Poems

 

For Kathleen

 

Last night I dreamed of you again:

our new teacher, at the Girls’ Grammar School.

We called you Wurzel, with your legs

like sticks, old brown suede shoes and love of green;

your red-knuckled, goalkeeper’s hands,

veins always up, big, square nails yellow-stained.

We all hated French and Spanish

and groaned as you’d vortex into the room,

singing and opening windows,

then start on the next chapter of your life

or discuss the death of Lorca,

your love of Camus, or the Dreyfus trial.

It was Julie who told the Head

That you would go into the book cupboard

Each double lesson for a fag.

When your nerves stretched tight over the classroom

Like humming electric cables

Above a field of cows, I was afraid.

I met someone like you last night.

She got excited, we became her friends

but her guard went right up then,

especially with the men. You were the first

grown-up to ask for my advice -

I knew what adultery meant, all right.

I prattled on about my Dad,

The rows at home, the drink. It seemed to help.

( We’d gone to hear Neruda speak.)

In the dream last night, when you were vital,

Fiery again, at the end,

Just as I woke, I thought perhaps

You’d died – and is this now too late to send?

Once in Minnesota                                                                   

 Ten times a week  the single man’s boast

Or the adulterer’s weary quota.

Five times a week still enjoyed by those

Whose marriages may be counted in

Days.

Twice a week appears to be the norm:

The average answer

Of average men, whose women

Disagree.

Once a week  their complaint

Or the honest admission of the Saturday Night

Martyr. It pays for shoes.

Mind your own business the response of those

Too embarrassed, too perverse, too forgetful

Or too busily employed

In the sport itself

To answer Sociological questionnaires.

We thought

Our passion’s play would never close.

Still.

At least, now, we can never end like the one who wrote:

Once. In Minnesota.