SELECTED POETRY

by
R.K. Wallace

SIXTH FORM POETRY

the poem was called
suicide
and it was singled out
and read with a
careful delicacy
like it was an injured animal
that had just been found
on the street
lying somewhere
in a gutter
cradled in the palms
of the hands of the teacher
who when finished reading it smiled
a melancholic smile
and said to me that
i had a gift

© R.K Wallace

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SCOTCH MIST

my grandfather would fire up his pipe
with pride
and blow out
a thick grey fog
while huffing on
about independence
as the reek slowly filled the room

and how i use to love
that reek
i would absorb it
deep into my soul
with a great sense
of comfort and security
that i belonged somewhere
in that uniting mist

but what i never realized was
how bad for my health it was
as it numbed my eyes with

tears of distortion
because my family were never really all that close
it was only at grandpas we would pretend
to be one
in amongst all that smoke
with our false sense of unity

© R.K. Wallace

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SERIOUSLY WHAT CAN I SAY?

this is
all about me this is
where my vanity lies

this is the where i can witness
myself looking back at myself

this is where i
reflect
this is where i
look into

the mirror of my own weakness

R.K. Wallace

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MUM'S PET DOG

she puts it in a cage
because she thinks that
when it misbehaves
it will learn by being
locked up
but it never does
it only becomes
more noisy
and more hyper
and more destructive
not because it is bad
but because its only trying to understand
how it can fit in
as part of
the family structure

© R.K. Wallace

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NATURE IS THE NEW TERRORIST

this is all because of
our perception
of what we think nature is

the smiling suns
the gentle melancholic raindrops
the musical thunders
the disco entrancing lightening
and the encore of the rainbows

but what we don’t want to think of is

the monstrous
volcano eruptions
that spit on your graves
or the tsunamis
that blur your vision
of paradise
or the earthquakes
that rip through the hearts
of cities
or the tornadoes that howl
like a breath of fresh air from hell

because you see
the fact is
this is nature too

whether you like it
or not

© R.K. Wallace

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A MINION POET SAYS HELLO

this is
the kind of poem
no one would even entertain
but i bet
if i was someone
famous
then this piece
of shit
would be regarded as a contemporary classic

© R.K. Wallace

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