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Poetry Library Southbank Centre - The Poetry Library housing the Arts Council Collection at Southbank Centre

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Gill Learner

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Comprehension Test

There was the clouded eye of the Friday fish, slatted seats
on trains, basins for breakfast drinks, and no flat bread.
The limestone Lycée swallowed us, stored us in cells,
bounced back our laughter down its corridors, sighed
from its drains at Midland vowels.

I looked up to the haughty on a catwalk, down on strollers
in the Bois from a fiacre which cost several thousand francs,
each sou a seedling dibbled from a tray and pressed
into a pot. With heels in holes from unfamiliar shoes,
the Champs Elysées saw me slipper-shod.

I learned to breathe garlic-Gauloise air, and the twist and flick
of table ‘foot’ from Rob of Loughorough. Tipsy on the scent
of coloured light in Notre Dame, I lost my girl’s-school heart
to Alistair who bought me grenadine. Even the crossing from Dieppe
couldn’t dim my longing to return.

Now there are different mysteries: blind-bend overtaking,
whether to retain the knife and fork, when does Bonjour
become Bonsoir, the favoured way of administering drugs,
graves like greenhouses, church clocks that double-chime
and how many kisses.

Page(s) 32

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