My latest radio appearance, which you can find here at 1:30:30, is a reading of the poem ‘Porlock’ by Dennis O’Driscoll. Since it doesn’t seem to be online anywhere, I have decided to type it up here:
Porlock
this is the best poem I have never written
it is composed of all the stunning lines I thought up
but lacked the time or place or paper to jot down
this is a poem of distractions, interruptions, clamouring telephones
this is a poem that reveals how incompatible with verse my life is
this is a home for mentally lapsed poems
this is the lost property office of poetry
this is my poem without a hero, conceived but never born
this is a prisoner of consciousness, a victim of intelligence leaks
this is the poem that cannot learn itself by heart
this is the poem that has not found its individual voice
this is the poem that has forgotten its own name
this is my most unmemorable creation
these are my most disposable lines
this is the poem that dispenses with words