Two Poems

Hats Off

‘Saddle the theremins, love is on the loose’ – John Ashbery

1

If you take yourself seriously – as the man
with the wall of certificates insists you should –
and if you throw away that idiotic hat,
committing your heart to reason, you’ll find yourself
clearer of hearing and several inches taller.
Many of your friends will fail to recognise you
and even your sister will do a double-take.

Is that you? Of this, you may even harbour doubts
of your own, squinting at your face in the mirror
as if the least flicker of an eyelash might prove
duplicity. Even that hat, that absurd hat,
should you retrieve it from the bin, is apt to seem
a more trustworthy witness to you than your tic.
...