I’ve had some poems I could submit
but now I’ve got behind a bit,
they’re packed inside the silent hive
of a sev’ral-year-old, old hard drive

tho’ un-backed-up, their form survives
in sev’ral forms of after-lives,
some stuck fast inside the lump
that’s hard as nails and gives me stump

my teeth aren’t hard enough to bite
just so hard and just so right
to get beneath the metal case
and reach the sweet of the database

where, with neat and gnarring grinds,
I could taste those still-there finds
and turn them on the tip of my tongue
to you, as tho’ they were still young

‘not to worry’ and ‘never mind’,
the uni-verse can give in kind –
I’ve found, if thoughts are clear and clean,
hearts make good the old has-been

and friends tell me I can reclaim
what may seem lost in my mem’ry frame,
that what went off may come back on
[smiley face emoticon]

 

Damian Robin is poet living in England. He works for an international newspaper and a bilingual magazine. He lives with his wife and three children.

Featured Image: Babbage’s computing machine.

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3 Responses

  1. Reid McGrath

    Damian: You don’t know how pleased I am this morning to have learned the word “emoticon” via the perusal of your sportive poem (I have been hunting for that one for a while). I enjoy your wry, giggle-bit of humor. Thank you and nice ending!

    Reply
  2. Alan W. Jankowski

    Vaguely reminds me of when my computer got stolen a few years back, and I lost a number of unpublished poems, some not yet complete…not sure too many of them were actually worth reclaiming though…

    Reply
  3. Roy E. Peterson

    Damian, you have shone a wonderful spotlight on something I suspect many of us have and that is fresh poetic bits and pieces, if not whole poems residing in our past personal efforts (old hard drives). I particularly love the way you end it with a “smiley face emoticon.”

    Reply

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