Hi everyone,
(and particularly those who’ve made comments, who’ll get some sort of 
mention in what follows).
Thanks for what’s been said! It’s really helpful in all kinds of ways. So I 
hope y'all don't mind reading each others comments as well as a reply to 
what you've said. I'm kind of lazy, and it might just be that the poem gets 
more coherent attention from me this way...

I guess, Sally, as you say, it’s “a north of England now poem” but I hope it 
can work elsewhere as well. And I ain’t worked in an office since I was in 
my teens but what I remember was always having to try and focus myself on my 
work instead of always being distracted – I was so very unhappy and bored. I 
guess I’m basing this narrative on assuming things are just as bad for some 
people now.

The comments about judgements, Helen (and welcome!) and Mike… Yeh, I did 
feel I was offering some potential for the men to be sizing up the women, 
and vice versa, as well as the narrator sizing up everything. I guess I 
could make that a bit clearer… so I think Ted will get replaced by Dave 
(again) which may help the reader see less people (and stand more chance of 
seeing more about what’s possibly going on). Thanks.

Frank, you’re making an interesting point (about referring back to the 
violence etc of the swans)! I guess I wanted the poem to let all the 
inferences be there, but not be too explicit. I was hoping the readers could 
find what you’re wanting me to say without me actually saying it! I guess 
I’d like it to be a poem about subtleties.

I was a tad worried, too, about swans being close to a cliché (as you 
mention Mike). I don’t think I can get round that. I even tried replacing 
the swans with geese! (It didn’t work, the young women lost their appeal) 
So, in the end, I thought, “Well, Dave is a cliché kind of character – and 
he’s intended to be – so why can’t the narrator show the mundaneness of his 
life by mentioning another potential cliché too?” (I mean I think I’m far 
enough away from the Leda & The Swan poems not to worry about those 
either!). I guess some poems are about what’s special (and this isn’t one of 
them!) and some poems are about things that are ordinary – trying, perhaps, 
to make the ordinary somehow, in some way, extraordinary.

And James & Christina, thanks for your comments. After I wrote it I had in 
mind, James, your estuary poems (and where you once mentioned how you went 
their when you escaped from work!) so I’m relieved you didn’t find a direct 
connection!

And Helen, Matt, yes… all those commas! Erch. They’re going! I looked at 
what I’d posted and thought, “Oh – expletive!” (Or words to that effect!). 
And, Helen, you mentioned the disparity in the numbers and, as I’ve 
mentioned above, a guy’s getting the sack from the poem!

Oh Gary, no coffee poem yet and no swans! But I remember one of yours about 
a place where people took food out... ages back.

Bob
(Who’ll mention that the title, if spoken, “might” include what someone says 
if the latent angers of some of the people surfaces or starts to fly… “F*** 
Off!”’s in there somewhere…)




>From: Bob Cooper <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: The Pennine Poetry Works <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: When We're For Coffee
>Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2004 18:36:26 +0000
>
>Here's one for some C & C:
>
>When We’re For Coffee
>
>Middle-aged-Dave, who’s my age, but the only one here
>in white shirt, neatly knotted dark tie, has already told us
>all he thinks about Grin & Blur It, as he calls the PM,
>education, then tax, but he isn’t offering his biscuits,
>and I’m looking out the window where, like yesterday,
>I hope to see swans. I’ve heard they’re vicious,
>they rush, they hiss, their long wings can break an arm.
>I ought to take time to watch them more closely. Now
>Ted’s telling Mandy and Susie from the top floor how FCUK
>is too crude a name for expensive T-Shirts and jeans,
>that beautiful things should be discreet, and the cost
>of heating the office is so much more than a jacket
>and a sweater with the firm’s logo, and how the customer pays.
>They smile to each other but not at us then glide off like swans
>while he turns to John, to me, and as we watch them
>climb the stairs I’m grateful we can’t see their eyes.
>
>Bob
>
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