Déshabillé

 

Déshabillé

 

Saying goodbye, he kneels so they are eye to eye,

And then pulls her close, holding her tight, claiming

The shape of her bones with clumsy, clammy

Returning hands: clavicle, scapula, pelvis, thigh.

His fingers travelling, needing that haptic fix,

Unravelling geography and geometry;

Love like L-dopa, memory – synaptic tricks -

Awakening, shores and shapes rushing in,

The topography stretching out, the moment elastic:

History, anthropology, a religion of lust and sin.

 

(We want to touch children, and animals:

It’s our first response – to reach out, to pet,

To stroke, to hold, to groom – prelapsarian

In its simplicity, uncomplicated by sexual

Tension and implication. The primeval set

Of genes from which love evolved,

A reflexive action, boundaries dissolved;

Yet so fraught with danger, so easily confused

That one can nearly share the sentiments of …

That one can barely tell the difference between…

The abuser and the abused?)

 

He pushes his nose in under her jaw,

Wanting the smell of her to claw at his nerves;

Nothing unique, the stink of child, undeserving

Of the scented disguises that adults can flaunt.

He stands – needing again that height, that stature -

Turns and leaves. The air screams! The fabric tears,

Ripped at the seams down years and years…

Lives undressed, stripped; Oh the hate! The rapture!

Touched

 

Touched (by intention) - an extract

Her boyfriend’s tongue,

Tipped with promises,

Penetrates her mouth,

Loosens, unbuttons,

Unbuckles her being;

She slides off the edge

Of herself.

 

She moves through the cinema

Of the world,

Where strangers faces

Matinee porno movies,

Eyes panning like sleamy hands

Running amuck amongst

The folds and fissures

Of her undressing.

 

Her husband has an access

To her body she denies herself:

The piercing and eating

Of her flesh;

A gift, a right, she believes

She has freely given;

An invitation to ...

A movable feast,

A candle-lit supper,

A take-away dinner,

Finger food.

The napkin of her skin

Glistens.

 

One day,

He’ll push the plate away.

In Camera

 

In Camera

 

There is usually a queue,

So you take a number, and wait,

Pass the time of day -

There’s always something to say -

Talk about the weather; stew;

Count the cost, and hesitate ...

 

The line shuffles forward,

Though one appears no nearer.

Some try to push in front;

A few wonder, What’s the point?

Others linger over every word,

Yet the meaning is no clearer.

 

And when your time arrives,

Everything seems to fall away,

As if the you as a notion

Has always been in question;

And what of you survives

Will barely have a say.

Learning to swim

M and Me Swimming

Learning to Swim

 

I take you into the shallows,

back into the loose

embrace

of water,

and

release you;

 

Year after year.

 

Time is the treading of water,

the dancing of limbs:

that sculling of hands,

that scissoring of feet

to the rhythm of trust and faith

(a mimicry of drowning,

of prayer);

a simple belief in buoyancy

that keeps you afloat,

and waiting for the right wave

to carry you forward,

and just

out of

reach.

 

But the water always gets deeper

as you get further from the shore,

and the gap never closes

on the distant horizon

(about three miles of eternity -

enough to last a lifetime).

 

Still, you step into the water’s mouth

and allow it to swallow you whole.

And I release you

(Or is it that you struggle free,

welcoming the current?)

and you drift away;

 

then with strong,

clean

strokes

you begin to swim.

 

Your feet will never touch bottom again.

Click here to read about the artist Michael Andrews and his picture 'Melanie and Me Swimming'

Click here to read about Graham Swift's story collection "Learning to Swim".

Departure

 

Departure

 

She’s travelling on the back of a borrowed waggon,

Pulled by tired horses, being jolted along

A rutted but unbeaten track, into the hinterland

She had never imagined mapping,

But the landscape has become rugged,

Jagged and unchanging.

 

Her belongings are spilling

out of the boxes, are tumbling

over the tailgate, falling

by the wayside, into

the dirt, into

the ditches.

 

She no longer acknowledges the driver,

Just turns her head away, pulling

A blanket around herself and huddling

Into a corner, away from the dank air,

From the creeping fog of early morning,

Wrapping herself in the shrinking

World of herself, in the warm fug of herself,

Taking a desolate comfort

 

In arrival.

Engineers

Engineers

Their life together has been spent

Like the digging of the Fréjus Tunnel:

Two separate countries boring into a mountain,

Removing rubble, to meet in the middle -

Their wholes perfectly matched.

Blood, sweet with tears, spilt;

Hard labour, planning and years funnelled

Through an ill-lit half-darkness to maintain

A vision -both troubled and riddled -

The holes selectively patched.

Imagine the joy;

The detritus.

Refraction and Reflection

Refraction

A thought resolves itself – surprising and cruel -

Into something clear and hard and perfect:

This is it; this is all there is: you are a fool.

Hold the image for a moment – hope for defects –

Turn it over, study its sintered clarity,

Its sharp-edged and brutal simplicity.

But light is refracted and the truth held this way

Or that takes on other colours, other shapes,

Something added, something taken away.

The mirror in which we live our escapes

Is haunted, like the ghosting on a TV set:

We watch ourselves as ourselves … yet …

Deeper feelings happen quietly; they seep.

It’s the petty emotions that busy and fuss

Our lives. So, like children surrendering to sleep,

We give in to a darkness to which our eyes adjust,

Wake to a past gone stale and a future skimmed,

                   (While you feel the light is sharp, the light is focussed ...)

Our shadows paler, and our substance thinned.

                           (You sense the light has bent, the light has dimmed.)