Common fault #1

Solder joint on SMC
with hairline fracture
holding reset circuit low.

Put multimeter away.
Have cup of coffee.
Get out magnifying glass.

Cock[sic]

the back bone’s connected to the
heart’s eye
the heart’s eye’s connected to the
mind’s eye
the mind’s eye’s connected to the
outside
the outside’s connected to the
inside
the inside’s connected to the
outside
the outside’s connected to the
mind’s eye
the mind’s eye’s connected to the
heart’s eye
the heart’s eye’s connected to the
back bone
the back bone’s connected to the
“cock”[sic].

My bed

My mind is like my bed.
It is made up,
and now I have to lie in it,

but my heart’s not in it.

I jotted this one down this evening and liked it enough but was immediately suspicious of it. Felt a wee bit clichéd to me, so I did a quick google search and sure enough it’s already been thought and done in other words by the writer, publisher and political activist Kevin Williamson. Of Williamson’s ‘My Mind Is Like My Bed’: “always in a mess, never made up, but empty without you”, one Amazon.com reviewer was inclined to offer the label of ‘toecurling Hallmark cards tweeness’. I’d like to think mine is better than that of course, but then I got to wondering – if not a Hallmark Card, where would I like my poetry to be reprinted? Paul Squires wanted to see his poetry on the side of a Qantas Jet. I think I’d like to see mine on bottles of Canadian Club Whiskey, or on the inside of a packet of tally-ho cigarette papers.

Where would you like to see your poetry? Does Hallmarking make poetry twee, or does twee poetry get Hallmarked?