I will write a poem…
when I’ve had another drink
when a loved one dies
when it stops raining
when the threatening letters arrive
when that filling is replaced
when my wife leaves me
Not as something blocking the drain
a foreign object lodged in a U-bend of the brain
But as an executioner’s block
that’s how I have always imagined you.
Bereft of ideas I am blindfolded
and led by the gentle hand of a Muse
up on to the blood-blackened scaffold,
where I am forced to kneel among the straw.
I lower my neck into the splintered mezzaluna
and as the crowd jeers impatiently
intone the mantra of lame excuses
in the hope that inspiration might come…
when I find the right pen
when the cheque is in the post
when the kids leave home
when the alcohol kicks in
when the moon rises like a something or other
when I stop worrying about…
Amazingly, all these things happen at once.
An unbelievable coincidence! I reach for the right pen.
A reassuring hush… Startled suddenly
by a swishing sound, the rush of cold air.