Lines

Jonty Driver

For a time now, one has had inklings -
Flakes off arrowheads, sawdust under beams,
Blots when the pen paused at a spelling -
That one’s brain is beginning to splinter:
Names on the edge which won’t fall over,
Days submerging, dates slipping (last July,
I said, when I knew I meant January),
Places gone missing (you know, that town
We lived in, the one with a river, willows,
The shallow dam where the children swam) -
And words never consciously used before
Come plopping up like bubbles in a mud-bath:
Mordant, moiety, minuscule,
(Biting, half-share, tiny)
And why did meniscus surface next
Crescent-shaped from the word-bank?
And then everything all at once
As when the printer suddenly sticks
And the last few lines are a smudge of black -
Or simply nothing, just the empty page ...

LitNet: 14 February 2006

Back to Jonty Driver's poetry

Did you enjoy this poem? Have your say! Send your comments to webvoet@litnet.co.za, and become a part of our interactive opinion page. Or submit your own poetry to Michelle McGrane for consideration.

Click here to receive our newsletter - your weekly cultural fix! Check out what's sizzling on our newsletter this week

back    /     to the top

© Kopiereg in die ontwerp en inhoud van hierdie webruimte behoort aan LitNet, uitgesluit die kopiereg in bydraes wat berus by die outeurs wat sodanige bydraes verskaf. LitNet streef na die plasing van oorspronklike materiaal en na die oop en onbeperkte uitruil van idees en menings. Die menings van bydraers tot hierdie werftuiste is dus hul eie en weerspieël nie noodwendig die mening van die redaksie en bestuur van LitNet nie. LitNet kan ongelukkig ook nie waarborg dat hierdie diens ononderbroke of foutloos sal wees nie en gebruikers wat steun op inligting wat hier verskaf word, doen dit op hul eie risiko. Media24, M-Web, Ligitprops 3042 BK en die bestuur en redaksie van LitNet aanvaar derhalwe geen aanspreeklikheid vir enige regstreekse of onregstreekse verlies of skade wat uit sodanige bydraes of die verskaffing van hierdie diens spruit nie. LitNet is ’n onafhanklike joernaal op die Internet, en word as gesamentlike onderneming deur Ligitprops 3042 BK en Media24 bedryf.