Guest poem by Kevin Higgins
Re-dedicated to Russell Brand
Doesn’t believe his own birth cert is genuine,
finds Charlie Sheen’s most recent
speech from the balcony strangely
plausible; knows – the way all those Israelis knew
not to come into work that day – that swine flu
was manufactured in a laboratory funded
by Donald Rumsfeld, today’s weather forecast
is a wicked lie, the dandelions exploding
up through his otherwise well kept lawn
were planted there by government agents
who lurk in the shrubbery at night,
that the Department of Agriculture laces
the sheep dip with weapons’ grade
plutonium to hide the fact
he himself is actually
dead, assassinated years ago
by US special forces
during an otherwise enjoyable meal
in a Chinese restaurant
no one wants to talk about.
Kevin Higgins is co-organiser of Over The Edge literary events in Galway City. He has published four collections of poems: Kevin’s most recent collection of poetry, The Ghost In The Lobby, was launched at this year’s Cúirt Festival by Mick Wallace TD. His poems also feature in the anthologies Identity Parade – New British and Irish Poets (Bloodaxe, 2010) and in The Hundred Years’ War: modern war poems (Ed Neil Astley, Bloodaxe May 2014). His poetry was recently the subject of a paper titled ‘The Case of Kevin Higgins: Or The Present State of Irish Poetic Satire’ given by David Wheatley at a symposium on satire at the University of Aberdeen; David Wheatley’s paper can be read in full here. Mentioning The War, a collection of his essays and reviews, was published by Salmon in April, 2012. Kevin’s blog is Mentioning the War.