Disenchanted
I ceased to jog or swim
in what seemed to me
to be a reproachful sea.
I preferred the anonymity
of the night
and delay the day
by sleeping late.
Perched on a chair
like a midnight owl
I drank while watching
awful movies on TV.
Diagnosed
with carpal tunnel syndrome
I had day procedures
on both my wrists.
Caught speeding
I lost my drivers licence
and gave up trying
to get it back.
Chris Kennedy
who cleaned for me
decided late in her life
to become a nurse.
Married with children
she studied
while working part-time
and to my joy qualified.
I began wearing glasses
for astigmatism
when I lost my focus
teaching at Frankston Tach
A procedure
called TURPS
cleared the ureter
blocked by my prostate
I’d go for walks
past disinterested houses
and over a creek
hoping to see some ducks.
Sometimes I’d weave
uncontrollably
before managing to resume
a normal stride.
I’d occasionally collapse
in my driveway
senseless
amidst the flower beds.
While crossing a road
I began to stagger
and fell helplessly
on the other side.
Unable to rise
I lay in the gutter
waiting for an ambulance
summoned by a bystander.
My GP arranged an X-ray
followed by a scan
which revealed
a tumour on the brain.
The neurologist
decided to operate
without delay
at Carbrini hospital.
A final MRI
failed to show
whether the tumour
was malignant or benign.
The surgeon explained
there was the risk
of partial paralysis
on the side of my face.
I waited philosophically
in my room
wearing a back-to-front
white surgical gown.
Compassionate words
from a visiting Nun
left me with feelings of
peace and serenity.
I regained consciousness
in the recovery ward
deaf in the right ear
and a splitting headache.
Prescribed pethedine for the pain
I learned the tumour was benign
with some still left inside
too difficult to excise.
Unable to urinate
with a bladder complication
a specialist urologist
decided to operate.
With a catheter
attached to a plastic bag
I was transferred
to a rehab hospital
I had to learn to walk again
regain my balance
and urinate
before discharge.
My good mate Harry Thacker
from Manchester England
ex Royal Navy
arrived to drive me home.
I met Maria
owner of the Carrum store
a refugee who escaped
by boat from Vietnam.
I was drifting apathetically
like a vegetating leper
exiled
on a lonely island.
Her friendship
helped me away
from yesterday
towards a new tomorrow.
A widow
whose husband
had recently passed away
she had five daughters.
Anne-Marie, Theresa, Margaret
Evelyn and Elisabeth
all married
with young children.
Maria and I shopped
dined on Vietnamese cuisine
and I became part
of her extended family.
Jodie Kewley
from Red Hill South
became my muse, critic
collaborator and lifelong friend.
Harry introduced me
to the digital age
with an I-pod
then an Apple computer.
Disenchanted
it seemed to me
our prestigious literary journals
were elitist and incestuous.
Grafted onto universities
they published only the best
of the tediously self-indulgent
derivative and pretentious.
I relied instead
on little magazines
with shoestring budgets
who couldn’t pay.
Polestar and Woorilla
Jimmy Saks Banksnotes
and Kevin J. McIvor
from New Zealand.
My first book Ghoul Days
published in 1986
by Neptune Press
was a flop.
Maria inherited debt
with the general store
from her husband
when he died.
I helped pay for stock
with a loan
which was repaid
and another which wasn’t.
I managed to kick
my cigar smoking habit
and began withdrawing
from antidepressants.
Maria and her daughters
began to call me Uncle Ken
an honorific title
or a new incarnation.
I began to jogged again
stroll along the sand
and swim backwards
out to sea.
Time is the tax upon what we want the world to be when measured against what it is. Many poets and musicians have achieved their beautiful creations in search of love. This is my review!
I wasn’t searching for love, Ylmmaz. I wasn’t searching for anything. I was arriving all the time!
I know you were not consciously searching for love.
I am searching for love, constantly, consciously, Yilmaz, but not in the context of this poem, which was an attempt to explore a life, to re-create it in verse. There was love, lost love, disenchantement, disillusionment, pain, loss – the whole gammut of life’s experience. This was just part 9. There only difference between each is the variety of life’s experiences.
Thank you for your response Ken.
