Simon Armitage
‘I rate myself as a happy, contented person’
*

I rate myself as a happy, contented person,
in spite of troubles here and there.
Selfish, some have said, but in the main
I take a centre line
and let my fringe flop where the wind blows,
northside or south.

If I move my mouth it's mostly to smile,
or something similar,
and I should run a mile
before making trouble. Truly, it's how I am,
that way, and not one angstrom the other.

Lastly, it has helped me more than I could measure
to separatе life into two divisions,
of things that is, and things that isn't.