Arthritic Fingers Have To Last (rev)

These painful, cold arthritic fingers have to last much

longer yet, they’re all I have to keep the pages on the
screen prescribed with glowing words, my favoured

antidote to weak and skulking weariness – cups of

strong black coffee still distress an empty stomach
used to tea, especially in the morning.

I ask myself why such a thankless task? 1,000 poems?
At one each other day that’s 5.49 years and who would

care – or notice, should I fail? Yes, I will prevail, with
deference to the quality of written word; if you sense
a diminution in the power my words project, why
then protest! I would be thankful just for that.

To know you’d take a cane to shoddy work would add
the spice that’s needed in this lonely quest. But did you
know the hardest part is hours just sitting on my arse
as things significant event beyond the window pane –
things that neatly pass into oblivion that’s numbed by
nether views anchored to a torpid poet’s bum.
© 2005, I.D. Carswell