I’m an Unashaméd Nutcase! [new poem]
I was HopSkipJumping through a glade
one strangesome Summer’s day when
I ‘lost my marbles’ in the kind of way
which seems to irk straitjacket friends
who revel in their self-appointed roles
to judge the sane as being ‘round the bend’.
They fell covertly from my pocket as I ran
with joy across the desert of this world,
although I was not really disconcerted but
instead was grateful to have been relieved
of such an ill-conceived collection of
those glassy balls which weigh you down
like nosey eyes inside your drawers.
This seemed to trigger some poor soul
to tell me I’m completely mad or,
to be precise, that I’m a total nutcase —
you may judge if that is right today but,
as for me, I do admit that this is true
and wouldn’t have it any other way!
So now I will present the evidence for
the prosecution of none other than myself
by those who section anyone who’s sane:
I am quite mad, for in the park I talk
to trees and touch them as I listen to
the breeze sing rustley in their leaves.
I am quite mad, 4 I arise from time 2 time
at 3 AM or 2 or 4 or any time will do
to gaze with fondness at the moon or
listen to the stars’ own shiny tune and
if I’m able then I listen to the sea.
I must be mad because I never get
depressed or ‘down in the mouth’
or empty talk gone south or what
ever could result in being glum for
I am more than blessed, even with none.
I am quite mad, for rather than a sweet
I have a boiled egg as my dessert!
I must be nutz, for when somebody
says that I am mad, I laugh like crazy,
don’t get sad, wonder what on earth
the darkness was which spoiled them.
I must be mad, for I would rather be
alone than in a crowded room where
‘hell is other people’ of ‘no exit’ doom.
I’m such a loon that I do as I please
without a care if I’ll be judged as nuts
by those who strut about defending
their insanity with vanity as being the
only version in the world of being sane.
I must be ‘nertz’ (old euphemism from
the 1920s as a substitute for ‘nuts’),
because I checked its etymology & origins!
(To understand why something is, one
must first look @ where that thing begins).
I must be mad, for I forgive all those
who’ve called me mad, knowing well
that those who are unable to control
a soul will then perceive him as a threat
and pigeonhole him in a drawer. To call
him mad is thus to wage their title war.
A soul who does not take with seriousness
success or pecuniary matters or career
will soon be labelled (the result of fear)
with the telling title known as ‘lunatic’
(I love to be associated with the lovely Moon!)
unhinged, a fruitcake, batty, out to lunch,
or off his trolley, off the rails, up the wall,
or cuckoo, screwy, screw loose, bonkers,
round the twist — I’m sure you get the gist.
I’m mad enough to think that everything
(especially music or a long-wet kiss) is more
important than big money in the bank.
Irresponsible? Maybe. Insane? I guess
we’ll have to disagree. For when I look at all
the mad stuff folks will do to fill their coffers
with some gelt or shekels, moolah, dough
or dosh, or spondulix and lolly, readies,
bread and all the other names we give to
what is just a load of manufactured tosh,
I’m pleased 2 finger my guitar or let my lips
alively linger with indulgence on a love-juice
letterbox shaped like a heart, should ever
such ‘insanity’ infect my art. Yes, you are right.
I am a total nutcase and against your bitter
judgements of my lifestyle I will never fight.
I’m such a nutcase that I would rather be
the fool who lives up on the hill than be
the smartass in the valley or the town.
I reject the watered-downness of your
automated paint-by-numbers frownness.
I must in your myopic view be quite insane
for I would rather do what morally is right
than merely like a stooge obey the law.
That’s what ‘insanity’ (or what you call insane)
when understood correctly and done right, is for.
Long time ago, straitjacket-wearing folks like you
would put mad looney nuts like me inside
an institution so we wouldn’t have to cause
you all embarrassment, not knowing where
to put your gaze. “Just lock the crazies up!”
as you would say. Well, I am here to haunt you
with a life you seem unable to ignore in all
your ignorance; and here am I, a troubadour,
offending you because you have suppressed
the child in you who loves simplicity and virtue
and who knows what’s good & right and would
never dream of making war, should you abandon
walking down your narrow corridor of spite.
Finally, I am evicting all the hard acerbic souls
who label those as madmen who do not conform
to how they think a human should behave,
when all their strong objections are not based
on someone being depraved but merely living
differently 2 them, 4 that is all that they condemn.
Happy as the nutcase which, in all your rancour,
you have made me out to be, I say to you in love
that this is who I am and so to be I’m wholly free.
And while I’m on this roll and sparked to this degree,
it is my firm belief that such a world as this is very
much in need of many more demented fools like me!
© Alan Morrison, 2020
The Naked Troubadour 