My first collection was shortlisted for the 1995 T.S. Eliot prize. Like most first collections, it represents many years work and changes in my life, particularly those written in grabbed moments with two very young children. My son was born in 1992, my daughter in 1994, so this collection sometimes feels like a third child. I was beside myself with excitement when Arc agreed to take it on.
At the T.S. Eliot party I met Mark Doty (who won it that year) and Michael Longley who is one of the poets I most admire. When the book was launched in Huddersfield, I read with Elizabeth Jennings, a lyrical master. The poem Black Slingbacks comes from my first pamphlet produced by John Harvey of Slow Dancer Press. John is the brilliant creator of Charlie Resnick, a crime writer, dramatist and poet.
Black slingbacks
On the 18th floor, looking over miles of
estates,
I thought I could see hills with trees on.
As if the edge of a city was that easy to
define.
At night, it's like every picture you've
ever seen
of skyscrapers. If I'd been there longer,
perhaps I'd be able to name
thos three blocks together, the long cliffs
by Elephant and Castle. But I never smelled
chocolate from the biscuit factory,
vinegar from Sarsons, which Carolyn said
rose sweet and sour on the wind
with the sound of trains.
One night I tried my key in the door
but it was locked from inside
and when you opened, like a gaoler,
I saw the shoes. "I've got a friend
here, I'm sorry."
You didn't think I"d be back.
The date's in my cheque book.
£7, taxi, the 24th.
Powder tower
Coming back is easy.
We can paddle the estuary
we waded chest high, clothes over our heads
to reach the dunes
see an occasional camel train.
Here freshwater turtles
die sparkling in salt,
herons fish with gulls.
Storms smashed the bridge
leaving only half a road.
It's getting dark.
Hassam and Mark climb
a ruined gunpowder tower
swapping languages - a pound
of oranges, the word for fig.
Listening to them struggle
I watch the horizon redden
as if I'm witnessing a battle
and the broken turret's arsenal
is exploding over the sea.
Ropemakers
After stooping through a tunnel washed
smooth by floods
our guide switches off the lights and we
stand
still as stalagmites trying to guess where
he is
from the strength of his sweet, beery
breath telling us,
as if he's engineered it himself, there'll
never be a crack
of sun or moon in here - where each winter
three rivers
once collided and tons of water were forced
upwards,
pummelling a ceiling more intricate than
any stately home's.
Above, near the entrance, the ropemakers
lived - twisting and plaiting - and after
rain or thaws,
had no need of ears, just mouthed and
lipread
above the roar, their faces yellow in the
candle flames,
paled by daylight only a few hours a week.
The old Anglia can't take it and my
parents' plans for driving
through the night give out with the engine
in a sheet of rain.
By fluke my father finds a garage, a
removals van
filling up, so we're lifted, floppy with
tiredness,
into the back to lie on blankets in the
dark. No signposts,
no blinding headlights for my father to
swear at
when they won't dip, no orange glare at
each new town -
just that rattle of a toolbox and roll down
door.
They could be taking us anywhere.
My mother promises tomorrow she'll pick us
cherries.
My brothers whisper themselves to sleep, but
I know
why the ropemakers avoided that hole in the
back
of their cave, so opaque, immune to wax and
matches -
it could draw you in by accident,
commanding silence while skin slowly
covered your eyes.
Taxidermy
The label says it's a mermaid.
There's always someone outside the shop,
looking. It's a local sight
this Victorian glass case next to a
lawnmower
and worn cutlery. Small, shrivelled,
the head is hardly a woman's, more like a
dog,
although the body's that of a fish.
It was a sailor's once. Perhaps he bought
it
wanting to believe there were women
of a kind at sea, craving something new
to take home. When he died,
his things were sold in a lot to the
pawnshop -
the only one left in North End
and still doing good business.
Close up, it's shabby., like a large cats
in museums
with worn skins and whose eyes, though
plastic or glass,
seem confused by stillness.
Just as a sailor would miss the sea
when he grew too old
and all that was left was to walk by the
funair,
watch the hovercraft take off, it's skirt
flapping,
or go to a pub on the dock
where the landlord kept whippets
with eyes brown as his mermaid's.
Foreigner
Tomorrow you'll sit in your room
and outside only litter will be moving.
You'll wander corridors of closed doors
and go to the cinema where you'll watch
the screen burst or flicker - hearing but
most of the time
not understanding. You'll wish you could
meet people
in cafes, at traffic lights, the way you do
at home.
But you have just minutes to make yourself
understood
before heads turn away.
And if you find a lover there'll be a time
when you hand her a book and ask her to
read aloud,
because you need her to speak your
language;
translating as she mispronounces words she's
never heard.
And if you like her, maybe you'll wonder
how long you'll have to witness
the sounds of your country broken up
like this - all those pauses in the wrong
place.