I Want To Be Billy Collins Poem by Colm Flanagan

And live in the mornings
While the seasons project themselves
On to the panes of Billy’s windows.
I want to walk downstairs
for fresh coffee,
drink from heavy clinky cups
and smoke sweet cigarettes
before and after breakfast.

I want to dance across wooden floors
While LPs slowly spin and play
‘Nights in the Gardens of Spain’.

I’d write perfect poems
As freely
as my wife
writes
shopping
lists.

I’d fix lunch,
Invite friends who have other friends
Who write poems.
And I’d need them no more
Than they’d need me.

And as I sit
Amongst my memos,
My questionnaires
And my policies for adoption,
I open up my book of Billy’s poems
And wonder what people might think
If someone caught me lazing about like this.