Maria K Jastrzebska
Pat
who let me copy her in chemistry
with whom I talked endlessly
about how stupid adults are,
the beauty of stars and did God exist,
who let me rest my head in her lap
and stroked my hair all the way home
on the coach, after a school trip
and chose me out of everyone
to confide in
There wasn't anyone else she could tell,
she said, not her parents obviously
and she was scared the other girls
would only think she was a slut
She was having sex
with a forty-year-old man
His wife was ever so nice
and the kids were mad about her
It all started when he took her
and the children sailing
When the wind blew hardest
it chafed your hands, but she held on
He was very skilled, she said
he knew exactly what to do
She was fifteen
and out of her depth in love
Pat also said
if there was one thing
which put her off
it was the idea of lesbians
she said if she ever met one
who tried it on she'd kill her
This is dedicated to Pat
who moved her desk
so she could sit next to me
All that year I was in trouble
for talking instead of working
Pat to whom I never told
my secret
Page(s) 18-19
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