Secrets

There should be secrets

For us to ponder

to worry about.

Not everything need be known

like how we got here

on this island Earth,

Why God put us here,

the point of suffering,

of brain tumors, cancer?

why some people sail through life

while others ….

What’s it all about, Alfie?

Like the house across the street.

Who lived there? Why did they go?

Why has it been left to ruin?

I could ask the guy raking the leaves

in the house next door

but if I knew, I couldn’t ponder.

There should be secrets.

There should be secrets.

waiting to be Called

Please Wait to be Called,

the sign said

So I did.

I took a ticket and waited

behind the others

till it was my turn

at the head of the queue

outside the draughty pearly gates

holding my flimsy little ticket

& when, growing impatient,

I stepped forward,

St. Peter held up his hand:

“There seems to be some problem,”

He said.

“You’ll have to wait a little longer,”

I stamped my feet a little

when a white light flashed overhead

& a door opened behind

& I was whooshed back

to the operating theatre where the surgeons

had revived me.

One step from paradise.

pic courtesy of Pinterest,com

Wish I Could Come Up with Something

I wish I could come up with something,

I really do.

I mean how long can it take for inspiration to strike?

Do I have to stand outside in an electrical storm under the tallest Norfolk pine to be struck?

Metaphorically speaking, of course.

I know slouching around doesn’t help or reading Beth’s poem on Cheetos and working up an appetite for snack foods won’t do it either.

Maybe if I played with my Rubik’s Cube like Maro does might do it — loosen up a few brain cells.

I’m desperate.

Perhaps if I go outside and wail beneath the full moon like uncle did before they took him away.

God, there must be something.

They still do ECT, don’t they?

That’s what happened to uncle. He saw God, angels, the whole shebang then settled down among the fairies at the bottom of the garden.

But he found something. He wasn’t wracked anymore. He found quiescence. If you got that, you don’t need anything else.

Shit, did I just write all that?

The Problem of Stephen King

Stephen King wrote a lot.

If God were as busy as Stephen King

He would not have rested on that seventh day.

Stephen King wrote as many books almost

as God put up stars

but not all of them were good.

None of them were duds

but only a few shine — you know them:

‘The Shining’, for instance, ‘Misery’,

the first third of ‘It’, the novella ‘Stand by Me’.

Maybe that’s all we can hope for —-

in a long and busy life only a few of our works

will shine.

*have I left any good ones out?

*what’s your favourite King book?

*which have you read over and over?