Poetry Magazines - The best collection of poetry magazines online - Simon Armitage

1 Adult Pain

Let me feel the pain
as I walk
if I must feel at all,
but don't let me grow
my mother's face.
Let it feel like karate
chops to the throat,
chest, gut & bowel.
Let it knock me down now.
Let it hail on the plains
of my skin.
Let it freeze over
but let the wind change.
Don't let me look
like my mother
& the pain grow
into my face.
It's long slow haul,
topographic, weathered,
face like a map
for the world to trample on.
I rush home to a mirror
looking for signs.
I want my own set of lines.
But already her hands
that have grown
on my body,
are drying up
& twisting
into knots.
They were always too frail
for factory work.
Now it appears that the sun
has gotten to them.
I don't mind
weather worn people.
Just don't want to look
like poverty.
Don't want it
to show on my skin.
Don't want to walk
around
as an advertisement
for pain.
Don't want to look like her.
But I have inherited
how to live & what to feel.
Pain so strong
I can hardly stand upright.
Even in the sun
I bend like a tree.
Hold onto skin
as tough as wood.
Didn't know emotional pain
could be so physical.
Didn't know
it could stop you
from walking in a park.

2 Infant Scar

she twists up around the mouth, if the pain
could be released, this is where it would come
out, the wrinkles are lines of strain, holding it
in, sometimes during sleep, it is emitted, in
little pup groans, deep below an earthy frown,
as if it was my first blood, mum said, 'you are
getting your first lines', 'but where?', 'a frown
mark, right between the eyes, you should try
to frown less', but she is wrong, the line was
created from an accident, when i was eight,
involving my drunken father, after the
stitches, nan coming through the frontdoor &
me standing there, with my tennis racket,
every time i picked up that tennis racket, i
felt like i had hit myself in the face with it,
when cross-eyed, i could see the black
stitches, gathering up the lump of skin, into
its big infant scar, i heard nan say, 'no', i felt
the weakness in her knees, beneath her
pleated skirt, a momentary tremble in her
heart, i will admit to liking the attention, i
pretended to be sick as well & got the
measles, but for nan something had been
ruined, she should have stepped in sooner
than this, then mum bought me an iceblock &
a basket ball, at school i was called into the
deputy principal's office, when he asked me
what happened, i said, 'i fell over', he didn't
believe me, but he couldn'tget a thing out of
me, i sealed my lips, the house, my heart, i
forgot, the little blinds pulled down, closing
my self blame in, even when the kids watched
me, bounce the basket ball against the brick,
waiting for me to pass it to them, i could
sense they were wary & didn't like me, they
saw me behind my infant scar & i saw them
through it, mum had told me what to say,
now from looking at it you will be able to tell,
i have been injured, somewhere inside, that
broken piece stored in a cupboard, this is the
line that separates us, it is not a wrinkle
setting in, mum's face sinks into the cotton
pillow slip, at night her lines rest themselves,
the sheets collapse down over her bones, she
is deeply asleep & the pain is working inside
her, like fingernails grown longer in the
morning, it's not natural aging