In the plane, returning from the toilet to my place
In the plane, returning from the toilet to my place,
I realise I haven’t got my boarding pass.
Evidently I’d left it in the file, replete
With a mass of superfluous papers, at my seat.
Only where is my seat? Should I raise the matter in the press?
Notify the president? The stewardess?
But she couldn’t help, insofar as she will seat me
Where there’s a seat, a seat free,
And that won’t diminish my sense of loss. I’d like to be back in place.
Not because it was more comfortable there, kicking off my shoes,
But because what one measures one’s manliness by
Is the power over things that vanish and other kinds of devilry.
I don’t remember what was there. No doubt a line
Of crumpled seats, warmth, and hips in a vice.
Maybe an infant crying. Maybe the peaceful rug folds
Over my neighbour’s knees, to the left. An Israeli
newspaper in my neighbour’s hold,
To the right. Bubbles in the glass of coke
That didn’t wait for me, Archimedes to provoke.
Translated by Daniel Weissbort
Page(s) 276
magazine list
- Features
- zines
- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
- Blithe Spirit
- Borderlines
- Brando's hat
- Brittle Star
- Candelabrum
- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
- Coffee House, The
- Dream Catcher
- Equinox
- Erbacce
- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
- Homeless Diamonds
- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The