People raise their eye-
brows, whenever I say that
Pete’s
my favourite Beatle—
that he was the
Best of the lot,
refusing to off
himself—when Ringo
and the boys
were running wildly
from the girls, buying
second mansions, everybody
in their moptops
cloning the look.
There he is, looking in
from beyond the wind-
ow, the guy who’s
shovelling coal—
from the bowels
of the yellow
sub, asking everyone
to let him be, that it’s been
a hard night’s day, desist
from egging him on, saying
his hair’s more salt than
pepper.
At least Sutcliffe
never knew
what would-have-been,
drink himself to
stupor, seeing Yoko
in the space of
Abbey Road, sitting
where he could’ve
on an amp,
watching accolades
pour in
for a ladder
'neath the ceiling ,
that no
should have been the
final word,
knowing she couldn’t
hold a candle
to his Figurative
Mother and Child.
See? Even in this poem
he’s been usurped,
that it’s the A
in this exhibit:
of the drummer
never getting
enough respect, that the Starr
was forever out-of-tune,
that his beats were out-of-sync,
that it never came to light
due to a million screaming
teens,
that Paul once passed him
by on Penny Lane,
looking him in the eye
without hello, a caring
how’ve you been?
That a bird just
shit on his head, failing to
hand him a tissue
to wipe it off,
a second for the
tear he’d feign
was rain.
Andreas Gripp
January 25, 2025
Stuart Sutcliffe, Figurative, Mother and Child
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