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Collected Poems

Page 4

by Peter Redgrove


  She went out in the early afternoon to fetch a child from.

  I pulled up from a pillow damp with heat

  And saw her kissing hers, her legs were folded

  Far away from mine. A pillow! It seemed

  She couldn’t love the empty air.

  Perhaps, we thought, a child had come to grief

  In some room in the old house we kept,

  And listened if the noises came from some especial room,

  And then we’d take the boards up and discover

  A pile of dusty bones like charcoal twigs and give

  The tiny-sounding ghost a proper resting-place

  So that it need not wander in the empty air.

  No blood-stained attic harboured the floating sounds,

  We found they came in rooms that we’d warmed with our life.

  We traced the voice and found where it mostly came

  From just underneath both our skins, and not only

  In the night-time either, but at the height of noon

  And when we sat at meals alone. Plainly, this is how we found

  That love pines loudly to go out to where

  It need not spend itself on fancy and the empty air.

  MEMORIAL7

  (David Redgrove: 28th December 1937–24th December 1957)

  Two photographs stand on the dresser

  Joined up the spine. Put away

  They fold until they kiss each other,

  But put out, they look across the room.

  My brother and myself. He is flushed and pouting

  With heart, and standing square,

  I, already white-browed and balding,

  Float there, it seems, and look away.

  You could look at us and say I was the one of air,

  And he the brother of earth

  Who, in Christmas-time, fell to his death.

  Fancy, yes; but if you’d seen him in his life

  There’d be his bright blond hair, and that flush,

  And the mouth always slightly open, and the strength

  Of body: those muscles! swelled up with the hard hand-springs at night

  Certainly, but strong. I, on the other hand

  Was remote, cross, and disengaged, a proper

  Bastard to my brother, who enjoyed things,

  Until he was able to defend himself. It’s June;

  Everything’s come out in flush and white,

  In ruff and sun, and tall green shoots

  Hard with their sap. He’s ashes

  Like this cigarette I smoke into grey dryness.

  I notice outside my window a tree of blossom,

  Cherries, I think, one branch bending heavy

  Into the grey road to its no advantage.

  The hard stone scrapes the petals off,

  And the dust enters the flower into its peak.

  It is so heavy with flowers it bruises itself:

  It has tripped, you might say, and fallen,

  Cannot get up, so heavy with dust.

  The air plays with it, and plays small-chess with the dust.

  THE ARCHAEOLOGIST

  So I take one of those thin plates

  And fit it to a knuckled other,

  Carefully, for it trembles on the edge of powder,

  Restore the jaw and find the fangs their mates.

  The thorny tree of which this is the gourd,

  Outlasting centuries of grit and water,

  Re-engineered by me, stands over there,

  Stocky, peeling, crouched and dangling-pawed.

  I roll the warm wax within my palm

  And to the bone slowly mould a face

  Of the jutting-jawed, hang-browed race;

  On the brute strength I try to build up a calm,

  For it is a woman, by the broad hips;

  I give her a smooth skin, and make the mouth mild:

  It is aeons since she saw her child

  Spinning thin winds of gossamer from his lips.

  THE PLAY

  (A Buffo Dialogue for reading aloud: Two Old Gentlemen)

  A: I don’t want to play

  B: But we want you

  A: I don’t want to play

  B: You must play too

  A: I’m not going to play for you

  You play too rough, I’m not tough enough

  B: (A red silk mantel with fur below)

  A: I’d rather not

  B: Why is that so?

  A: I need something to do

  But I’m not a fool

  I don’t want to play

  No, not today

  No, not with you

  B: But there’s this fur: these red silk gowns

  The hat, the beard, and the buskins

  A: Will I have a wig: will I have a wig?

  B: Oh yes, that too: oh yes, that too

  A: And a pink silk handkerchief with thin green squares

  To flourish in their faces and clean me ears

  B: That too oh dear me yes: you must have that too

  A: And pantaloons with cherry-bobbled tops

  A big fat pipe and a frilly stock

  B: Yes of course you can have that too

  You can have these decorations put on you

  A: What do I do?

  B: You have to die.

  A: I have to die?

  No, really, surely, that’s not a fact.

  Do I die too soon or in a late act?

  B: In the last act.

  A: Is that a fact?

  B: You have to die; for most of the play

  You just stand around making puffing noises

  Waddle on, get lost, or out of the way.

  A: Until the last act.

  B: Yes, and then in a loud voice

  You have to die in a loud voice

  Gigantic enough to deafen us

  Terrific enough to panic the audience

  And bob them and sway them like the cherries dance

  A: O that’s all right that’s all right

  B: I want to hear your soul race

  In the forefront of that voice

  I want it to start with a physical push

  And end with a seagulled hush

  On the shore of that land where your forefathers are

  And I want the whole company to weep when they hear

  A: I can do that I can do that;

  How do I die then, now tell me that.

