My memory my capacity my feet and my redbush
My bank account my notebook my collarbone and my view
My indigestion my slippers my speculation
My passport and my bicycle my blindness and my ribs
My dissonance my heartbeat my cooking my cough
My neighbour my salt my history and my houseplant
My withdrawal my exit my yawn and my emptiness
My floorboards my uncertainty my paracetamol my hands
My hair and my diary my trousers and my sky
My diffidence and my thirst my suffering and my steps
My fountain pen my keys my torch
My height and my conclusion
My reward my door my plans my breath
My independence and my skin
My peppermint tea my speculation my irritation
My eagerness and my tongue
My skin and my ribs and my history
My indifference and my trees
My recalcitrance my insurance my loss and my ticket
My water bottle my endeavour my notebook and my text
My blankness my tissue my collapse
My walking shoes my memory my pursuit
My obsession my regression my box and my paper
My toothbrush my muscles my tiredness my mask
My mind and my hair and my sky and my dust
My air and my bones and my trouble
My porridge my knees my coldness and my silence
My book my earplugs my memory my blood
My hands and my tears and my email
My hopelessness my gracelessness my rain and my welcome
My apple my heartbeat
Like lions after slumber in unvanquishable number
Oh yeah.
With heartfelt acknowledgements to Green and Scritti Politti (1982)
8 comments:
ah wonderful - but I'm baffled - is this something you wrote in the style of the lyrics?
yes exactly that - the song's called Lions After Slumber, and follows the same pattern and ends with the same two lines - otherwise this is me...
Oh my, Scritti Politti - I used to know them. They were amazing, and so are you.
This is amazing. I don't believe I know Scritti Politti - must google that!
Thanks all - the tremendous song that inspired this outpouring is on the prophetically titled Songs To Remember album. Once I possessed it on vinyl, now on CD, and still play every now and then with enormous pleasure. 1982! Wow that's 29 years ago...
Oh I'm glad you've still got a copy! I'm most certainly not in love with Jacques Derrida!
It's a great idea for an 'after' poem.
Sometimes 'after' poems are better than the original thing that they come after. Meaning to say that I love this, what you've posted here. It's one powerful list poem - the more so for seeing it typed, black on white (ok, grey). I have this ongoing tussle with people who insist that poetry only becomes itself when spoken out loud. Not necessarily so. This is visually powerful. I think leave the 'My' list unbroken.
Lucy - nor me, but still in love with the record after all these years
Signs - ...you mean unbroken by 'ands' or linebreaks, or the final two lines?
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