where art collides philosoperontap

The 1984 – 1986 series of poems are ones written in those years. They have been in a book in one of my drawers since then and never looked at. I hadn’t actually realised that there were more than one or two but there are 23 in total and I will be posting them all in the 1984 – 1986 category of poetry.

Having forgotten all about them there is a little overlap in words and ideas with what I am writing today but I thought they were worth showing anyway. I was in my early twenties when they were being written and only a year or so out of college.

In scarcely a shelter of frost-bitten briar
A tramp slept soundly his last night of sleep
A bottle of whisky, last drunk of at midnight
Lay empty beside him poor company to keep.

Oaken boughs cracked and small ponies shivered
As the teeth of the wind and the ice made their mark
But this wretch was no wiser to wintery weather
And died in the gutter, alone in the dark.

No searchers came searching, no body was missing
In this soulless black of a January night
And the snow drifted deeper, a ghostly white cover
For the corpse of a brother who lost his last fight.

Middle class suburban Sunday
Boredom, traditional and tedious
Black and white film on television
Followed by Dickens and religion.

Outside the rain falls steadily
Clouds closing sooner, a soon
Forgotten afternoon of Monopoly,
Tea and quarrelling with sisters.