Authenticity

you are alone for two days

so you call yourself a loner now

you are too sick to smoke this morning so

you say you’ve given up

you call a cow by her first name

take a photo of a horse and

call yourself a country boy

you stretch once against a tree 

so now you’re a tree-hugger?

you breathed in very deeply two months ago and 
say you meditate regularly

that book i gave you, lies unopened but

you do love coffee tables and

if you know the title and 
you spill a drink on it

at least it looks well read

you are many things

great and wonderful
cover to cover

so why pretend to be all other?

i see through the film strip
and transparent impressions

you boil some pasta so

suddenly you cook

but you still don’t know the 
difference between a

chilli and a pepper nor

what to do with a bay leaf

and the only thing you know how to bake

is time

if you are as bored by your own company

as you say you are

then you are possibly boring

if you are not interested in other stories

nor really listening to the world

nor traveling

nor caring to cook for your mum

nor picking up a new sport

nor opening your mind to horses, skiing

reading the newspaper front to back

(even the business section, just once as a joke)...

reading biographies

buying literature in another language

planting something in a garden

rearranging your ugly furniture

donating clothes to charity (if they would take them)

then what can i say?

i say

do some volunteer work at xmas 
in a soup kitchen

just for sheer joy of it

and don’t tell anyone

give up smoking 
and see what happens

but don’t tell anyone

the thing about loners is

they don’t notice they are alone

please stop telling me 
what a loner you have become

in the hope that I will 
come over to take a look and

keep you company


please stop telling me stuff

  

© 2010 Rennie