Never tell someone a poem was about them.

it never comes off
as well as you intend it.
blue flowers
would go red
reading poems
about blue flowers.

they'd flip their leaves
with reason
and saying things
like
didn't you notice my stem?
isn't that
wonderful? and my roots,
nobody ever talks about
my roots,
or my leaves,
just the flashy top layer,
as if that's all I was;
just a whore in petticoats.
it's all so obvious,
it's all so
shallow,
why are you poets
all so
shallow?
and we are -
and proud.

that would be the end
for a long time
of poems about blue flowers.

but
I can't help
that I see
eyes first
and put them down
and don't dare presume
to take a crack at
your mind. I'm not that arrogant.

like those
guys that go to another country
live there a few months,
get a flat,
get a job
and say
I know this country now - here
is my epic
about this,
my country.

no,
instead
you just go somewhere
and try to live in it
and try to
not get lost
while you notice things
like heat
and pretty girls
and blue flowers,
light sky blue -
the blue
your eyes are.

 

DS Maolalai

DS Maolalai recently returned to Ireland after four years away, now spending his days working maintenance dispatch for a bank and his nights looking out the window and wishing he had a view. His first collection, Love is Breaking Plates in the Garden, was published in 2016 by the Encircle Press. He has twice been nominated for the Pushcart Prize.