It's a full life, if a trifle banal

Tuesday. Half-arsed excuse for a functioning human being that I am, I had to slink with my tail between my legs over to the library in order to return some spectacularly overdue books. The fine is mighty and still not paid, and it was pissing it down as I trudged over. Afterwards, obviously, I had to go book shopping to cheer myself up, and went to David’s, the Emporium of Pain Relief and Shelter in a Storm. To replace Brendan Kennelly’s The Book of Judas which had lately been returned unread, I picked up his most recent selected verse, Familiar Strangers.

Brendan, bless his socks, made me laugh then cry within the space of five pages. Here’s why. Cut so you can choose your own adventure.

( She laughed )

( She cried )

The poetry meme: if you read this, post a poem in your LJ. This is from Cromwell by Brendan Kennelly, a book-length poem whose "little hero, M.P.G.M. Buffún, Esq., [is] helplessly entangled with Oliver Cromwell as the latter appears and disappears in history, biography, speeches, letters, legend, folklore, fantasy, etc."

( A Man of Faith )