Poem
Helen Mort
GEORGE, AFRAID OF FINGERPRINTS
GEORGE, AFRAID OF FINGERPRINTS
GEORGE, AFRAID OF FINGERPRINTS
thought ofthem on patted dogs, the purple leaves
of late geraniums, or gathering ancient
in the pockets of his winter coat.
Their gauze
was on his bookshelves, from the heartwood
to the spine of Henry James. They trailed him
as he clutched the banister at night.
At length,
he thought of how they’d linger in the auburn
of his first wife’s hair, their savour
on her temples, or her own quick fingertips
and saw
them spread through every hand he’d shook
and every shoe he’d forced, still laced
onto his foot, and every door handle
he’d tried
and given up. The shape of them
when he closed his eyes, like something
jammed at the dresser back,
a vision
of his childhood street, the varnish tin
in the corner shop, its silver lid,
its weight so startling in his fist.
His mother’s voice.
The careful turning out and owning up.
Even now, his mark there in the centre,
those brilliant spirals burning on it still.
© 2008, Helen Mort
Publisher: First published on PIW,
Publisher: First published on PIW,
Helen Mort
(United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 1985)
Helen Mort was born in Sheffield in 1985. As a child, she loved language in general and poetry in particular and can’t remember a time when she wasn’t trying to write poetry, including dictating “an incoherent poem about trains” to her mum whilst at primary school. Although “not sure where the urge to write came from”, the sounds of words entranced her. She particularly delighted in “the way so...
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GEORGE, AFRAID OF FINGERPRINTS
thought ofthem on patted dogs, the purple leaves
of late geraniums, or gathering ancient
in the pockets of his winter coat.
Their gauze
was on his bookshelves, from the heartwood
to the spine of Henry James. They trailed him
as he clutched the banister at night.
At length,
he thought of how they’d linger in the auburn
of his first wife’s hair, their savour
on her temples, or her own quick fingertips
and saw
them spread through every hand he’d shook
and every shoe he’d forced, still laced
onto his foot, and every door handle
he’d tried
and given up. The shape of them
when he closed his eyes, like something
jammed at the dresser back,
a vision
of his childhood street, the varnish tin
in the corner shop, its silver lid,
its weight so startling in his fist.
His mother’s voice.
The careful turning out and owning up.
Even now, his mark there in the centre,
those brilliant spirals burning on it still.
GEORGE, AFRAID OF FINGERPRINTS
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