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

I queue
waiting to buy
crusty mixed-seed harvest-bread.

I watch the shop girls
behind the glass counter
who pick out
scones, meringues, carrot cake,
cherry slices, little jam tarts,
cream puffs
all kinds of dainty
sugary
creamy nibbles.

These girls are so young
I think
between 15 and 19
they seem like an alien species
creatures magically animated from
pre-raphaelite paintings
such china-boned yet
blushing-rosey faces,
such fine gold limbs.
They move serenely
in the hot-bread shop interior
with dewy cheeks
perfumed, I suppose
with sugar and spice
all so very nice.

Watching them
I remember myself
that age
with a pang
I did not have
soft eyes
curved cheeks
full lips
I
scuttled crab-wise
a bitter crab-apple old woman
emaciated
brittle-boned
all my blossom
dried out, the youth
stripped from my skeleton
like shreds of fish
consumed.
My hair fell out in clumps
when I brushed it,
my once glossy, thick
flame-red (‘Ginger’) hair
the hair which had been the source
of unceasing taunts
the hair which I told my grandmother
at the age of eight
I would gladly swap
for her grey perm,
(‘I wish I had your hair’ she’d purred
‘I wish I had yours!’ I cried
‘I’d like to chop all mine off and wear a
                                                           wig...’)
I granted my own wish
my hair fell out
my flesh fell away
I did it to myself
because I wasn’t enough
like the beautiful nymphs at school
the sleek-limbed
milk and honey
nubile
golden girls
who made my life
hell
called me a ‘dog’
and ‘Ginger’ with a hard g, like nigger,
“Is your minge ginger too?”
they’d screech
with beautiful mouths
ugly voices.

I look at the shop-girls
it seems a long time ago
but their casual glances
still make me wince.

I have to remind myself
that Ginger
is pungent and refreshing
neither sweet nor savoury,
hot,
and that ginger biscuits
don’t melt
soft and sugary
like pink sponge and marzipan and meringue
but are
tough to eat
break teeth.