The Portrait of the Poetaster as a Man - Prologue

I speak of now - the state I find I'm in
And try to justify my ways to all,
In doing so I'll speak of failed fusion,
Which leaves me partitioned, whilst you unite.
I notice faults between myself and most
And so within myself where most know peace:
The latter kind may generate the first
But both are obstacles to normal life.
I am not whole - I have no sense of self -
Partly because I have no membership
Of one or other group or social class:
I can't assert for certain who I am.
I lose myself in situation's grasp -
Myself collapses separated from
Surroundings and their influence which cast
My shapeless form in shapes that pass as passed.

Now nearly two score years have passed since birth
And I were proud had I but nought to show:
Instead a trail of broken marriages
And debts to put a working man to shame.
I've aged yet immature - thus boon of age
Has yet to come to me and though I see
Maturity in friends' and siblings' lives
I stay youthful, unsure and racked with fears.
And my objective state is tattered rag
(Perhaps best swept away from others' view):
It's meaningless compared to social worth:
To me it's all I have to show from life.
In recent past I've had no hearth or home -
In hospitals and hostels I have slept,
A scant reminder to domestic cheer:
I need see this as water past the weir.

Now broken chances trailing dead behind:
And I dropped out without first tuning in;
And squandered chances trailing in my wake:
What few have had more opportunity?
I never saw beyond the document
And praised at school for learning fact on fact,
But to mature - present profession's face -
I took no guide and thus stagnated young.
I have grown old and not enjoyed my youth
And miss the youth I never grasped or knew,
I watch the smiling, playing, revelling young
And bar myself for so much more than age.
Those wasted gifts of mind that I passed up,
They flowered in youth and promised to bear fruit:
Neglected by their gardener they but rot
And advertise themselves in that they're not.

Now occupation might well do me good
Though my appraisal is that I'm unfit:
I lack the social skills which are required
To start to function in the world of work.
I made effort - professional attempt,
And chose a type of work which sends me mad:
I tried acquiring web programming skills
And thus I'm certified: more ways than one.
When in my prime, the work was way too hard,
And in this area there's nothing worse
Than inability which shows itself
To all concerned through targets that are missed.
Since being poor oh how my skills have lapsed
(The science seems to change with season's turn)
I might as well attempt to light the night
As make and build a modern paying site.

Now first impressions, attitudes of mine
Provoke the type of thoughts which guide me wrong,
These flits of thought repeat despite my wish
To exorcise what strikes me prejudice.
And these impressions and the attitudes
Which rule my mind might well be taken from
1960's thought-safe TV sit-coms
Concerning well-to-do contented class.
Thus my conclusions: mostly misconceived;
And there's a corresponding deficit
(Or tutored innocence) in treading path
That's mine and other's sexuality.
And if I see, I see stereotypes -
And casting scenes in terms of castes long-gone,
Impressions form as false: my waking self
Rejects such thoughts, such thoughts I try to shelf.

Not now, but then in drink I sought a friend -
Thus chaos reigned for short of two decades -
The drink always the uppermost in mind
Despite the many other calls in life.
Like all in times of stress I reach for drink
But this relaxer causes more distress
And aggravates the starting drive or need -
Whichever first, a dependence follows.
The mood when drunk becomes normality -
The mood when sober seems one lacking joy -
And all life's pleasures will retreat, replaced
And substituted by a drunk's desire.
The problem is the personality
Which drinks - remove the drink - remains a drunk:
Through four years, most without, I struggle still -
This part of life must change and that I will.

London's my firm location now as I've
Stopped dreaming that a change could bring a change:
If malady - then centres in my head
And that is fixed despite geography.
This place - a force and forces way of life
To souls not born and raised to her curt ways:
Alien to her proud entrenched elites
I but exist, persist and fail to thrive.
This capital's a young and stubborn wife -
Defy her will and she insists more strong,
But play uxorious and she repays
All promised then when promises were made.
And she has been a friend to me at times
Of need when other friends have turned away
And taught me how to cope with pain's duress,
Subsisting side by side with loneliness.

Politenesses and kindnesses now flow
And pour from even harsh men when desired:
Simple ability or aptitude
Which I do not possess in slight small sense.
With this I lack a social property
That has no name, a one that's poor defined,
And in respect of this I'm asocial
And this restricts the ways I interact.
An implication, look or word or smile -
I try yet my communication fails:
A language spoken fluently by all,
And I don't grasp the basic rudiments.
So this difficulty is plain to all,
For others interacting and for me:
I might know beneficial synthesis
If able to uncover genesis.

And now I wish I'd find I understand
The etiquette and interplay of friends:
The jostling roles producing give and take:
The show that's common frame of reference.
Too many candidates will takes dislike;
My conversation seems to be inept,
And limited to but some paltry themes:
My learnt humour - youthful - antisocial.
Subtle the art - to sacrifice and mix -
Forward oneself in raising joined commune:
I fail in humbling self to group desires,
Assert a me when I should acquiesce.
For years I've yearned to find companionship
And failing, realise the fault is mine:
An isolate, I crave some company,
And long to be within society.

And now to love - a word I wasn't taught -
I've lost and found, mistook and thought I'd found
But never understood the calls of love -
My heart on sleeve for all to view but me.
Fanaticized by love which drives me mad
I burn and bathe in all consuming flame
With scant regard for just regard, I love
And idolise my objects of desire.
I said it drives me mad and this is true -
No love for me, but with insanity:
As stands, not yet the case I fear to love
But weight of evidence would tell me to.
Regardless, I desire a woman's kiss,
And yearn for heart and heart's requited love
And too the smile and eye of promises:
All said I'd be content with fondnesses.

My family, now, as always, are strange
And my parents divorced when I was young
And they forbade the words "mother", "father",
And they also omitted word that's "love".
And so, my family's atypical -
And with parents both wed again I've four
In all, assumed or real, mothers, fathers:
Professionals the lot for what it's worth.
Each of the four have faults they're blind to see -
They're proud or angry, cold or they disown;
One of these faults is that they'll show bias:
Good to their favourites - how they treated me!
Past thoughts have occupied the far extremes
Of well known nature nurture paradigm:
When you are damned by both in equal share
It matters not, which weighs in foul or fair.

Fifteen years now I've been one diagnosed -
My mind collapses being leant upon -
I, coshed and soothed by medication's fist,
Attempt the shades of stress which others breeze.
And in those years I've scarce known even health;
Once in a while I'll lose the plot - delude:
Most times disabled trying hard to live:
Was rare to say that I was sound and well.
When I am ill it's like a natural drug
Has been administered to make me well -
The feeling is illusory: those close
Witness descent into insanity.
I used to think my illness was the cause
Of woes - but now for other reasons too
I see the cipher to society
Laid out for each and all to use but me.