About Yesterday

There's only so many times you can leave the office at lunch carrying a notepad, sunglasses and headphones before people start asking questions. Questions like, what is that guy doing on his lunch hour with headphones and a notepad?

No one has actually asked me the question, yet. Which is good, because I don't want to answer it. However, if they ever do, I have already prepared my smokescreen. Here it is:

I'm sitting in nature, and writing poetry.

This seems genuinely believable, and as long as I deliver it with a serious face I can't think why anyone would ask me any follow up questions. Poetry is innately private, personal. No one would ever ask to read it in its raw form. No colleague would, guaranteed. So I'm quite confident that no one will ever know what I'm really doing out there.

Just in case, when I come back from lunch I try to walk and behave like I've been outside writing poems. I act poetically.

And a funny thing happened yesterday. I pretended to be a poet so intently that I accidentally wrote a poem. I didn't plan it. It just came into my head while I was sitting on the train thinking semi-hard about it and holding a pen and paper.

I guess you could call that self fulfilling poetry.