Dear Poetry lovers,
1980 is the first poem in BE.aGaIN, and was the jumping off point for the rest of collection-A scene setter-Year of birth and context.
The work was inspired a lot by Muriel Rukeyser’s “Poem”(I lived in the first century of Two World Wars) https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47657/poem-i-lived-in-the-first-century-of-world-wars
I loved the phrasing of the first line in particular and “borrowed” it from it’s 1968 incarnation to relate to my own birth “The second last decade of the last century”.
Fag end (Anglo meaning -Cigarette end) of existence followed as did the line about burning holes in the sky-There was a lot of ozone being depleted by leaded gas, cfcs etc. at the lower level of consciousness of the time.
The last line is in brackets deliberately as was not sure whether it should be in there or not-the ego has a strange way of not wanting to be abandoned in print!. The brackets also was a nice feedback loop to Rukeyser’s title.
Join me each day on the blog as we continue to journey through BE.aGaIN over the next 50 days,
Algo
Algo Poetry-Behind the Lines 