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PSYCHIATRY RESEARCH TRUST
POETRY COMPETITION 2009 WINNING POEMS
The trouble with being
a W
"Candidates
whose surnames commence with letters from the second half of
the alphabet are at a distinct disadvantage." -
Report on a More Egalitarian System for
the Interview Procedure
I suppose initially I have
a problem with identity:
I even wonder at myself.
Am I a What? A Which? Or a merely Who?
Perhaps I'm schizoid; I
fear I'm really split apart in two.
In mirrors I glimpse a
wraith ghosting me indefinitely.
I have troubles too with place, and
occasionally time.
You've guessed? Where, Whither and then
When. It's true
I'm not quite the centre of anywhere,
and, despite wisdom,
Always the final in the row. No wonder I
haven't got a clue.
Is it, you think, I'm wanting in
initiative? Yes, I am a sheep,
Even, at heart, a ewe. Where others
lead, I always follow,
And though I start work strongly at the
beginning of the week
I am so weakened by the weekend I'm
through.
I'm in a double-act, but never know who
pulls the string
In me, or who's ventriloquist. I'm
somebody's fallguy too,
The butt of everyone's whim. And when I
get it wrong
I fall so silent that I'm overlooked.
I'm in nobody's queue.
I am also missing out in sex. I've a
headstart with wooing wenches,
But fear I am wishy-washy, transparent
as a window, seen clear through
From beginning to end. And (just
between we two) I never arrive in climaxes.
Suppose I'm the wo(e) in woman. Or am I
losing a screw, or maybe two?
Though I appear boldly in World Wars,
I'm never mentioned
In dispatches. I miss the boat, and
nearly miss the show.
And because of names like Janowitz,
Johannsen, not to mention Jung
Am practically always last one in at the
interview.
This doppelganger in my name is weird
for me. I wish I were a singleton.
But then suppose I'd worry that the
other one, the simpler man,
Were my better half. Oh how I wish I
wasn't what I am.
Don't scoff; be glad it's me, not you,
that's neither U nor yet non-U
But just a puddled, fuddled, muddled,
troubled W.
By Roger Elkin
Second Prize Winner,
Psychiatry Research Trust (Excel for Charity) Poetry
Competition 2009
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