Carl Halling Poet Free verse

London As the Lieu

Until recently, I had the impression
Of decaying
Along with the moral standards 
Of contemporary Europe, 
With London as the lieu 
To which all Autoroutes lead.
                                                                    
In my room, I was surrounded
By debris
Of my existence,
Lacking the will even to clear
The carpet, whose colour,
Incidentally I came to forget.
                                                                    
I ceaselessly tampered with my hair,
Growing it long,
Having it cropped, hennaing it red,
Dyeing it blue-black, bleaching it near-white;
It fell out in bunches,
Dessicated and exhausted.
                                                                    
My face grew sallow and haggard,
With bloodshot, inflamed,
Glazed, blue-ringed orbs, 
And bitten, bloated, ravaged lips.
My body lost its athletic aspect,
And became shapeless and emaciated.

("London as the Lieu", which first existed in prose form as part of an absurd - which is to say entirely fictional - unfinished story, dates from the '80s.)

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Maurice Rigoler January 28, 2015 at 12:21 PM Hello again. I truly hope this poem is fictional, otherwise I'd say you're in sad shape. Back to the Metro: My first ride on the NT metro had me almost believing I was in Dante's Inferno! Bullet holes in the car windows, the graffiti public porn! I didn't see much of it in the Paris metro. / M Carl Halling January 28, 2015 at 3:44 PM Hi Maurice, don't worry, it's entirely fictional, written in the 1980s, when I liked to see myself as a tortured artist, when in fact I was more than averagely happy, certainly compared to today. There's none of that in the oh so clean, safe and efficient Paris Metro!