Bad Taste
You're losing it. You're letting yourself go;
your home's a dump, your neighbours are all rotten -
they set a bad example. You've forgotten
your duties as a host. Now, say hello.
I'll ask you how you are. Tell pleasant lies:
remember, this is how it's done. To mention
the folly of the question draws attention
to the mendacity of the replies.
Because - if you want honesty - I think
I liked you better when you were still living;
to tell the truth, however unforgiving
it sounds, I can't help noticing you stink.
I liked you more before your bones poked through
your flesh (which wasn't green); when your eye-sockets
were less like craters left by two gone rockets;
in short, I liked you more when you were you.
Old possum, don't just lie there playing dead,
as though my visit were an interruption.
Are you so busy studying corruption
you can't sit up and answer me instead?
Tell me I write a lousy elegy.
Tell me that this is all in dreadful taste.
Tell me: what's more obscene than fucking waste?
Death is in quite poor taste, if you ask me.
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