Issue 6: January 2004

Paul Batchelor | Zoë Brigley | Olivia Cole | Sasha Dugdale | Anna Woodford

SASHA DUGDALE

On Metaphors

The fishing metaphor, that conceit for hooking lovers,
Tugging them out of the great wash of their lives
With a silvery pin fastened through their eyes,
Seemed as ill-used and empty as the others —

Bringing them up, till bursting into endless air
They twitch and thrust with terror in your hand —
Beached and hopeless, a hundred miles from land.
Tight you hold them and begin to tear

The little anchor free from one great eye
And let them drop to flex and gasp it out.
By their markings they belong to sky

Not sea. But we will claim our catch for food:
Devour them whilst they lie quite still and pout,
Dressed and delicate. Yes, this metaphor tastes good.

Lipstick

Bought this lipstick today —
And she says to me straight off:
You look like the whore of Babylon
Pouting like that. Only one thing
God gave you lips for, love —
She says to me.

It's in a tiny gold shellcase
Tipped like a missile
And ruby, raspberry, russet
Rolled into one. She says:
Wipe that stuff off you,
Slut that you are.

I traced it around my mouth
In the mirror. Coloured in —
God, it's beautiful.
It makes me cry like that.
I stand and look one minute
Then wipe it off on my sleeve.

I come back out and look at her.
She says, is that blood on you?
What's that gash over your cheeks?
I say to her: that's my mouth.
There's only one thing
It's good for.

She's tutting away to herself.
What's got into me, she thinks
What went wrong?
On days like that I stay away,
Sleep, sit on the toilet,
Pinch myself till the bruises come.

Then I'm back. Can't keep me down
For long. I'll wear the lipstick.
My lips, I say
I DO WHAT I WANT WITH THEM.
But she's gone. She's taken off.
It's like she never was.

Illuminated

Many centuries later, Scribe A is judged boring, sober
For his measured calligrapher's crawl.

Scribe B colours and races, undaunted and resourceful:
Lines for peacocks and wolves to prowl.

God, if only we knew how Scribe A was tormented by passions,
Unholy, indiscreet. How his hands trembled before him,
His faith wavered inside him, his appetite hardened unbidden.
He paces the lines like a sentry, chastising the spirit with quill-wound —
Guiltily wishing the writing done.

Scribe B was careless, inspired, knew nothing of A's feelings,
Or how A followed his quick wrist over the vellum.
Scribe A is brought to a fever —
An incident out on the sea shore, when B, naked, plunged in.
A holds tight to his plummeting mind.
Only Godless resignation, the pricking of self-mutilation
Will drive him on through his task.

Lord, the words stand before us — even, unbroken, joyless:
Scribe A controls, overcomes.

Yet B they will likely remember — catlike, surefooted and feathered:
The incorruptible predator of A's heart.

These poems are included in Sasha Dugdale's first collection, Notebook (Carcanet, 2003)

As translator:
Life Without, the selected poetry & prose of Tatiana Shcherbina (Bloodaxe, 2003)
Black Milk, Vassily Sigarev (Nick Hern Books, 2003)
Plasticine, Vassily Sigarev (Nick Hern Books, 2002)