Issue Three – October 2015
MAYHEM
ISSN 2382-0322
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Mark Anthony Houlahan
If this was a Plath poem
it would rage with spleen. It would claw your brain with hyperbolic, mythologised imagery. But
this is not a Plath poem. This is a found poem. A Plath poem seeks power within the volcano of
the angry self. A found poem by consent finds language anywhere it may be lying waiting: on
line on a billboard or for instance in the bottom of a three drawer office unit where I found these
words: school certificate sixth form certificate university entrance a bursary [three fails in
scholarship I warned my parents this would happen but they wasted the entry fee anyway], b.a.
(history & english), masters (english), teacher training certificate (social studies & english),
doctor of philosophy (english), a fat brown envelope of accomplishment.
But let’s not get ahead of ourselves, sunshine. Your teachers have some suggestions. Has
difficulty with ball handling activities. Needs to … mix with others in sports before he can
mature fully as a person [that was my standard three teacher we spent all of 1968 really not
liking each other]. Untidy work doesn’t help [he means it is better to use a compass to draw
circles than a twenty cent piece]. Crayon work fair [that was in form three]. He could have done
better had he been more constant in his studies particularly in English.
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