(after Frank O’Hara*)
I’m not a painter


I’m someone sitting in a gallery

at the front end of the 21st century

at the back end


of the end of an epoch


                                               and I’m writing


because the words just roll


on from each other             like this


and you don’t have to wait

for the paint to dry


and you’re not left with a painting


you have to put somewhere:


in a gallery, or in the home

of a wealthy collector      —just words


on a screen
and it’s the end of the day

writing this poem                 which has nothing


to do with my job

or perhaps everything to do with my job, everything


to do with sitting here          waiting


for the next person to come in


or thinking about what I need to do


to organise the next load of art


to be trucked in here         and all this

is so mundane now, Frank


it must have been exciting


to write about ORANGE


(or to paint SARDINES)
in New York                in 1971                the year before I was born


before it all petered out
			                          —but


I have this wistful envious nostalgia

and I’m hoping something good

will roll out and onwards


for a few more years, even decades


and I agree, there’s many ways


you can write about ORANGE


if you don’t think it’s just a colour


but something you can ride on,


                                            kick about,


                                            poke your finger into,

		                            lick, as well as suck
it’s ten minutes before 5 o’clock


when the doors can be closed

and I can go home                 but it feels good right now


every tap of the keyboard


echoing off the gallery walls         it sounds like


I’ve got something to say


and it needs to be said

until it rolls no more


and the words are leaving


like the cars


that have started rolling


past the gallery


and out the gate.


*’Why I Am Not a Painter’ (1971).