Out of the Blue: Poems 1975-2001 Read online

as she dived once

  and an angler cast

  with lightning-proof rod

  from the crinkled rocks.

  A slow Medusa tilted beneath her,

  shadowing toes and ankles

  then on with its belly to the south,

  braille on its tentacles.

  She could read it like a newspaper

  as it hunted alongside her.

  I shivered

  at the roll of her syllables,

  and her joined feet winnowing,

  and so I trawled her with me

  over a shallow forest of dog-jawed

  fruit sucking the trees,

  past angler-fish socketing sand

  with stone-cold faces,

  through shrimps which divided between them

  her armpit crevices

  then flicked that way and this

  tasting the dew of her breasts.

  I trawled her past innocent sand

  and the spumy outstretched arms

  of agar and tangle –

  but no, I wouldn’t look down

  however she called to me

  until my fingers were shrunk

  like old laundry.

  I did not dare look down

  to be snagged by ruby and seal-black

  trees relaxing their weave.

  On shore nobody’s waiting.

  The children, firm and delicious

  as morning goods, have sheathed up their spades.

  The boy with burned legs

  has stepped out of his pantaloons

  and skips in his blue vest

  on the verandah boards.

  The big one lights a mosquito candle,

  Dad fills his glass of wine

  four times, while they count,

  and crickets saw in the ditch, frantic

  along with the old car number-plate

  and the boys’ jar of fishing maggots.

  They are screeching, all of them:

  night, night, night’s come

  and no one’s ever had a pedalo out this long.

  Night-wind sifts on the shore

  where striped recliners and wind-breaks

  squeak by the green pavilion

  crying for more.

  I’ve lost my wife to the sea

  Dad thinks hazily,

  and takes another bottle of Muscadet

  out of the gas cooler,

  he imagines her dreaming

  and sleeping miles from him,

  each breath takes her farther,

  toes in the air,

  sea claps under her pedalo

  impudently happy –

  Below me now a mirror of wave-ruts

  in firm brown sand,

  I’d pulled her with me for miles

  and there was nowhere to hide.

  Now let me see you swim back

  I said. She was mouthing

  like mackerel tossed in a bucket

  when the man’s too busy to kill it,

  with her scale-lapped bathing-hat

  fly-blown and crazing.

  She had nothing on underneath.

  She was bare and bald as an eel.

  Now she was an old bathing-woman

  a mackintoshed marine Venus,

  now she was that girl with lipstick

  a push-up bra and a beehive,

  now she was a slippery customer at Cannes

  bare-breasted and young,

  now she was my old

  familiar snake again.

  I took her curls in my hands and I pulled

  but they were limpetted, smiling,

  and there were just the two of us rocking.

  We were close as spies

  and she stayed silent

  till day dived after its horizon

  and the sea rustled with moonlight.

  Swell shuts and opens

  like a throat,

  she claps

  under my pedalo

  impudently happy.

  Where are you now

  my sister, my spouse?

  Clap with one hand

  or clap to nothing –

  I know you can.

  Kiss me with the kisses of your mouth

  my sister, my spouse.

  The pedalo rocks

  and is still again.

  Beetroot Soup

  Its big red body ungulps

  from the bowl in the fridge

  with a fat shiver.

  Glazed

  with yellow beading of grease

  the soup melts from the edge,

  yesterday’s beetroot

  turns the texture of tongues

  rolling their perfect ovals

  out of the silt at the bottom.

  Like duck breast-feathers, the dumplings

  wisp to the surface, curl

  as the soup brightens

  just off the boil.

  There’ll be pearl onions

  – two to a mouthful –

  white butter,

  then later

  plums

  piled in a bucket

  under the table

  thatched with dull leaves

  and a black

  webbing of twig

  over their round

  sleep.

  When the soup’s done

  yellow

  constellations

  burst on its skin,

  bread goes to work

  wiping and sopping

  the star-scum

  set in a slick

  on the base of the pot –

  chicken fat.