I’ve been thinking a lot about pain, forgiveness, and love. There are so many things I want to express. We all have to start from somewhere. Sometimes, we screw up and it takes a long time to heal whatever it was that caused us to get into trouble in the first place. You’re right, there is no quick road. If there was, it would be a lie. The light is flickering ON-OFF-ON-OFF more often than we can perceive.
I saw a single lotus flower
Standing tall with petals spread
I watched as there began a wind
A strong and mighty monsoon gale
The flower bowed as if in courtesy
The storm thrashed with ferocity
Dark clouds, lightning, rain, and thunder
Through it all the modest lotus
Never was torn asunder
Nicely put, Yilmaz – and the flower survived!
May I refer you to my worst pain of all – and I didn’t suffer alone. Many others have been there too, even Araham Lincoln, I assure you. Please read part 11 on ‘Depression’ Maybe you could create some appropriate lines..
Beat wishes,
Ken
Uncle Ken,
Wonderful! I did read it before you told me to read it. I have suffered from it myself for many years…
Love has no religion. Love is not a religion. Divine love is a mystical ‘drowning’ in the reality of the creator.
She was beautiful, a strange quirky girl with a great sense of humor and heart as big as an elephant. She seemed a little out of balance, suffered from chronic depression. She was the black sheep of the family. It is not necessarily a bad thing to be a black sheep of a family, although growing up it may never felt that way.
I do understand though how people have become mindless, like sponges soaking up the poor substitutes for truth around them, losing their hearts and minds, but still under some illusion that they are free thinking beings and in control of their own destinies; they are only like ghosts, shadow people.
Beat wishes
Yilmaz Alimoglu
Love is mystical, and unrequited love can be hell, but whether it is divine or not, I cannot tell
Yes, you become mindless, like ghosts, shadow people – as you and I have been – like sponges, soaking up ‘life’ – not substitutes, Yilmaz, real life – and real life is the only truth, and the only way. You are finding your way and I am finding mine. Your way may not be my way – with respect!
Kindest regards,
Ken
You are right.
Yesterday I was feeling a little melancholy, because I felt so at home and so loved at my mother’s home then I had to leave. When I was there so many people were hugging me and holding on to me, all so happy to see me, everyone just radiated. When I woke up today, here in Vienna, I was feeling a painful sense of separation.
If one’s feelings are hurt by what another said or did, it’s merely their ego, that is too attached. At least, that’s what I think today. Tomorrow, I may feel differently about it.
Yes, conditions change and with them thoughts. Ego is sometimes a vice , sometimes a virtue. Like the eagle we aspire to fly high and float with the waves of commendation or admiration, at times, falling and failing through rifts of condemnation, but rising again in the fluky air, to try and reach a goal, a proper place, instead of wasting away, our minds consumed by artificiality, pretence and false illusions. So a little ego is far less dangerous than a big ego – a lust for godlike powers, to control and manipulate.
To create a poem one must have an ego that may provide the inspiration, a poem that, our ego suggests, deserves recognition and, hopefully, some success. I can’t agree that self-esteem is a sin – although self-importance probably is. The word is not easily defined, because it can be miscontrued.
I hope you feel better soon. :wave:
Ego comes from work in the energy field. But, I guess egos are protective of our perfect, impeccable, intellect and soul.
A Little Animal man is always afraid and protective of his honor by which he mechanizes to survive. He can’t fail! Little Animal Man has big ego. Animals don’t think with their hearts. They just manifest disconnected, protective, insular existence based upon GMO assistance. Then there is also Man at liberty. Love is the most celebrated word in language.
Before you have heard all my songs
Don’t cry for me Uncle Ken
The scent of white roses, sooth the heart
On which fallen love, cannot be measured by instrument
Ego, confidence, ambition, pride – just words. Emotions like love, and feelings like compassion matter more. Words are indifferent. We are brought up to compete, to aspire, to be successful. There are degrees and extremes which can be harmful, shameful, worthwhile and worthless.
We are initiated into a tribe. We abide by the rules imposed by the leaders of the tribe. We worship God because that is the tribal custom. Other tribes worship their own interpretation of God. We fight for supremacy and we die because we are mortal.