I Have Wasted My Life*
I woke to puddles again, the driveway potholes I patched last week already reforming casualties of floods washing over the surface which spirit freshly spread gravel away. Isn’t this fitting for a rainy day I’ll spend scrolling twitter – a day when whatever I might have created with this pencil in hand is swept into the gully, mixed with all the other dreck caught up in the storm.
*Appologies to James Wright
5 thoughts on "I Have Wasted My Life*"
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I wouldn’t bother apologizing to Wright. He admits to lifting the line from another poet.
https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2015/06/23/i-have-wasted-my-life/
I did not know! I will still nod to Wright when I can in the (small) hope that some of his gifts will rub off. 😉
Agree with Tom. Love “already reforming casualties.” Do you write first drafts with a pencil? I have always done that. Can’t quite compose on a computer.
Ah, you caught the lie of the poem. I have Blackwings and a pad I take notes on but almost always compose on the screen – which does not make for an evocative line in a poem!
The circumstances of the poem (the recurring potholes) reminded me of Bonnie Proudfoot’s Goshen Road.