For Philip Larkin
So much is true
Who writes in poetry
Writes in love you
Said many anyway
I not, wish I were, well
I am the age you were
When you showed the quacks up
By croaking early promised
Complete, or sure, if slow, recovery
Time healing, like a doctor's
Talked through hat, it hurts
A girl who wasn't
The boy's head on my shoulder
Shan't let them peer at my oesophagus,
Another useful tip, or heart,
Senility or optimal debility
To think you wrote in favour of the
Flaubert Parrot shit
Depresses me a bit
But I live in hope if not in love
Poets do and must
Be like you I do
Live to receive such a letter too
You know the one
Signed by an entire class
Of Welsh schoolgirls
Admiring and flirting
And fun.
So much is true
Who writes in poetry
Writes in love you
Said many anyway
I not, wish I were, well
I am the age you were
When you showed the quacks up
By croaking early promised
Complete, or sure, if slow, recovery
Time healing, like a doctor's
Talked through hat, it hurts
A girl who wasn't
The boy's head on my shoulder
Shan't let them peer at my oesophagus,
Another useful tip, or heart,
Senility or optimal debility
To think you wrote in favour of the
Flaubert Parrot shit
Depresses me a bit
But I live in hope if not in love
Poets do and must
Be like you I do
Live to receive such a letter too
You know the one
Signed by an entire class
Of Welsh schoolgirls
Admiring and flirting
And fun.