for B.S. Johnson
as a young man on a couch
watched a fat man on a beach
he saw futures
as surf splashed screen
as poems were fed to the wind
as stories cut
to a bunch of bananas
a director's in-joke
it's all in the timing
dead he was
a fortnight after filming
there he was
a year later
and three amnesiac decades passed
till we could see him again
larger than death
shaping and shouting
from the well-appointed
confines and confluences
of his own case study
lost and found
documented and celebrated
the fights and foibles
the hard-won recompenses
fortunes shuffled
in a box of bad news
blessings and insults
peering through slots
from multiple outlooks
flying the flag in the face of it
believing in invention
renovating the novel
as an older man hunched
tapping into
a laptop of luxury
a lifetime of skirmishes
trivial or deadly
I dream of drawing lines
in the sand
in memoriam.
© Paul Taylor 2005
This poem was provoked by Jonathan Coe's fine biography of B. S. Johnson, Like a Fiery Elephant, a review of which can be found at Black Star Review. More about this poet, novelist and film-maker can be found at the B. S. Johnson website.
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