My bedroom, dusty and rank
with teenage anger,
Putting the world to rights
through a cracked speaker’s static;
a chorus of voices chanting
in my lonely imagination,
the army I lead
from a mattress on the floor.
A spinning refrain, played again
and again
“Here you stand, my judge and jury.”
A dead mouse, a decaying
spider plant, the only witnesses
to these carpet-muffled pleas.
We stood together,
a council of the defeated,
alienated.
Jaded even before the fight;
“In gods they trust to hide the sins
which they commit themselves.”
Sullen and restless
we’ll decompose
our withered leaves,
settle into the dirty corners
anonymous
not forgotten
“We’re legion.”
Written well after the fact for the GloProWriMo Day Sixteen prompt:
try writing a poem that imposes a particular song on a place. Describe the interaction between the place and the music using references to a plant and, if possible, incorporate a quotation – bonus points for using a piece of everyday, overheard language.
As an angsty teenager, awkwardly looking at the constant depravity of the world, I latched on to anthems that united me with others, even if only in bedrooms across Britain. One such song that resonated with me was Theatre of Hate’s Legion, which I had bought (saving mum’s lunch money) on a 7″. My old dodgy record player had a method of allowing repeat plays of the record on the turntable, and so it was that one day I played this song 59 times in a row. I’m not sure why I never got to 60. My dirty, dusty bedroom housed myself, a tragic spider plant and a mouse that soon suffocated among all the incense smoke used to cover up the smell of cigarette smoke. It was a typically pathetic teenager’s bedroom. But I was convinced I was not alone and I was convinced that I was right.
1994ever 