Being Boring, a poem by Wendy Cope

Post 453 - Here's another clever poem from Wendy Cope (I posted her poem 'Flowers" last month). Cope (1945 — ) was raised in Kent, England, where her parents often recited poetry out loud to her. She has published several volumes of poetry including Making Cocoa for Kingsley Amis and Serious Concerns. She has a remarkable talent for parody and for using humor to address serious topics. Her earlier poems were written when she was living alone in London without a partner and feeling very alone and isolated. But she then met the poet Lachlan Mackinnon and moved to live with him and his three children in Winchester. And she reports she's much happier there. She says, "Of course misery writes more good poems than happiness, but happiness does write good poems now and again."


Being Boring by Wendy Cope


'May you live in interesting times.' Chinese curse

If you ask me 'What's new?', I have nothing to say

Except that the garden is growing.

I had a slight cold but it's better today.

I'm content with the way things are going.

Yes, he is the same as he usually is,

Still eating and sleeping and snoring.

I get on with my work. He gets on with his.

I know this is all very boring.

There was drama enough in my turbulent past:

Tears and passion - I've used up a tankful.

No news is good news, and long may it last,

If nothing much happens, I'm thankful.

A happier cabbage you never did see,

My vegetable spirits are soaring.

If you're after excitement, steer well clear of me.

I want to go on being boring.

I don't go to parties. Well, what are they for,

If you don't need to find a new lover?

You drink and you listen and drink a bit more

And you take the next day to recover.

Someone to stay home with was all my desire

And, now that I've found a safe mooring,

I've just one ambition in life: I aspire

To go on and on being boring.