Niceness
By Jim Murdoch
I’m a nice guy. Just saying.
Just so you know
if I act up or out and shit—
and I will act up and shit;
up or out—
that it’s simply a biproduct
of my niceness,
say, a symptom.
No! Better: a repercussion.
I mean, it’s not rocket science:
fat people do fat things,
lazy people do lazy things
and nice people do nice things.
Do I need to draw you a map?
Seriously. It’ll be a nice map.
Poet's Note: …from Latin nescius “ignorant, unaware,” literally “not-knowing,” from ne- “not” + stem of scire “to know” (see science)
Jim Murdoch has been writing poetry for fifty years and has graced the pages of many now-defunct literary magazines and websites and a few, like Ink, Sweat and Tears and Poetry Scotland that are still hanging on in there. For ten years he ran the literary blog The Truth About Lies but now lives quietly in Scotland with his wife and, whenever the mood takes him, next door’s cat. He has published two books of poetry, a short story collection and four novels: Jim, not the cat.