Getting it wrong or times I regret being myself

A reckless promise made
To someone I barely knew
An obvious mistake the second they
Decided it was time to make good
On something said in jest

The time a good friend
Sat me down to make me learn
A life lesson I would have walked
Naked through the desert
To avoid ever knowing

The time I decided it was my duty
To leave things in a better condition
By attempting to explain a toxic
Workplace dynamic
To the deliberately deaf

The times I took jobs I knew would be awful
Because I couldn't let myself believe
There would be anything better around the corner
The times I stayed in them
The times I turned the other cheek

The one time I was naïve enough
To stand up for myself
Only to be shot down
In a vicious character assassination
By someone I trusted not to abuse their position of power

The time I was attacked in the street
For being in the wrong place at the wrong time
And observing some nefarious activity
In which I had less than zero interest
Following a truly lousy evening

The times I was groped on the bus
And couldn't bring myself
To make a loud scene
Cursing myself for cowardice
As much as the perpetrator

The times I listened to my detractors
More than my supporters (always, sorry).
Most of them live in my head
It gets hard to avoid their commentary
While dehydrated

The time I tried to explain my surprise
At the coloured anatomy of cats
Over board games, while tipsy
Offending my best friend's husband
So badly he refused to visit for seven months

The time I let my conscience overrule social norms
The time I spoke the unfiltered truth
Without thinking, sleep deprived
Beyond the wit of my audience
And suffered for it

The time I dropped my phone in the street
And swore
But failed to hang up on the grandmother
Who never forgave me
A single lapse in a public setting

The time I couldn’t help my father, dying of a heart attack
Because I was half-way to a funeral for another relative
At the other end of the country
He still whispers to me of his disappointment
Late at night when I can't sleep.

I am sorry, dad.  I tried.
Nothing I did or did not do
Would ever have been good enough
In that moment
Made for regret

The time I believed a loved one’s lies
More fool me
Twice, three times, staying
Until I told myself it was the right moment
To walk away

The time I couldn’t believe
Someone's personal truth
Despite understanding all the small ways
In which we are blinkered
By our own experiences

For once I found it hard to see
Through someone else's eyes
And tried to fill in the blanks
Meaning two plus two
Made minus five

The time I blurted out a correction
And ruined a first impression
In front of strangers
Because my inner perfectionist
Refused to suffer a lie

The million times I could not bring myself to say no
For fear of hurting the feelings
Of someone who lacked the same consideration
For my own
Assuming they were my equal

The time I called the police because my neighbour
Was being beaten by her partner
The time the despatcher didn't care
And I did not challenge their callous response
Because I was too concerned that help arrive quickly

The times I have swallowed my pride, my words,
Bottled up my feelings, ignoring the knots
In my gut at the wrongness of what I knew
I was about to sacrifice - my dignity
My sense of self

All these times call to me on repeat
Those grey days when I am feeling
'Lower than a snake's ass'
As my other grandma used to say
Rudderless, unworthy of love

And now, at almost forty
What is all this worth, this much regret?
We live and learn
Perhaps the real problem is
I do not know the answer yet.

Everyone’s A Critic

The loud purring
Of a sensitive soul
Rumbles across my lap
A gentleman-mouser
Whose claws are rarely
Sheathed in my flesh
Save for those few
Accidental motions.
He pauses in his
Hypnotic kneading
Of careful paws
Twitches a whisker
Opens a lazy eye
We are content
Devoted Familiar and
Current Provider of ear-scratches
Precious moments spent together
Do not last as long
As they once did
Those rare islands
Of near-silence
I try to spend
Writing.
Such a distraction
Is sadly unacceptable
In company
My failure to stroke
Soft furry egos
While fingers
Play over lettered keys
And coffee cools
At a careless elbow
Lead to gentle taps
Polite, then more insistent
I frown and mutter
Trying to shake loose
Some old ideas
From new forehead creases
Transmit them to my dusty screen
Before the next
Set of demands is issued
By the charming pout
Of the other House Tyrant
Whose three-year-reign
Continues to sway
The working lives
Of all her subjects.
It is not enough.
I cannot please all
Of my many masters
Not this day.
As gentle snores fade to yawns
I sift through the tired
Dog-eared card catalogue
Housed temporarily for safekeeping
Within my rapidly emptying skull
Brain cycling faster
The vocalisation
Begins in earnest
Close behind my ear
“Miaouw!”
He is starting to insist
“Pssst! Shush!”
It is a futile gesture
To try to silence
An old friend
The search continues
There are paws on my shoulder
Tapping, prodding
A hint of sharpness
A gentle shove
Hot breath on my neck
Can I find a verbal noun,
Subclause, or synonym
To convey my sense
Of panic at the first stirrings
Of any sleeping creature
Under four feet
But still a giant?
Too late.
“Mummy!”
I hiss my discomfort
At the sudden perforation
Of my thigh.
Time’s up once again.

The Music of Words

Gently lash me with your tongue
I will not try to speak
To interrupt the flow of one
Whose tempers fray the week
The sea that breaks upon my ears
Is washing you away
The fading sounds that fuel these tears
Are quieter today
Your practised script, articulate
I heeded as a child
When sounds that issued from your throat
Wrought protestations mild
Now older I’ve more strength to voice
Harsh thoughts that must be said
I understand that I’ve a choice
Of silence; but instead
With fingers jammed in ears I bellow
Drowning out your boom
These tones of sturm und drang that echo
Round the living room

Merry Wives of Windsor in a nutshell

A welshman, preacher, merry met
A frenchman, hot of temper, yet
A while they stood, and wagged a jaw,
Ere stag betwixt the trees they saw.

A beauty fair, and lover poor,
Adorned her hair with faun and flor
And caught thereby, in flaxen net
Three suitors, ill fish, none a pet.
One lover, penny-pinching flop,
One foreign boor, one drunken fop.

Two sires at odds, jealous of dam,
Convinced of cuckoldry and scam,
Employed the service of this beast
Hoping to convict at least the one
If not the brace. But yet, mistook
In faces fair the lusty humour
That their trials shook.

And in the end, as oft is true,
All well, all broke, all mended too.

Shakespearean Spoof

After ‘Merry Wives of Windsor’ the Musical, by the RSC:

Since what I am to say must be
But that which shocks this company
It shall scarce boot me to say
I liked it – for fear they cry
‘Alas! Alack! ’tis pity she’s a fool.’

But thus, if workers do befit
the ownership of poor opinion, thus
Why then, anon, I’ll state my case
And cry aloud ‘Egad! ’tis true,
I liked this stew.
Tho’ mush and mash and rant and rave,
The hero too did need a shave
And heroine a trim.

But Merry Wives, without a beard?
But foolishness, I am afear’d.

Allegory

A mother hen – yet not a mum,
Took ducklings travelling for fun,
A day away she did devise,
And all the trip did organize,
‘We’ll go abroad’, she crowed, ‘Wahey!’
‘And later on, we’ll see a play…’
So fix’d was she upon this path
Her charges scarce did dare to laugh
At bawdy farce that after pud’
Turn’d out, Alas! to be no good.
In truth it was a sad affair,
A musical, with no tune there,
A play without a bit of fun,
But laboured jokes and scaffold’s hum.
The little ducks could scarce contain
Their disappointment at this shame
And thereof, loudly, did complain.
To which, the hen repayed in coin
And long and loud did scold and scorn
The ducks for having dared express
Opinions they ought not possess.