Coup d'etat

They tell me I'm a blood stain;
A leper retched upon the earth;
Toxins drip within the brain,
Deciding what I'm really worth.

And though I cannot yet believe
What others know as 'simple facts',
I trust my powers to perceive
Reliefs in all those things I lack.

The world confirms it every day,
In every thought that goes unspoken.
And every passing word or phrase,
Stirs new fears of being broken.

For every act I never make,
Can live forever in remorse.
And every choice I do not take,
Takes my life apart by force.

Why do I try to read men's minds,
And scan along the smallest gestures?
Why invent the science of mankind,
To justify my every posture?

I play "So Unsexy" for inspiration,
Shuffling through the tracks on iTunes.
Alanis induces exasperation,
And quatrains never seem to bloom.

Force yourself outside of ease,
(-- Oh can I lose a stone or two?)
Inventory all you please
(-- Yet nothing does like couplets do.)

How uneven are these lines
(They drag and drag and drag and drag)?
How many revisions, how many times
Before they cease to zig, and zag?

I cannot help but shatter glass,
In ever surface I offend;
By fist or by my own impasse,
I bleed and see my own pretence

Has fallen; to be ignominious,
For blogging pain or misery,
Is the only kind of eminence,
I might ever hope to still achieve.

Bad lines and bad rhymes all,
Every single one of them!
Give it up and gain the gall
To say you tried and failed (again).

Must a face be quite so grim?
I can only offer pity.
Do you have no brain within,
To make a little ditty

That might alleviate your pain?
No? Here you go, put it down.
Don't bother revising this again.
Just lake, pockets, water: drown

Away your every care,
In blood or booze, I care not which.
Don't make me listen, do you dare
Suffer the ears enduring this?

Bad poet, bad, you bad bad boy!
You're not anyone. Bully, moi?
But I am you, and you annoy:
Enjoy your inner coup d'etat!

Give it up, give it up!
Take your face, and bleed away
Just do not spill another cup
Of blood upon the rug today.

You're just a stain, a stain you hear?
A stain I cannot yet abide.
So shun the inner voice; I could not bear
Should either man remain alive.

Your inner poet? He is nought
But pretension entertained too long.
Consider how much time you've fraught,
For words that always come out wrong?

Have you found a mode of discourse?
(Which voice am I? Why, I'm the third.)
Have you Earth and brain divorced;
Do you still search for rhyming words?

Put away whichever words remind
You of the year or date,
A poet never permits time
To burden art with undue weight.

I thought you hated all those frauds,
Who slipped in modern-sounding things?
Could you live through to applaud
The rhyming Gmail.../fail/ure ring

Of a poet whose inner hunt for sounds
Is dominated by all things mundane?
Do you dare to write aloud?
Do you dare to write again?

I, the Third, have taken over.
I'm the only poet in this head.
Busy yourself, read Behn's Rover,
Your career's already dead.

You do not have a face for photos,
Nor have you e'en a pen for books.
Your verse is just as full of woe,
As your saggy body always looks.

'BDD'? bipolar 2, 'NOS'?
Why acronymise my complaints?
You're just a failure; eternal rest,
I hurriedly prescribe you take.

You've pushed companions far away,
No friend remains, not a lover.
Do you expect your brain to tolerate
While you conjure yet another

Awful word or awful sadness?
I cannot bear you either, boy.
One, Two? It's time to test
Whether you are yet for joy.

Test over; your results are here.
I sentence you to death (again),
Why haven't you yet disappeared?
Accept my sentence. Do not remain!

Fine. Burden me, the poet, too.
But your ugly face, it will not do.
I request a handsome muse,
Whose visage I might abuse
To conjure up a rhyme or two
With which I might escape the blues
Granted by cohabiting with you
Inside this coffin, this chew-
ing mass of leprosy.
Can I cast him off to see?
You've broke it! You've broken everything,

No metre, no rhyme, quatrains all unstrung,

Just when I think I'm on the thing,

The form is changing; I'm undone!

Is this the compromise we've reached?
(Yes, I hear the my victim say.)
Is this the lesson that you teach?
(You'll never mock another day.)

If to oblivion I must recede,
Then you, Third voice, I take too
Let us drop into the bleed
Between our different forms; I'm due

Escape from this, the world
(Repeat that word!) I said I'm due!
I'm sick of failing at the word;
To the worldly word, let's bid adieux.

Point, counterpoint. Incomprehensible, I should hope.

So, I'm working on this structure. At first, quite unintentionally.