  The Diving Reflex

  Where the great ship sank I am,

  where cathedrals of ice breathe through me

  down naves of cold

  I tread and roll,

  where the light goes

  and the pressure weighs

  in the rotten caves of an iceberg’s side

  I glide,

  I am mute, not breathing,

  my shoulders hunched to the stream

  with the whales, drowsing.

  Bells rang in my blood

  as I went down

  purling, heart over heel

  through the nonchalant

  fish-clad ocean –

  her inquisitive kiss

  slowed me to this

  great cartwheel.

  Down I go, tied to my rope.

  I have my diving reflex to sister me,

  and the blubbery sea cow

  nods, knowing me.

  There is blood in my veins

  too thick for panic,

  there is a down

  so deep a whale

  thins to a sheet of paper

  and here I hang.

  I will not drown.

  The diving reflex can enable the human body to shut down and maintain life for as long as forty minutes underwater at low temperatures.

  Bathing at Balnacarry

  Two miles or so beyond

  the grey flank of the farm

  and the wall of gravestones

  the oncoming rain

  put an edge on the mountains,

  they were blue and sure

  as the blade of a pocket knife

  whizzed to a razor traverse

  cutting the first

  joint of my thumb –

  It was stitched, not bleeding,

  the dark threads in the sea were weeds

  and my son was packing them

  between the stones of his dam.

  He was holding back the river

  while the mountain punctured clouds

  to hold back rain

  no farther off than we’d cycled

  bumping towards our swim.

  In the grey purse of Balnacarry

  there were red pebbles and smooth pebbles

  and the close grain of the water,

  the men were absent –

  one walking in the woods

  one fishing off the rocks �
�

  the child behind me built up his dam

  through which the downpour would blossom

  in the sea at Balnacarry –

  it was cold, but not lonely

  as I stripped and swam.

  Boys on the Top Board

  Boys on the top board

  too high to catch.

  Noon is painting them out.

  Where the willow swans

  on the quarry edge

  they tan and sweat

  in the place of divers

  with covered nipples –

  Olympians,

  that was the way of it.

  Boys in the breeze

  on the top board

  where the willow burns

  golden and green

  on feet grappling –

  boys fooling

  shoulder to shoulder,

  light shaking.

  The lake’s in shadow,

  the day’s cooling,

  time to come down –

  they stub their heels on the sun

  then pike-dive

  out of its palm.

  Sylvette Scrubbing

  Sylvette scrubbing,

  arms of a woman

  marbled with muscle

  swabbing the sill,

  tiny red grains

  like suck kisses

  on Sylvette’s skin,

  Sylvette’s wrists

  in and out of the water

  as often as otters.

  She grips that pig of a brush

  squirts bristle

  makes the soap crawl then

  wipes it all up.

  Babes in the Wood

  Father,

  I remember when you left us.

  I knew all along

  it was going to happen.

  You gave me bread but wouldn’t look at me

  and Hansel couldn’t believe it

  because you were his hero,

  but I loved you and knew

  when you stroked my hair you were bound to leave us.

  It was Hansel who crumbled the bread

  while I skipped at your side and pretended

  to prattle questions and guess nothing.

  Father,

  did you drive home quickly or slowly,

  thinking of your second family

  waiting to grab your legs with shrieks of ‘Daddy!’

  and of your new wife’s face, smoothing

  now she sees you’re alone?

  Father,

  we love it here in the forest.

  Hansel’s got over it. I’ve learned to fish

  and shoot rabbits with home-made arrows.

  We’ve even built ourselves a house

  where the wolves can’t get us.

  But wolves don’t frighten us much

  even when they howl in the dark.

  With wolves, you know where you are.

  Cajun

  This is what I want –

  to be back again

  with the night to come –

  slipper-bags across our saddles

  how fast we rode

  and all for nothing.

  Your lips on his lips

  your hand in his hand

  as you went from the dance.

  We heard Mass at dawn,

  When I knelt for communion

  it was the hem of your white dress

  I felt in my mouth,

  it was your lips moving.

  This is all I want

  to be there again

  with the night to come –

  meet me where the fire

  lights the bayou

  watch my sweat shine

  as I play for you.

