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

5.15 p.m. Fifteen minutes to go. The telephone rings and I pick it up, thinking it will be someone wanting to order petrol. It's Mary. She asks if I'm going to the reading. Yes, I say, wondering why she's contacted me less than a week after we'd decided not to see each other again. But I want her there so make arrangements to collect her about 8.

   Two hours later. Stan Getz playing Hershey Bar on the radio. I'm humming along with him. Don't know why I feel excited when I'm reading. Not nerves. I just like the atmosphere. Travelling, drinking, meeting people I know. Frank and his wife arrive and I climb into their car. We call for Mary. I ask Frank to go to the house for her. Why? Maybe to rub it in a bit more that she didn't want to see me on Saturday and now I'm not bothered if she comes or not. She gets into the car and gives me a quick glance. I feel good that she's there. Crazy.  Nothing can come of it. I'm married. She's flying to the States in a couple of months to finalise marriage plans with some guy in New York. But we still keep seeing each other.

   It takes half-an-hour to get to Blackburn. Another fifteen minutes to find the place. We pass a fairground in full swing. Screw poetry, I  say, let's go on the fair. But Frank's more interested in poetry. He needs it. Forty-five, virtually unpublished, a little afraid that if he doesn't make it soon he never will. We reach the pub. Tony is sitting at the bar, his guitar propped beside him. Order drinks. Into the room. Tina's reading. That limpid voice I've always found so attractive.

   When she's finished I walk over to her and Dave. Say hello. It's three, four years, maybe longer, since we last met, though we've written, sent each other pamphlets and magazines, said things in reviews. I ask Tina if Tony can play, mention that two or three of us would like to read. She doesn't know, things are tight. Too many folksingers taking up too much time.

   After the interval. Tina tells me I'm reading next, then Tony's on. She doesn't mention Frank. He's disappointed, I can tell, maybe a little hurt, and makes derogatory remarks about the folksingers. I feel a bit embarrassed. I read, fooling around, digging for laughs because most of the audience are young, art-student types, more interested in pop music and gossip. I try a political poem but the reference to Engels and Tussy Marx fall on deaf ears. I'm uncomfortable, sitting on a high stool, can tell that the audience isn't with me. So I cut it short. They clap, politely.

   It goes on. Tony plays. Then some screwball imitating Bob Dylan. He's awful. Noisy, his words a meaningless jumble. Frank and his wife walk out of the room, come back a few minutes later to say they're leaving. I look at the clock. Time for another drink. No, they have to go. I shrug. Tony says he'll run us home. See you Frank, next week, I'll phone you.

   We leave just before 11, swing down the street. The lights of the fair are still on and we park but when we walk around they're closing down. A couple of policemen are shepherding everyone away. The hot-dog stand in darkness. Dodgem cars tipped on their sides, covers over them. We head back to the car, start for Preston.

   Half way and we decide we want coffee. No cafes open this time of night. Pull onto the motorway, the service area ten miles down at Charnock Richard. All right, if it doesn't take too long, Mary says. Coffees all round. Tony eating doughnuts. We sit, talking about the piped music, its nostalgic qualities. Watching the people straggle in. What the hell are they all doing here, this time of night? Be funny if they were all restless poets and musicians.

   Mary stares at the waitress, a dowdy girl listlessly shuffling trays. She guesses that the girl's from a farm nearby and can't get a job anywhere else so has to do badly-paid work like this. Tony and myself laugh. Crap, she's from Liverpool or Manchester. Probably been shacking up with a truck-driver and drifted into this job to raise some money to get her to London. The end of the line for all drifters. Cynical bastards, Mary says, and as the girl moves past us she calls her over. Do you live around here, Mary asks, and I grin into my coffee, my usual amazement at her naivete taking over. Can never figure her out. Has spent the last few years wandering - Liverpool, London, Dublin, Tel-Aviv, Istanbul, other places. Lots of jobs. Various affairs. And yet comes on so corny at times. Still, the girl has responded and is telling Mary her story. She's from Adlington, a small place a few miles away. But doesn't live on a farm.

