I am not one to satiate my whims.
Prefer instead to let them fester, to
germinate & bloom beneath my skin
into full-blown neuroses that I nourish
with lethal doses of Coltrane in

lonely rooms at 3am, with thoughts
of you that scratch & claw, searching
for an exit
Others tend to their whims
like schoolgirls fussing over broken nails
or split ends, never once realising

that what you've got inside you
can never really get out, and a whim is
only a whim, whether it manifests
as the Holocaust or the sudden desire
to walk to the shops for cigarettes.

 
Glenn Cooper's poems have been widely published in the small press world. His latest books are Outrun Your Fate from Lummox Press, and Planet Ali via www.kaminipress.com.He lives in Australia.