if the language is sexist)
like the sheep on the hills they
are maggots
Money built this place – money
squeezed from the labours of a million
people and the blood of millions more
animals –
They are so fake / so fucked
these woolly Welsh Bastards
and I am as Welsh as they come
myself
# # #
** Note: This was originally written in 2017 – since then the crocus painting has been finished and sold. see below