   The manageress beckons to the girl, orders her to clear some tables. Tony goes for more coffees. I argue with Mary, telling her she's playing at sociology, what the hell does she know about ordinary working people, she's spent her life drifting in and out of colleges or with a bunch of bohemians. Tony brings the coffees and as he leans over to put the cups on the table I can't resist saying to him. Excuse me, do you live around here? He picks it up at once and replies. Oh yes. On a farm? I ask. Mary takes a deep breath and glares at me. Oh Christ, I think, you've done it again. End of night or more likely end of affair when she tells me later that we've nothing in common.

   We leave the cafe. Head along the motorway again. Birmingham 104. Tony driving with that relaxed, easy style he has. I'm curled up in the back with Mary. Birmingham 98. Shouldn't we be heading away from Birmingham? Hell, we came off the service-area the wrong way. Nothing to do but drive on until the next turn-off. It's near Wigan. We eventually reach it. Might as well call on my sister, Tony says. It seems like a good idea. But he knocks and there's no answer and he finally decides it's not worth bothering anymore. Heading back to Preston. Streets and roads virtually empty now, apart from police patrol cars. Who else rides around early hours Thursday morning?

   Near Preston. Back to my place, Tony suggests. Ok, I say. Mary says nothing, not knowing where Tony lives, thinking it's probably in Preston. We get there (ten miles north of Preston). Walk into the house. Records, books, toys littered around. Tony's wife is in hospital, the kids staying with relatives. He makes some hot, sweet tea, we sit, drinking it, listening to records. 3am. I'm beginning to feel jaded. Pick up a book of poems. It seems unreal, people writing all those words. But I do it myself.

   Tony goes to bed. I spread the sleeping-bag on the floor. Use a cushion off the chair for a pillow. Undress. It isn't easy to settle. Mary opens her eyes everytime I turn. She's worried. Suddenly she wants to get a taxi home. I haven't enough money, I say, relax, Tony'll run us into town when he goes to work in the morning. It'll be too late, she replies, my parents will wonder where I am. Oh hell, you're a big girl, I tell her, damn your parents. I'll have to telephone my father, she insists. Ok, I say, turning over and she gets up and rummages around. But doesn't move towards the door even when she's got her coat on.

   The light's coming through the curtains around 6 and she persuades me to leave and see if there's an early bus. The morning dampness catches at my chest. We're lucky, the first bus comes a few minutes after we reach the stop. It jerks through the fog. Mary is asleep with the movement. The people getting on and off, obviously all regulars on this route, look at us out of the corners of their eyes.

   Into Preston. Bus station just beginning to come alive. Another bus to catch. It's half-full, the 7.30 starters travelling down to the factory it passes. I used to work there and get one or two curious looks and nods from men I vaguely know.

   Fifteen minutes later. Well, all I can say is that I'll see you around, I remark, and Mary smiles, nervous now we're nearing the part of town where we live. I kiss her and get off the bus. She has a little further to go and as the bus pulls away she waves. Walking through the Estate, unshaven, pale from drink and lack of sleep. I have to be at work in less than two hours. People are drifting towards the bus-stop. They say Good morning, clearly wondering why I'm only just heading home at that time. Shave, wash, change. Coffee and toast. I can't face the fried breakfast I usually have.

   9.15am. Fifteen minutes of the working-day gone. The voices in the room are oddly distant. The heavy heat from the pipes washes over me. For some reason I'm thinking about the discussion I took part in on a local radio station a few nights ago. The interviewer wanted to know what the practical purposes of poetry readings are and I said they give people an opportunity to see and meet poets, find out they're just ordinary and have the same concerns and problems. The telephone rings and I pick it up, thinking it will be someone wanting to order petrol. It's Mary.