He wears his scars with pride,
pulls at the wounds until they bleed.
A face is like a map of experience.
He has the face he wanted
but not the one he needs.
The tattoos are not permanent marks of pain,
they are the rituals he went through to join the tribe,
and the arguments he has are not with himself,
but with an unjust God.
Darkness is hungry.
It threatens to swallow you,
and in the foreground stands a man,
as he sees himself,
at the mid-point stage of a play
that is only partially written.
He is all splodges and lines,
closed eyes blocking out the world,
a Boxer’s nose
caused by drink
and not an opponent’s fist.
An image where life has removed hope,
hanging on a wall in a millionaire’s holiday home,
where the canvas is seen as being far more valuable
than the artist who poured himself into
lines, splodges and whirls,
half a century ago.
About the Author
Ben Macnair is an award winning poet and playwright from Staffordshire in the United Kingdom.
