{"id":1000,"date":"2007-05-25T20:20:00","date_gmt":"2007-05-25T20:20:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=1000"},"modified":"2007-05-25T20:20:00","modified_gmt":"2007-05-25T20:20:00","slug":"one-prose-poem-and-one-vignette-by-geoff-mills","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/one-prose-poem-and-one-vignette-by-geoff-mills\/","title":{"rendered":"One prose poem and one vignette by Geoff Mills"},"content":{"rendered":"

This poem was not intended for publication<\/span><\/span>

This poem is not intended for publication<\/span>
and is to be found post-humously among my effects<\/span>
when the scholars and publishers scavenge through<\/span>
the biography-shaping artefacts of my life. <\/span>

It has been carefully concealed <\/span>
so as to be conveniently found,<\/span>
a remarkable discovery that will reveal<\/span>
the visionary depths of my self awareness,<\/span>
the agonized sense of my own genius.<\/span>
It will shock and excite the scholars <\/span>
for its frankness, unashamed <\/span>
self celebration and its revelation of a <\/span>
naked ambition hitherto unsuspected. <\/span>

It will affirm the poet's reputation<\/span>
not only because he had known for years<\/span>
what it had taken the literary establishment<\/span>
a while to suspect, but because its status <\/span>
as a private piece reveals the extent of his modesty, <\/span>
self effacement and sensitivity to public opinion.  <\/span>

And some knowing bastard from a respected<\/span>
literary periodical will shatter the reverent tone<\/span>
and say “<\/span>this poem is not a poem, for it reads exactly like <\/span>prose”. <\/span>
And though I  concur, his objection will seem<\/span>
churlish, insensitive and ill-timed<\/span>
for I, the genius, will be lying<\/span>
defenceless in my coffin.<\/span>

Quite dead.<\/span>

<\/font><\/p>\n

– – – – – – – – –<\/span><\/font>

<\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font>

The Silence<\/span>

At noon he shuts the stifling heat, roaring television<\/span>
and detached voices behind him and plunges into<\/span>
blackness. The warm plastic glow of domesticity<\/span>
recedes as he thrusts forward and senses the chill<\/span>
blast<\/span> of winter slap his cheeks.The high childish shrieks<\/span>
and deep mannish moans fade, only to mesh<\/span>
with the whistling wind that assaults quivering grass<\/span>
and trembling branches with malicious violence.  <\/span>
Suddenly he feels that weight of feeling he both fears<\/span>
and craves. The illusion of company and warmth<\/span>
that his home creates seeps away and an icy wave of<\/span>
ringing solitude washes over him.<\/span>

Suddenly he isn't just alone, he is always alone, but<\/span>
desolate.  It is that numb desperate aching pain <\/span>
that he is familiar with and yet privately cherishes. <\/span>
It is his own unique pain that no other will <\/span>
experience \u2013 a sparkling razor thread that sears his<\/span>
whole being and gives life a piercing edge.<\/span>

He sits between two bushes beside the river, weighed<\/span>
down by a stomach that churns slowly with <\/span>
emotion made dense and solid by time. He imagines<\/span>
that if he should jump into this liquid blackness <\/span>
he would plummet straight to the bottom. He would<\/span>
have to sit on the river bed \u2013 black inky water <\/span>
all around him \u2013 and wait for the eerie echoes in his<\/span>
swollen mind to swallow him up for good<\/span>

He listens. The roar of silence rings in his ears.<\/span>
Nothing. Just nothing.<\/span>

Should he have the powers that at times he feels he<\/span>
possesses he could sit on the river and it would <\/span>
carry him through the country side, through the<\/span>
cities, over the estuary and into the sea. He could <\/span>
roam the country untouched and unseen \u2013 unshackled by<\/span>
a mind diseased by sadness and a stomach<\/span>
made concrete by anxiety, anger, tears, longing.<\/span>

He perches still and still no-one knows. More his own<\/span>
time than ever \u2013 yet more than ever detached,<\/span>
disassociated, severed \u2013 on the fringes of time. <\/span>
Still silence reigns, darkness rules. And still<\/span> nothing. <\/span>
Eerie deafening nothing.<\/span>

He dislodges and trails his way home. This has never<\/span>
happened. No one will ever know. He leaves<\/span>
a section of himself there forever \u2013 perching on the<\/span>
edge, in the cold, by the liquid blackness \u2013 <\/span>
betrayed by that part of him that decided to go<\/span>
home… back to the stifling warmth, roaring television<\/span>
…a world of cheap yellow glow and hollow<\/span>
uncomprehending voices. <\/p>\n

\u2022 Geoff Mills says “I studied English at University and have had poetry and prose published. I am a fat man.”
<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This poem was not intended for publicationThis poem is not intended for publicationand is to be found post-humously among my effectswhen the scholars and publishers scavenge throughthe biography-shaping artefacts of my life. It has been carefully concealed so as to be conveniently found,a remarkable discovery that will revealthe visionary depths of my self awareness,the agonized […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1000","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1000","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1000"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1000\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1000"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1000"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1000"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}