Saturday, December 3, 2011

So it's not in a shop

but in keeping with the season of IPYPIASM that's in it, today I wrote a poem involving a shop. I wrote this in a work SHOP - see all the links? it's amazing isn't it... anyway - the workshop person (who was very nice and good by the way) got us to pick a public place and write a poem about the people around and about it seconds before a bomb goes off. - taking inspiration from the poem "The One Twenty Pub" by Wislaura Szymborska, translated by Dennis O'Driscoll.

I picked a shop. A fictional newsagent place called Mc Swiggan's. It's the first thing I've written in yonks so I'm not sure if it's any good. If anyone knows of a newsagent called McSwiggan's, please let me know so I can get them to put this one up in their shop...

Blowing Up McSwiggan's

Some goths and norms
coagulate in footpath
congregations
laughing through their braces
cigarettes light up their faces

An aunt runs in to buy
a card, a certain celebration
coat pulled against the cold
winces past a young alsation

A thin man wants a paper
with the date his son was born
Should've left it off till later
Would be safer to go home

There's a toddler on a lead
with icecream dripping through his fingers
though it's nearly nine at night
still his mammy chats and lingers
with a long past maybe boyfriend
she ran into him by chance
and now they're swapping numbers baby
but they might not get to dance

Farmer stops to check the lotto
red cheeks grump at lack of winning
thick chocolate cheers him up
so there's no fear of him thinning

The world thinks it can keep on
but in McSwiggan's soon it's ending
no more nothing for the lot of them
ashes, dust, dead colours blending

6 comments:

The Bug said...

Ooh I like it! That's an interesting premise. You did a great job with it.

However, if I were you I wouldn't put it in a shop - you might be arrested for being a terrorist or something!

Elisabeth said...

What a terrific poem, Niamh. I find it jovial and disturbing all at once.

Niamh B said...

Thanks Bug I can see what you're saying re the shop, maybe not
yes Elisabeth - thought it was really a horrible premise, but got into it after a while :-)

Titus said...

That's one hell of an exercise to introduce at a workshop. Really stirling job you did with it too - Elizabeth's right, your handling is fine and light and I can see them all, which of course makes the foreshadowings and the final stanza the bigger.

I wouldn't have known how to start with that one.

Niamh B said...

tks titus, I thought it was a fairly horrible idea, but the main reason I think was to try and write some convincing people, glad you liked

Mara H said...

Thanks greeat blog post