I
The neighbours
Watch him cautiously
His machine’s noise
irritates them.

He's a bum –they say,
And go back to their
comfortable lives.

The machine bangs on.

Yesterday, for example,
While the man from the electric company
Was cutting off the power,
Smiling, the neighbours
Rumoured about his life,
About all the things he should be doing.

They looked at his garden,
Potential Amazonia,
They looked at his hangover-rough, bearded face
And left proud of
not having to live his life.

Curiously,
Sometimes
He thinks the same.
Sometimes
He believes they’re right.

But he gets drunk and then it's over.

II
The neighbours
Have reminded him again
To turn down the radio
That they can’t sleep
That they work
That they couldn’t bear
the noise of his machine when he writes.

He can’t ask them to shut up.
He can’t ask them not to work.

He asks them then
To fuck off
once and for all,
to great outrage from the lady
who lets him creep
in that house.

That house which suffers so much of neighbours.

The machine bangs on as sharp as a chain gun

And it’s a beautiful hate machine.