Wednesday, February 21, 2007

At last, another bar poem

A few days ago I happened upon this, and thought it another of those strange coincidences that have been dogging me recently, in that it is somewhat similar in mood and circumstance to the piece I unearthed from my old archives the other day.

I don't think it's very good really, but it does capture something of the self-indulgent, self-satisfied melancholy that we tend to practise in bars.

I am curious as where this place is. [Update: One of my correspondents informs me that there is a Milne's Bar on Hanover Street in Edinburgh. An extremely likely candidate! I must check it out the next time I'm up there.]


Milne's Bar

Cigarette smoke floated
in an Eastern way
a yard above the slopped tables.

The solid man thought
nothing could hurt him
as long as he didn't show it -

a stoicism of a kind, I
was inclined to agree with him,
having had a classical education.

To prove it, he went on telling
of terrible things that had
happened to him -

so boringly, my mind
skipped away among the glasses
and floated, in an Eastern way,

a yard above the slopped
table; when it looked down,
the solid man

was crying into his own mouth.
I caught sight of myself
in a mirror

and stared, rather admiring
the look of suffering
in my middle-aged eyes.

Norman MacCaig (1910-1996)

No comments: