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Ev’ry poet, given long enough,
Will name a poem this –
Some to relish the Schrödinger’s title,
Or one as subtle as a hiss,
Others who simply forget to attach one,
Or choose to leave it still undone,
But ev’ry poet will try this bluff
In the final analysis.
Perhaps it’s there, but printed in white ?
Perhaps they couldn’t think what to write ?
Perhaps the only copy to spare
Has suffered a tear, or a bookworm’s blight ?
Or scratched into a wall, in rough,
In some forsaken abyss.
But now they sit unheralded upon the bustling page,
With nothing to grab our eyeballs and engage –
We’re on our own.
They’re standing naked on the stage,
Relying on their lines alone –
Straight to business, no quick kiss
To say hello and set the tone.
Yet ev’ry poet, given long enough,
Will give a name a miss.

“Poems don’t have to Rhyme”

They told us that at school,
And we read some Hiawatha,
Then some Milton and some Armitage –
You know the stuff.
I shrugged, and ploughed along
To some Ezra Pound or other,
Feeling overwhelmed by culture
Till I just switched-off.

I guess it works for those for whom it works,
But all I found was faff –
It might as well be scat or freeform jazz
For all I cared.
I needed rocking rhythms in verse,
And lines that didn’t break in half,
I needed souls that used a regular rhyme
When they were bared.

They told us that at school,
And they dared us to disagree –
And they’re telling us still, with tuts and sneers
And humourless debate.
But we know what we like, and some of us like
For our verse to be less free –
So poems don’t have to rhyme, I guess,
But when they do, they’re great !

Writing by Heart

I can remember learning at school
The poems I had to learn by heart –
And yet I cannot recall them now,
We’ve slowly drifted apart.
It’s a shame,
Because some songs demand our remembering,
Work all the better when read heads-high,
With eyes in contact, and tongues in confidence,
Proudly aloud and never to be shy.

Sometimes, when I’m writing a line,
I think of someone decades hence –
Someone having to learn it at school,
Trying to make it make sense.
I’m to blame,
Because good luck committing me to memory,
With all of my showing-off to distract.
I’ll try to keep it short to make things easier,
Hope you can make it to the end intact.

But pray, allow me one more verse,
To make my case, one hit-or-miss.
And if you stumble, I shall not mind,
I’ve mangled far better than this.
All the same,
In those moments when it all comes together,
When the words are at the ready to be read –
I wish I could remember like I hope you can remember,
For no poet wishes to remain unsaid.