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

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

« Previous item
Contents of this issue
Next item »

Lorraine Mariner

print this page

The Writer

After the sculpture by Giancarlo Neri

Lorraine Mariner reading The Writer 1075.9 KB
Play - Right click here and select save to download the audio file.

The sheer scale of it, that when
you stood next to it your head
came to about a fifth of the chair height
had me thinking that this was the desk
of a London literary giant, maybe
we better leave before he finds us.

But the table top being empty, now
that was tempting, as was the chair
pushed dead centre beneath, which
seemed to be saying the giant
was finished, it could be mine
if I learned mountaineering

and as you reminded me later
in the pub, we’d taken some trouble
to see it, walking on Hampstead Heath
unsure of where we were going in drizzle
and fading light, so I was already
showing signs of commitment.

Just forget that I laughed over
S.H. who’d already visited
with a black marker pen and written
Woz ’ere on a table leg; this need
to leave some words behind
not unlike a dog pissing up a tree.

Lorraine Mariner’s first collection, Bye For Now, was
published by The Rialto in 2005 and reviewed in Magma 33.

Page(s) 20

Back to top