Refusing Saul’s Armour
x times y marks the spot
where my maths hit the wall.
It was all x from there.
In my last school exam
I drew maths on the paper.
Degrees were critique
but my mind was a groover
and a fiver a week
masked my sexual terror
shy of love, which we heard
was the forty hour week.
Critique bullied life
so I read unset books
slept in buildings and long grass
years before the Pill
or the Haight, that of Ashbury,
while faith, faith and tobacco
kept the Black Dog at bay.
When all turned to hope and blame
was his teeth-baring day,
and our spastic model poet
agile in his narrow flat
showed us his sword collection.
Shame on bellies sucked in:
his stung blades knew their paladin.
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