! Not Quite Myself Poem by Michael Shepherd

A broken night; breakfast-table phrases
assembled for a touch of sympathy:
‘don’t ask…! ’
‘bit out of sorts…’
‘haven’t really got going yet…’
‘not quite myself…’
a familiar unpleasantness, discomfort, restlessness, unease –
something’s got it in for me, but what, and why?

but today it’s worse than that..
so, run through the well-worn menu
of remedies: seek distraction,
play some music, read the paper,
connect the hands and mind - clean the gas-stove, ha…
express absorbing interest in the state of others…

or there are mental and spiritual consolations;
‘these things will pass…
in two hours, you’ll have forgotten…’
‘these things are sent to try us..’ yeah yeah…
(or if you’re British, the dismissive joke,
precious personal illusion shattered…

no, dammit, this is just too much today,
let’s play it out; just sit and watch it,
dive into this pool of misery,
see what we come up with..

on the surface, it’s like some iron mask;
beyond that, the sense of body as factory,
producing unwelcome chemicals..

and down there in the depths,
monsters stirring; and the baffling sense
- sitting here, apparently unmoved –
that somewhere, disguised as yet as nowhere,
something unknown is resisting something else unknown…

what goes on, on days like this,
deep in the mind? Is it remedial,
dark things playing out their roles?
Will tomorrow bring some unsought sense of relief,
as of some knot of being, secretly resolved;
gratitude of a sort, yet none the wiser?
The mystics call it ‘the dark night of the soul’;
but even they cannot do more than say,
it’s deeply personal; call them demons if you wish;
in there, there are battlegrounds – or training-grounds;
expect this; this is mortality..

while the voice of sergeant-majors, who do not deal
in introspection, when there are battles to be won (won?)
ring out on this parade-ground of stern discipline –
‘snapaatavit..’

ah well, there’s always ‘poetry’; thank God for that;
believe/pretend, this is for the public good;
that someone out there will say, yes, you’ve hit it..

now, will strong coffee or a morning’s fast
ease this burden of mortality? while
on the doorstep, love, joy, praise, thankfulness,
sheer joie de vivre - there, you can even name them…
wait patiently to knock.