The tomb of the unknown publisher.

The tomb of the unknown publisher.

Would it please you to know

That I can picture you?

With more than a pinch of vanity in the pronouncement

How do I know there is even a ‘you’

It is all supposition

Garnished with post-modern irony

But I do see you, reading,

Fingering the pages,

Turning them back and forth

Scratching an itch

Mouthing the words

Very quietly

"I once lay dead

Beneath

A blood-red moon

Exsanguinated

As empty as a

Poor man’s pocket”

A half-smile playing across your lips

As you pause to sip a glass of Chardonnay

Ice cold, fresh from the fridge

The bottle in a bucket on the table

The sun warming the wooden deck

The shadows of tall

Trees swaying elegantly in the breeze

A Blackbird male voice choir

Singing in harmony

Strains of Acappella on the wire

It is all so very suburban and comfortable.

I love it that you like me,

A literary giant trapped in a lunch box

And it is all I can do not to believe it

When the truth is, I am never read

Not by any publisher,

Or even an underpaid editor

Over a lukewarm cup of tea,

Never mind a crisp white wine.

Or anybody else, if it comes to that.

It is as much hubris as anything

Else I have heard today

The belief I am a writer, suffering for his craft.

Van Gogh never sold in his lifetime

So many other foolish souls bleat on

In the same sorry-arsed way

Tearing out their hair in disbelief at their unwarranted rejection

Too many people trying to be something other than they are

Isn’t that just dreamland

A karaoke nightmare,

Found naked on the stage

Realising that we can’t sing, too late

To be humiliated for the sake of entertainment.

I hate those reality nightmares

Too close to the truth for my liking,

Maybe you will read me one day

When I’m dead and gone

Discovered in a footnote, after the burning

When civilisation makes a comeback

Before yet another end-of-the-world tour,

When once again, they unearth Frank Sinatra

Yes, he will be singing My Way

So good they named it twice,

Please Mr Postman don’t return to sender,

If only you could,

As I never post anything, to anybody, anyway

And my own box is full of spam.