DAVID MCLINTOCK - POEMS

David McLintock lives in Liverpool. He likes making words do things they weren't invented for. He has been writing poetry for some time.
He types them up to keep his home tidy.
He lives with a ukulele, 4 guitars, and a shruti box. And a lot of books. All his cupboards are empty, all his worktops are full, it's how he keeps up with what he's getting up to.

​Attitudes

​I am at the other end of a TV reality show
watching morally, while flicking the index
of a book about a War, selecting a stance.

Now I stare out the patio windows
at the neighbour’s garden, shake my head
at the state of his hibiscus.

Earlier I heard a phone-in on the radio,
‘Who’d phone in to this rubbish?’
I heard myself shouting to my wife.

The cupboards in my kitchen are ordered,
with nothing in not to my taste.
My walls are papered and painted in colours

I chose, and to my standards.
Why do other people not understand
what is so easy to understand?

I live my life with very folded arms.
I do not like it 
when my wife tries to touch me.

You cannot be young all your life,
I keep reminding her.

Speech
​

Firstly, the idea
Vaguely instigates
An almost unnoticed
Notion that pricks
One’s desire to speak.

Then, quickly, the terms
Of the thought are made
Concrete, and the correct
Order for their procession
Solicited. Finally,

The articulation
Of the words or phrase
Are delved from memory,
The lips and tongue
Move, air is forced

Appropriately through
Throat and, before
We know it, the words
Are out. If we are
Fortunate, we find –

After we’ve spoken – 
That we have not made
Ourselves a fool again.    
This last is, of course,
Habitually the weakest

Part of the process.
We see crowd us
The shocked glares
Of friends we are fast
Losing, and wonder

How our thought,
Amazing of itself –
Can constantly
So ill-attune
To present circumstance.

I often spend my nights
Nowadays alone,
And speak what I wish,
But only to myself
For I find no other audience.


​

The Widdly-Diddlies

We scoff at the widdly-diddlies,
Carefully unpacking their accordions,
Balancing guitars on their knees 
Yet plugging them into nothing;
With their little trim upturned-
Wigwam beards, their frothy, 
Farm-smelling, light-red bitters
That leave interlocking rings 
All across the rocky table.  But 
They scamper through each reel
Nimbly, as watchable as squirrels,
So even as we laugh at them
Our knees are bouncing.

String-plucks, quick key-stabs
Grip, clench, release each other, 
And through the to and fro of 
Glanced sound rhythm coheres 
And plunders the bar’s acoustics, 
Roils in the smoke-dark corners,
Melds with the long black beams,
Teaches pulse to each rippling body – 
Hesitant at first we soon succumb -
As the entirety of here unites 
And thrums with the reverberation.

These are old guys and girls,
No dreams of boasting headlines
Or mikes angled for them on 
A V side-stage.  They’ve kids 
Doing volunteer work, Central 
America, and a leak in the roof that
Needs clambering to tomorrow, 
If the weather’s stable. They’re 
Landscape gardeners, ex-
Servicemen, retired teachers.  
One’s a magistrate.  They’re 
The widdly-diddlies. They make 
A song without an effect in sight, 
They make a tune blowing 
Across an empty bottle.

They are the widdly-diddlies.
They are musicians.
They are not heroes.
They are musicians.
They are not philosophers.
They are the widdly-diddlies.
One’s a magistrate.
One plays the spoons on his chin.
One stops strumming to drink.
One smokes a pipe, 
Smiles through a thick beard.
They are the widdly-diddlies,
They are not heroes.
They are musicians.
Even as we laugh at them,
Our knees are bouncing.

​

Rothko Lovers
​

Under the sheets, in the dark,
fumbling with one another,
2 streaks in a Rothko repro,

dulled, smaller than life-size,
framed inexpertly –
not everyone would see

what’s good about it -
but we do - 2 pointless streaks
getting grubby with each other, 

languishing in oils not ours.
Just stare at us - it’s only 
a habitat we have different.

Other than that our distinctions 
smear, smudge, and we likely 
smell of the same brush.

​

​It Goes Without Saying

The way we’ve been playing
There’s no point delaying
It’s no use me staying
It goes without saying

Continual swaying
To caustic affraying
I think you’re betraying
It’s no use me staying
It goes without saying

No purpose in praying
Nor weeping nor braying
The life we were laying
Is done, dead, decaying
So no use me staying
It goes without saying

It’s time to be paying
The dues due to slaying
A love that seemed weighing
In balance, conveying
A deep inner raying
Of light that’s now greying
There’s no use me staying
It goes without saying

​