  B: With a sword, a height,

  A mad dog’s bite,

  Poison, razor,

  And you choke on a fruit.

  A: That will make a noise, a noise

  To bring the house down

  B: It’ll bring the house down

  And that’ll kill you too

  And you’ll shout at that

  A: Then there’ll be a fire and a rushing wind

  B: And that’ll kill you too

  And you’ll shout at that

  A: Then the gas-mains will explode

  B: And that’ll shout you wide

  And the winds will come again half-solid with snow

  And the firemen’ll be unable to get anywhere near you

  For you’ll burn in the winds and shout with the snow

  With the gilt and the gore and the toppling gods

  And the plush and the pipes and the pattering plaster

  And the fire and the wind and the wind and the fire

  All shouting

  All shouting

  And the greasy smoke rising higher and higher

  And the arch will crash and kill you again

  And hard fire will come and kill you again

  And the wind sneaping round half-solid with snow

  And the firemen trying to grab at you

  No one could suffer as hard as you do

  No one could last as long as you will

  No one could shout as you would

  And the voice and the voice

  And the voice and the voice

  What do you say, eigh? what do you say
?

  A: When can I start: give me my part.

  B: Here is your part

  A: Is that my part? now watch my art

  As I die as I scream as I die for my art.

  WITHOUT EYES

  Today, to begin with, she will do without eyes.

  Staring at the speckled ruby eyelids make of the sunny window

  Now she tries the world with her eyelids closed;

  Pulls the length of her body out of the rasp of sheets

  Into her self-made night-time; delicately shuffles her way along the hairy carpet

  To the cool rim she traces round with a finger.

  Heaves the heavy bulging of the water-jug, tilts

  And lets it grow lighter,

  The tinkling in the bowl wax to a deep water-sound.

  Sluices her bunched face with close hands, finds natural grease,

  With clinking nails scrabbles for the body of the sprawling soap,

  Rubs up the fine jumping lather that grips like a mask, floods it off,

  Solving the dingy tallow.

  Bloods and plumps her cheeks in the springy towel, a rolling variable darkness

  Dimpling the feminine fat-pockets under the deep coombs of bone

  And the firm sheathed jellies above that make silent lightning in their bulbs.

  Moves to her clothes – a carpet-edge snatches her toe

  Plucking the tacks sharply like flower-stalks from the boards but

  Leaves her smirking in darkness. Dresses:

  Cupped hands grip. The bridge chafes quickly over the thighs

  And closes on the saddled groin,

  Her silk dress thunders over her head and on to the flounced opening

  Into quiet

  And her eyes clip open on the ardent oblivion of her resolution and

  The streets and clouds from her high window, swimming and dazzled, rush in.

  PICKING MUSHROOMS

  A: What are you doing?

  B: The usual; it’s the season; picking mushrooms.

  A: Boletus omelette and tummyache this year?

  B: Or young white puffball, grilled in butter.

  A: Let’s see what you’ve got. Yes, I thought so: boleti.

  B: It’s a hell of a mess; this one is broken

  And this and this; they’re more brittle than usual;

  And stubbier too; you can’t see where they are;

  I’m too late on the scene; the caps are sticky;

  They get leaf-clotted; like tar and feathers;

  You have to hunt them like birds and creep up softly

  Not clump hamfooted and squash them down –

  Look at your footprints

  A: Whoops – I’m sorry.

  B: I coveted that clump for my moss-lined basket.

  A: Here’s one!

  B: Lawyer’s wig – it drools to an ink.

  A: What’s that white one, through the trees,

  By the big tree, on the leaf-drift?

  B: Lepiota! The parasol mushroom –

  Shoots three feet up on a warm wet night,

  Tabbed with shaggy leather-coloured scales;

  They wash off in a torrent of rain;

  It stands in the rain like a tiny ghost

  Quite white, arms outstretched;

  But those are seldom the best.

  They’re slightly luminous too.

  This is a fine one, just three feet high!

  If it gets any bigger it’s riddled with worms.

  Wonderful with cheese in a casserole.

  Right sir, I’ll have you!

  A: Great flabby thing with no roots at all;

  It overflows your basket; the cap’s cracked across.

  Will it last home?

  B: Young and fresh it keeps two days.

  Tomorrow and Sunday: good as a roast.

  Those shallow roots you despise so much

  Run back to where I was stooping

  Only ankle-deep in leaves, trifling for boleti.

  That fuzz, white threads in the stem-crater

  Feeds deep in the leaf-mush and wraps tree-roots,

  Rests on rocks, riddles the sub-soil.

  This is the sex, the parasol,

  Just like your own, it has deep roots,

  And makes as much seed. Billions of beings

  Fly from the cap and may take root

  Or again may not. You can’t stop them breeding;

  Burn down the forest: spores would rise up

  And flurry for miles on the first gust of hot air.

