A Poem by the Green-Eyed Monster

O my God, these poets. How they nature on.
Their pieces are stuffed as full of leaves
as a nursery, as full of birds as a rookery.
Do they write on trees, say, inscribe their words
on sheets of hammered bark? Perhaps they pull
reeds from the river, pound them into pulp
to make their rustic paper. Do they really live
day-to-day with their heads up squirrels' arses,
with nuts and catkins like a veil before their eyes?

Why is it so hard for me to believe that they draw
water from that old cold well, and squeeze dough
between their inky fingers? I picture them
in their armchairs, just like me,
watching the latest coloured crap
the TV companies provide. Just as modern
and unnatural, just as full of e-numbers,
however hard I read the labels, just as
dislocated from the primal re-creation.

But somewhere they buy the Wordsworth glasses,
the Tennyson titfer, and the greenest ink
that monks can muster, and off into cloisters
of forest and streams and mountains merrily
they go, journal in hand, quill-gilled.

And I am here, dammit, with a huge red dog
snoring like pre-Genesis, squashing my toes
and there goes the Green Man stalking past
disdainfully as I tip-tappity at the keys
and hear the rustle of a crisp packet
lodged beneath my unpoetic bum.

© M. A. Griffiths