Getting old,
living alone, I still
talk too much but to myself.
I talk my way through
procedures like
carrying books downstairs.
The monologue’s so stupid
I do it in farting Mockney
or worse, mincing
Estuarian: none of it worth
the touch of my own Standard Midland.
from Selected PoemsFind more by Roy Fisher at the library
Copyright © Roy Fisher
Used with the permission of Flood Editions.
When the dead in your generation are still few,
as they go, they reach back; for a while
they fill the whole place with themselves,
rummaging about, inquisitive,
turning everybody on; bringing
their eyes behind yours to make you see things for them.
Now there are more, more every year,
sometimes a month packed full with them
passing through, first dulled, preoccupied, and then
taken quickly to silence. And they’re gone, that’s all.
from Selected PoemsFind more by Roy Fisher at the library
Copyright © Roy Fisher
Used with the permission of Flood Editions.
