– 94 –

Life Sentence

When the man from the Arts Council mistakenly
knuckles my door in the hope an artiste
might be found on the premises,
when this woman
with frankly, Norks, you wouldn't believe them,
asks do I have faith in the beyond,
or Arkansas, as he's known round here,
a stud-nostrilled bogan with musically
simian taste,
he or his gravid sister
wanting to borrow my ‘fockin’ tape-deck, bro’,
there's a queue, veritably, to my front veranda,
each expecting feedback as though manna's by right,
why, I quote Akhmatova
at them, my one
stab at truth in a tricky world. ‘The Venice,’
I tell them, ‘the Venice of Doges is next door.’