  It is for you I play

  my voice leaping the flames,

  if you don’t come

  I am nothing.

  Skips

  If I wanted totems, in place of the poles

  slung up by barbers, in place of the clutter

  of knife-eyed kids playing with tops and whips,

  and boys in cut-down men’s trousers

  swaggering into camera,

  I’d have skips.

  First, red and white bollards

  to mark the road-space they need.

  A young couple in stained workwear

  – both clearly solicitors –

  act tough with the driver, who’s late.

  The yellow god with its clangorous emptiness

  sways on the chains.

  The young man keeps shouting BACK A LITTLE!

  as the skip rides above his BMW.

  The driver, vengeful, drops it askew.

  Next, the night is alive with neighbours

  bearing their gifts, propitiations

  and household gods – a single-tub washing-machine,

  a cat-pissed rug, two televisions.

  Soundless as puppets, they lower them

  baffled in newspaper, then score

  a dumbshow goal-dance to the corner.

  Time by Accurist

  Washed silk jacket by Mesa

  in cream or taupe, to order,

  split skirt in lime

  from a selection at Cardoon,

  £84.99,

  lycra and silk body, model’s own,

  calf-skin belt by Bondage, £73.99,

  tights from a range at Pins,

  deck-shoes, white, black or strawberry,

  all from Yoo Hoo,

  baby’s cotton trousers and braces

  both at Workaday

  £96.00; see list for stockists.

  Photographs by André McNair,

  styled by Lee LeMoin,

  make-up by Suze Fernando at Face the Future,

  hair by Joaquim for Plumes.

  Models: Max and Claudie.

  Location: St James Street Washeteria

  (courtesy of Route Real America

  and the Cape Regis Hotel),

  baby, model’s own,

  lighting by Sol,

  time by Accurist.

  The Silent Man in Waterstones

  I shall be the first to lead the Muses to my native land

  VIRGIL

  The silent man in Waterstones

  LOVE on one set of knuckles

  HATE on the other

  JESUS between his eyes

  drives his bristling blue skull

  into the shelves,

  thuds on CRIME/FANTASY

  shivers a stand of Virago Classics

  head-butts Dante.

  The silent man in Waterstones

  looks for a bargain.

  Tattered in flapping parka

  white eyes wheeling

  he catches

  light on his bloody earlobes

  and on the bull-ring

  he wears through his nose.

  The silent man in Waterstones

  raps for attention.

  He has got Virgil by the ears:

  primus ego in patriam mecum…

  He’ll lead the Muse to a rat-pissed underpass

  teach her to beg

  on a carpet of cardboard

  and carrier bags.

  The Wardrobe Mistress

  This is the wardrobe mistress, touching

  her wooden wardrobe. Here is her smokey

  cross of chrysanthemums

  skewed by the font.

  They have put you in this quietness

  left you here for the night.

  Your coffin is like a locker

  of mended ballet shoes.

  You always looked in the toes.

  There was blood in them, rusty

  as leaves, blood from ballerinas.

  Tonight it is All Souls

  but you’ll stop here quietly,

  only the living have gone to the cemetery

  candles in their hands

  to be blown about under the Leylandii.

  In your wooden wardrobe, you’re used to waiting.

  You know these sounds
to the bone:

  they are showing people to their seats

  tying costumes at the back.

  Everything they say is muffled,

  the way it is backstage.

  A stagehand pushes your castors

  so you glide forward.

  You know Manon is leaning

  on points against a flat,

  nervously flexing

  her strong, injured feet,

  you’re in position too, arms crossed,

  touching your bud of wood.

  You needn’t dance, it’s enough

  to do what you always did.

  That was the second bell. You feel it

  tang through the crush. The wind

  pours on like music

  drying everyone’s lips,

  they’re coming, your dancers.

  You hate the moment of hush.

  There. The quick luck-words

  knocking on wood.

  When You’ve Got

  When you’ve got the plan of your life

  matched to the time it will take

  but you just want to press SHIFT/BREAK

  and print over and over

  this is not what I was after

  this is not what I was after,