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Shearsman 56 |
Peter Redgrove
Moth and Motor-car |
Moths rolling over and over
in the car lights,
the beams and rafters of light,
Their widening rooms
wedged open. The goldstone
of the moths' eyes flashing.
We stood under a gigantic hedgerow,
moths lying on the sheet
like broken yachts.
Her breath took frosty forms
like moths. She released
a potion from her cunt
As a moth might ooze its balsam
and fan it with its wings,
her dress started this,
The night moths wished to gather
on its flowers. I was penetrated
by this balsam of hers
And by the balsam of the moths sticking
to the white sheet with their
excited juice, I could not tell
Moth from lover, it was all natural.
We had laid the old double sheet
down on the grass
In front of the blazing headlights,
we had laid it down
like a gigantic marriage-ghost,
We smoothed out the creases that
cast their shadows, and fastened
the hems down with white stones.
The rest, it happened of itself,
each moth a small lamp fuelled with sperm-oil,
as the sheet darkened
With its night-progeny
seeking to create a dress like hers,
wide on, a nightdress statement,
The sheet an imaging mirror,
a linen mirror like a bride bed,
moth neckline, moth buttons,
Moths patterning a one great moth,
we felt our skins darkening
not just with what we saw
But what was seen
through the lighted
balsams, human and non-human,
Answering each other.
Copyright © the estate of Peter Redgrove, 2003
| Peter
Redgrove was
born in 1932 and lived in Cornwall from the mid-1960s. One of the
most consistently remarkable English poets
of the post-war period, he was the author of over thirty verse collections
and ten works of fiction, as well as plays and works of non-fiction.
His collections include Selected
Poems (Cape, London, 1999). and
From the Virgil Caverns (Cape,
2002). He died on 16 June 2003. A posthumous collection Sheen (166pp, £10)
appears from Stride in October 2003, and a tribute volume, Full
of Stars Dreaming (54pp, £5.95)
appears from the same publisher in October 2003. Both books can be
ordered, post-free, from the publisher at 11 Sylvan Road, Exeter
EX4 6EW. |
