The undertaker's assistant puts her finger
to the tip of a tilted coffin
to guide the inexperienced pallbearers.
She stands at the ready in black livery,
perky buttocks in clinging trousers,
jacket pushed out by cocky breasts.
But what makes me stare is that black ribbon
looped around her saucy pigtail.
Published, 2002, in ROPES (Review of Postgraduate Studies), Issue 10, NUI Galway. (ROPES does not have its own website).
Showing posts with label Year 2002. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Year 2002. Show all posts
Saturday, October 13, 2007
The calf-man
Three or four times a year a van drove into the yard,
the calf-man climbed out and unlocked the doors
to show to my father, who feigned scepticism,
two or three calves, blinking, lying in straw;
they gawped from the dark of the calf-smelling van;
the calf-man poked them with his stick to get them up.
My father's resistance always unravelled in the end
and the two men prodded a gangly calf to a shed;
then the calf-man came into the kitchen to be paid
towering, reeking of cattle, his dung-stained coat
buttoned tight, his cap scarcely covering his great skull.
He refused tea while my father wrote out the cheque;
they argued a little over the luck money
before he left, the van moving up the hill
past the elm trees, to try his chances in Malone's
and only then, if he thought he had got a bargain
would my father look at us and grin shyly
while outside the calf lifted her head and bellowed loss.
Published, 2002, in The Rialto, Issue 51.
the calf-man climbed out and unlocked the doors
to show to my father, who feigned scepticism,
two or three calves, blinking, lying in straw;
they gawped from the dark of the calf-smelling van;
the calf-man poked them with his stick to get them up.
My father's resistance always unravelled in the end
and the two men prodded a gangly calf to a shed;
then the calf-man came into the kitchen to be paid
towering, reeking of cattle, his dung-stained coat
buttoned tight, his cap scarcely covering his great skull.
He refused tea while my father wrote out the cheque;
they argued a little over the luck money
before he left, the van moving up the hill
past the elm trees, to try his chances in Malone's
and only then, if he thought he had got a bargain
would my father look at us and grin shyly
while outside the calf lifted her head and bellowed loss.
Published, 2002, in The Rialto, Issue 51.
Last dance
A knot loosening in his brain
has closed the book of expectation.
He shuffles for miles in purple tracksuit bottoms,
mumbles the thing again and again.
What comes out of his mouth defies meaning
what matter now are words already spoken.
The suits have gone to the charity shop
but for one that will do later.
The job was good, they let her keep his car
it sits in the driveway looking big.
He dines on scrambled eggs and meat cut up small,
the same for her, she can't be bothered.
The bedroom-slipper shimmy the nightly dance
she catches him on the street trotting home to mother
and partners him back to the room
the smell of cigarettes and disinfectant.
While she sleeps he shuttles between lock and lock
muttering the thing is, some step to be taken, but what?
Published, 2002, in The Interpreter's House, Issue 20.
has closed the book of expectation.
He shuffles for miles in purple tracksuit bottoms,
mumbles the thing again and again.
What comes out of his mouth defies meaning
what matter now are words already spoken.
The suits have gone to the charity shop
but for one that will do later.
The job was good, they let her keep his car
it sits in the driveway looking big.
He dines on scrambled eggs and meat cut up small,
the same for her, she can't be bothered.
The bedroom-slipper shimmy the nightly dance
she catches him on the street trotting home to mother
and partners him back to the room
the smell of cigarettes and disinfectant.
While she sleeps he shuttles between lock and lock
muttering the thing is, some step to be taken, but what?
Published, 2002, in The Interpreter's House, Issue 20.
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