It occurred to me that I should maybe lay down some plans for how often I intend to share my poetry with followers of this little blog, and whether it should be public for all to see or just for supporters/members. The problem being that my mental health issues tend to play havoc with me when I start insisting with myself that something must be done. I may not have mentioned it yet on here that I am undergoing a long winded process of self diagnosis to ascertain whether I am really just someone who is plagued by depression and nothing else. Lots of things point to autistic traits and some, indeed many of the same, point to the possibility of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. There's a thing called Pathological Demand Avoidance (PDA), that could be triggered by any of the above, which I appear to suffer with. So much so that I am utterly bewildered as to how I've even managed to get this blog started. But that's the thing with mental health issues, they are wide and varied and each day they can affect you differently and other autistic traits such as hyper focus can override the PDA and assist me in getting things done.
Looking back over the past 10 years, particular the period when I founded and ran the literary magazine Bare Fiction, I can see how those two specific traits played out a continual battle for ownership of my id to the point that I had to walk away (or, truth be told, cry punching fists into the sofa in an attempt to be swallowed whole) from it all.
But this blog is about me working things out and, strangely for me, the process of doing this somewhat publicly is proving to be very helpful. When I started getting out of the house for my coffee walks roughly two months ago I would share the occasional picture and post about what I was eating, or reading, with friends and followers on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. And those friends who saw these posts were extremely encouraging with their happiness that I was 'doing better'. I'm not quite sure how much 'better' I'm doing but at least I'm out here and not hiding under the leaves (a phrase must try not to overuse).
So, all this to say that I hope/expect to share at least one or two poems publicly with everyone and one or two privately for my supporters. I may share previously unpublished poems publicly but more than likely, at least to start with, those will likely be kept behind the supporters locked posts so that I can still, if I get around to it, submit them to magazines at some point.
For now, here's a short poem that seems to have had a life much larger than I expected it to. First published online with Nutshells and Nuggets back in 2016, it then made its way into the anthology The Everyday Poet, edited by Deborah Alma and more recently appeared online thanks to Anna Dreda and one of her Poetry Breakfast attendees.
See you soon, and thanks for reading. Rob x
Inefficient view of a happy man
I only saw him briefly,
as the train sliced off
a second of his life
to put beneath a pain of glass.
He carried branches
in his arms. On his face
a look beyond
contentment kept him
from sinking in the grass.
Robert Harper