There’s The Rub

Had intended retiring to read - yeah I devour sci-fi 
like a junkie, now even the aura of its wash has a 
mephitic scent of ambivalence; too much I guess 
produces torpor - or a debilitating despondency if 
not enough of the right stuff - as such the last four 
titles were never ever even opened 

I’m no hero imaginatively seeking adventure, less 
a futuristic romantic and more the sceptic reading 
text where doggerel and bad construction blare a 
warning ‘this will be dangerous to your sanity’ - it 
is a fair accusation of ineptness on both our parts 
and the authors can’t hear me grinding my teeth 

So I’m in bed practising writing as if it will cure the 
undiagnosed disease - leastways I can see errors 
in my composition before it strangles readers in an 
indolence of indifference; I often wondered, do the 
authors ever read their prose aloud, or is it effects 
of entrenched editor detachment 

The penny drops when I try to imagine me in the 
same situation, but then I’m not selling my wares 
through book companies whose profit motives are 
what declares ends and means; and that’s the rub 
right there, my idea of perfection in entirety rests 
with me, not as a token of editorial celibacy 

© 20 November 2013, I. D. Carswell