The Duchess responds

(to Robert Browning)

My mother said to me: “Now mind,

You must be generous and kind

To lords and servants, great and small;

You are a duchess, after all.”

This seemed like good advice; I took it

Much to heart.  A friendly look, it

drew from me a blush, or smile,

and everybody loved me, while

I lived. They even loved my lord

the duke, for my sake, and ignored

the steady rising of the taxes.

Pity he relied on axes

for unpleasant work.  They would

an accident have understood;

a temporary leave of senses.

Cruelty, though, has consequences.

Now his name (nine-hundred years

of history) and all his fears

have fallen with him.  From the wall

my painted smile observed it all.

Musings at midnight

…because there’s no point me trying to do this thing if I don’t bang something on there every so often.  Even if it’s a pile of unreadable poo.  Which this will be, so free to stop reading and read some of the poems in my archives, they’re far more interesting.

I don’t understand.  I went through about a month of writing poetry – of really bloody loving it, couldn’t get enough.

And then it stopped.

A couple of reasonably-creative sputterings, and it just… burnt out.  Fizzled.

Maybe when I went to Whitby, my muse liked it so much, she decided to hang around for a bit.  I got to be her for a whole weekend, and it was wonderful.

I will write some more about it, I promise.  I have pictures, and everything.

But the poetry.  The passion I had for it.  It’s still there – somewhere – it just isn’t… turning into anything.  Nothing I wouldn’t be ashamed to share with the world, anyway.

Or perhaps this is how it works for me.  This is what happens with other things, after all.  I pick things up, I drop them, I pick them up again.  Sewing, drawing, crafting, even my day job sometimes.  All things I can do perfectly… adequately, when I put the effort in.  Jack of all trades.  Master of none.

Except writing.

I so hoped that it wouldn’t be that way with writing.  Picking it up, getting bored of it.  It’s what I want to do.  It’s what I’m good at.  If I can be forgiven some unrestrained egotism for a moment, I really think I can do this.  Just not… right now.

So I’ll just write this maundering nonsense instead.  It’ll keep me going until that little madam gets back from her jollies.