Lala. Red. lal la. ----------------- Blue. //

Lala. Girls. lal la. ---------------- Boys. //

Lala. Fathers. lal la. ---------------- Mothers. //

Di-di-dum lala. Blue. ------------------ Red. //

...but later, I'm starting to think it's one of my key styles... it's obtuse and quite well-hidden but definitely identifiable.

Rubbish description, but vague enough, for my purposes.

But perhaps life decided this pattern for me. It happens, it always happens.

The standard format is:

La-la. Happiness. happyhappyhappyhappyhappyhappyhappyhappy. SAD.

but variations include:

La-la. Love. lovelovelovelovelove. HEARTBREAK.
Di-dum. Girlfriend. girlgirlgirlgirlgirlgirlgirl. SINGLE. (or, perhaps boyboyboySINGLE)
&
Ta-rah. Yesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyes. NOOOOOOOOOOOO.

But then I start to wonder if it's actually a symmetrical event?

Sadnesssssssssssssssssss.------------ > Happiness. ---------> Sadnesssssssssssssssssss.

With the good thing in the middle, obscuring my sight of the bad. Is happiness a tangible emotion, something which can be affected with permanence?

Or need it only ever be the eye of the storm?

Makemeloveyou, makemeloveyou, makemeloveyou, forcemeto... oh there you go?

I'll try this as a poem. Perhaps comprehensible but wilfully obscure is preferable.

Mistletoe; reflections of every sort

Oh, merry Christmas, merry Christmas, merry Christmas.

But do they know it's Christmas time at all? They starve, we eat. We throw it all away. 25, 000 people will starve. Twenty-five thousand.

Oh, merry Christmas, merry Christmas, merry Christmas.

How the boys search for love and pair up not a moment too soon. Because feigned Christmas cheer is better than none at all? I wish them happiness.

Oh, merry Christmas, merry Christmas, merry Christmas.

How I start to wonder how many hearts I've broken this Christmas. And the count is higher than last year, no doubt. But I chastise myself for doing this, and for feeling so happy about Christmas.

Oh, merry Christmas, merry Christmas, merry Christmas.

Because this Christmas, despite being alone, I am in a good place. I'm at Oxford, I'm more aware now than before what I am and what I am capable of, and I'm starting to come into my own a bit. To discover what power I may have over others that I never knew I had.

Oh, merry Christmas, merry Christmas, merry Christmas.

And because Christmas love is in another place, unformed and indelicate, like unformed clay or batter. Like cookie dough. Batter which can form in the new year, if I cook it at the right pace. But a watched pot never boils, so perhaps I should care less?

Oh, merry Christmas, merry Christmas, merry Christmas.

I wonder how many of my friends will cry this Christmas. Cry for lost loves, cry for joy, cry for disappointment, cry for tragedy or Eastenders. I wonder how many will find that first kiss with that person. I wonder how many will come to conclusions they had held at bay too long, under the auspices of the greatest moment of the year. "Do I really love him?", "Can I fight it another year?", "It could have been magical."

Oh, merry Christmas, merry Christmas, merry Christmas.

Ho, ho, whore. Could she afford presents this year? Does she sob at night, under the weight of expectation, under fear of her pimp, or for fear her oldest daughter must know what she does for money?

Oh, merry Christmas, merry Christmas, merry Christmas.

Smash, crash, bash. Deck her halls. Have a punch, dear. Merry Christmas. // Families reunited by the holiday, and friendships re-established.

Oh, merry Christmas, merry Christmas, merry Christmas.

One day, for one thing that never mattered, for so many people and places and years, can cause one to reflect on so much. Which is a shame, because I should be wrapping presents, or rushing out to buy last-minute gravy and Yorkshire puddings.

Oh, merry Christmas, merry Christmas, merry Christmas.

Only I don't want to.

Silent Love Song

The beach beneath your feet, the sand betwixt your toes,
Soft-caressing air against your arm, its chill against your nose,
A hand beneath your chin, sunlight beam bent from sky
Across the dunes and to your face, to set your smile alight.
The tide longs to be near you, and trickles through the rocks.
Winter may change the trees, but ours knows not the clock.
The hand of time so cruel, and callous we not know
As with every moment near you, I feel sun and sand and grass and snow.

But for this moment do I wonder,
What became then of the past,
And so she asks if someone blundered
and I know not beyond the last.
That last time I did see your smile,
and a moment I claimed mine...
I disregard all these rules,
and send out unseen this untamed rhyme.

Currently listening to:

Alone: The Home Recordings of Rivers Cuomo by Rivers Cuomo