Caffeine and the fate of the writer.

Slumped over a coffee
with a bad back;
so much to say
that it has all withered down
to nothing

as lonely men learn to cry
in damp apartments,
whilst banjo players the world over
apply plasters to their bleeding thumbs.

The kids see loitering
around corporate, fast-food outlets
as a gateway to masculinity
and yet, I sit here questioning mine.

Just remember what I said;
'we are without reason.'
The problem lies, not in this,
but in those still looking.

Inside the bars,
cheque books,
antique auctions,
between legs,
in the pages of old, dusty literature,
at the bottom of a glass
or in the violent midst of making conversation.

There is as much use in straining through
as there is in summing it up
in a single line
and wrapping a plastic bag around your head;
the Kosinski way.

Maybe you'd rather go like Berryman,
Hemmingway or dose up on carbon monoxide
just like Sexton, in your mother's fur coat.
Whatever it may be
it doesn't matter.
Just like you
don't matter
to me
nor I
to you.