Victor Tapner
Marie and Odile, July 1939
I love the way Odile wears her hat,
the way she strikes the match
holding the very end
so you think it’ll break
as she goes to light a cigarette,
her Claudette Colbert hands,
the watch fastened
high on her wrist
like the couturière
last summer in Berlin,
how, when she orders
an apple pastry
it stays uneaten on the dish,
her fork resting
under a tiny piece
as though she’s about to take a bite
but you wonder
if she ever will,
her skin as clear as Dietrich’s
and that tuck of hair
behind her ear
as she reaches forward
and the match flares
and I catch her
in the tea-dance mirror.
Victor Tapner's poems have been published widely in magazines and anthologies, including Bloodaxe's The Honey Gatherers. He won the Academi Cardiff international poetry competition in 2000.He lives in Essex and works in London as a journalist.
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