The Little Elections: A Poem

The Little Elections

after The League of Gentlemen

Unlike all other candidates,

 I’m very much in favour of dog shit;

have it with everything;

am especially fond of the sort produced by

frightened Rottweilers.

I have the energy, enthusiasm and necessary

sexual appetite to properly

service the people behind doors

            I’m knocking on locally.

I’m for more traffic jams

            and overweight policemen called

Frank. 

I won’t be diverted into talking

about abortion or world war four.

This is a little election for little people.

I’m against nasal congestion

and political reform; have lived locally

for the past half hour.

Our eight year old, Cian,

will support whatever football team

you want him to. I’m against

adverse weather conditions in Salthill;

okay, in theory, with the continued

existence of black people.

I’ve studied transport systems

at Mauthausen, Belzec, Vorkuta; think I know

            how to ensure two Ballybane buses

never again come along at once. 

KEVIN HIGGINS 

Kevin Higgins poetry features in the generation defining anthology Identity Parade – New British and Irish Poets (Ed Roddy Lumsden, Bloodaxe, 2010) and one of his poems is included in the forthcoming anthology The Hundred Years’ War: modern war poems (Ed Neil Astley, Bloodaxe April 2014).  The Ghost In The Lobby (Salmon, Spring 2014) is Kevin’s fourth collection of poems.

Praise for Kevin Higgins’s poetry:

“His contribution to the development of Irish satire is indisputable…Higgins’ poems embody all of the cunning and deviousness of language as it has been manipulated by his many targets... it is clear that Kevin Higgins’ voice and the force of his poetic project are gaining in confidence and authority with each new collection.” Philip Coleman

“Gil Scott Heron’s The Revolution Will Not Be Televised as re-told by Victor Meldrew”. Phil Brown, Eyewear

“good satirical savagery”. The Cambridge Introduction to Modern Irish Poetry, 1800-2000