I Heard The Name Daniel Defoe.

Having no tuppence for fish and chip supper,

marrowfat peas, pale ale, bread and butter,

I shaped a plaything from yesterday’s paper

and pretended the pavement a pitch.

Some time later, I mentioned the weather

in a bus queue, under puddled umbrellas.

I motioned a cup and a ring and a feather

beneath afternoon nimbus, Cumbrian

and desiring elegant fiction, delicate end.

They bore, the huddled, a semblance to me,

of memories of memories of memories of me;

to some I have known. To some I have been;

beginning and muddle and then…

on a beach, four oh four in the morning,

without doubt, a voice arose without warning,

from the ocean, erosion of sand. Again,

Becoming more than mere empty pages, becoming

notebook poems, unedited prose; becoming, and then

I heard the name Daniel Defoe. Begin.