  A: Give me your stick. Crisp on top,

  Sour underneath; they go a long way, like spider-web;

  No rustling down here; it thicks up like fog;

  Steams a bit too, from the tamped-down layers;

  Soaked paper, stuck matwise;

  Legs, angled breastplates, eliding from light, glimpsed;

  Ringed, pointed, greasy and quick;

  Thin red wands, ragged with limbs;

  Slithering flow; adorable creatures!

  Whew! what a smell; you shouldn’t jump like that—

  Only a click-back skipping; if you want to be

  A mighty fungus-hunter … don’t look like that

  B: Put it back quick. There’s a baby there.

  A: God no. Stay here, I’ll get a doctor—

  No, police. Put back the flap. Don’t stir;

  Don’t stir it about… I’ll be back.

  B: Was it the woman or the man

  Chose the tenderest, deepest, most shaded from wind

  ‘Lie still here’ until I arrived

  Licking my chops, eyes licking the ground.

  What tiny ribs. A hairpin of a jaw.

  Soft in the leaves, shrunk to the bones,

  Itch of the wet and leaf-stench sent

  The small ghost out for another body,

  A monstrous sex which I would have nibbled

  For my palate’s sake, with red wine and pepper.

  ‘Lie here baby’ but he wouldn’t stay still:

  The bad baby signed to my friend through the trees.

  They’ll be punished, and I am sick to my stomach;

  Sick of abounding life and a flowing palate;

  The red beetle kneels, and gobbles my progeny.

  III

  THE NATURE OF COLD WEATHER

  (1961)

  FOR NO GOOD REASON

  I walk on the waste-ground for no good reason

  Except that fallen stones and cracks

  Bulging with weed suit my mood

  Which is gloomy, irascible, selfish, among the split timbers

  Of somebody’s home, and the bleached rags of wallpaper.

  My trouser-legs pied with water-drops,

  I knock a sparkling rain from hemlock-polls,

  I crash a puddle up my shin,

  Brush a nettle across my hand,

  And swear – then sweat from what I said:

  Indeed, the sun withdraws as if I stung.

  Indeed, she withdrew as if I stung,

  And I walk up and down among these canted beams, bricks and scraps,

  Bitten walls and weed-stuffed gaps

  Looking as it would feel now, if I walked back,

  Across the carpets of my home, my own home.

  GHOSTS

  The terrace is said to be haunted.

  By whom or what nobody knows; someone

  Put away under the vines behind dusty glass

  And rusty hinges staining the white-framed door

  Like a nosebleed, locked; or a death in the pond

  In three feet of water, a courageous breath?

  It’s haunted anyway, so nobody mends it

  And the paving lies loose for the ants to crawl through

  Weaving and clutching like animated thorns.

  We walk on to it,

  Like the bold lovers we are, ten years of marriage,

  Tempting the ghosts out with our high spirits,

  Footsteps doubled by the silence


  … and start up like ghosts ourselves

  Flawed lank and drawn in the greenhouse glass:

  She turns from that, and I sit down,

  She tosses the dust with the toe of a shoe,

  Sits on the pond’s parapet and takes a swift look

  At her shaking face in the clogged water,

  Weeds in her hair; rises quickly and looks at me.

  I shrug, and turn my palms out, begin

  To feel the damp in my bones as I lever up

  And step toward her with my hints of wrinkles,

  Crows-feet and shadows. We leave arm in arm

  Not a word said. The terrace is haunted,

  Like many places with rough mirrors now,

  By estrangement, if the daylight’s strong.

  THE STRONGHOLD

  We had a fine place to come –

  Into the keep of the old oak,

  The frill of leaves to challenge through,

  The tower-room in the old trunk,

  The knot-holes, loops and battlements,

  And the chinks wedged open with sunlight,

  The fine soft shavings of decay

  To putter in, run through our toes.

  We were the breathing of the wood,

  Its tender core, the faces, watchers, guardians,

  Bare and bony-cold in winter,

  Warm and odorous in summer

  And in the autumn rustling in our leaves.

  That is all gone now; by haunting

  I learn that oak-tree strongholds are out of fashion

  And I grow too big to squeeze inside:

  The shadow of my head cuts off the light

  And I peer into unrelieved and cramping gloom.

  The sun breaks in hiding darting shadows outside

  And smooth children’s faces form among the rough tree-barks.

  MISTS

  They do not need the moon for ghostliness

  These mists jostling the boles,

  These boy-wraiths and ogre-fumes

  That hollow to a breasting walk;

  They are harmless enough in all conscience,

  Wetting eyelashes and growing moulds,

  And do not speak at all, unless their walking flood

  Is a kind of languid speech. Like ghosts

  Dawn filches them for dews.

  They wink at me from grasses pushed aside

  And impart a high polish to my shoes

  That dry in dullness, milky, sloven leather,

  From walking in ghostways where tall mists grope.

  TWO POEMS

  I SPRING

 

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