Love and Other Maladies
by
Book Cover & Preview Text
FAILURE I could have been a sex goddess but I don’t have the right size breasts I could have been a PhD but I couldn’t pass the tests I could have been a diva on the nightclub scene but I couldn’t reach the notes I could have been a sailor on the great north seas but I can’t keep my footing on boats Can’t drive a hard bargain Can’t mend a flat tyre Can’t play a sonata Can’t relight your fire I could have been a wonderful mother I just forgot to give birth I could have been a gardener on a T.V. show but I don’t like scrabbling in earth I could have been a Buddhist, with a mind that is free just like the Dalai Lama but my ego’s the size of a ten ton truck and I’m too addicted to drama Can’t do yoga positions Can’t tap dance or rumba Can’t crochet or cross stitch Keep losing your number I could have been a runner in a marathon if I could only give up smoking I could have been a comic who brought down the house only no-one knows when I’m joking I could have been a genius of the creative kind a Beckett or Harold Pinter but I can’t write like them, so I sat on my arse and twiddled my thumbs through the winter Can’t order on line Can’t work the remote And now that you’re gone Just can’t keep afloat I could have been a Mata Hari or a J. Bond but I’d confess at the first twinge of pain I could have been a Freudian analyst but the thoughts in my head are insane I could have found religion, been a born-again Jew But the Bible don’t have the solutions I could have been secretary of the U.N. But I can’t stick to those damn resolutions Can’t fix leaking taps Can’t flirt with the plumber Threw true love away Could I be any dumber? THE LAST TIME If I’d known it was the last time I would not have slept that night. Held in the circle of your arms I would have lain awake, trying to make believe that proximity was akin to love. And in the early morning light I would have gently turned to study the contours of your face, committing you to memory as a painter might, so that I wouldn’t now struggle to recall how your lip curved or the perfect symmetry of your jaw. If I’d known it was the last time I would have stretched out like a cat and basked in your morning smile and I wouldn’t have made that stupid quip to protect myself from my desire. I would have been like a hungry journalist noting what was said even the clothes you wore. If I’d known it was the last time as we stood at your front door I might have left you with a well-crafted compliment, a light and lovely tribute to your allure. Or perhaps for the first time I could have told you what I really felt because as this was the last time it wouldn’t matter any more.
Formats
Book Details
About the Book
Love, heartache, loss and other maladies: longing, regret, failure, addictions, madness, suicide, emptiness and ontology. A sprinkling of myth: a twist of irony. A meander across the dark side. An antidote to personal growth and self improvement. The perfect gift for the existentially disappointed.
About the Author
Debby Klein has been a playwright, an activist, a counsellor, a cabaret writer and performer, a psychiatric patient and a facilitator. She wrote her first poem aged five but on hitting adolescence her poetry became so morose that for a number of decades she concentrated on comedy instead and with rather more success. She took the plunge back into poetry as a performance poet to take the art of the morose to a whole new level. She is co-founder of Desperate Poets Inc. This is her first published collection.