Some days

Some days I am sufficiently self aware to recognise that I'm making mountains out of molehills and getting worked up about things that fundamentally Do Not Matter. Some days I can be polite to people who annoy me, serene in the face of incompetence and placate people who enrage me. Most days, I hope, I maintain a veneer of calm in the workplace, regardless of whatever is going on underneath.

But on some days, just every so often, it feels that only the words of the wonderful John Skoyles stand between me and my desire to tell certain people exactly what I think of them. For which some people should be grateful...

If You Have an Enemy

If you have an enemy, picture him asleep.
Notice his shoes at the foot of the bed,
how helplessly they gape there.
Some mornings he needs three cups of coffee

to wake up for work,
and there are evenings when he drinks alone,
reading the paper down to the want ads,
the arrival times of ships at the docks.

Think of him choosing a tie,
dialling wrong numbers,
finding holes in his socks. Chances are
his emptiness equals yours

When you thoughtlessly hurry a cashier
for change, or frown to yourself
in rush hour traffic and the drivers behind you

begin to remind you
the light has turned green.

(John Skoyles)