Poem
Ruby Robinson
Interlude
Interlude
Interlude
During the interlude, nothing is found or figured out. Minds unhitchorbit-less. Eyes forget to blink. Plastic spoons, Häagen-Dazs, lipstick,
urinals, red curtains, left and right brain hemispheres are floating
in the gap between one universe and another, between a platform
and a train. A streetlight falters, an oak tree sheds its season in one breath,
black T-shirts reposition the world, clothed bodies descend,
pinned in place by tubes of searchlight. You hear somebody
refolding their legs, the squeak of a shoe’s leather, a boiled sweet
rolling from one cheek to the other and it feels like – were the actors
to drop dead (from an after-party in the theatre bar last night,
that someone spiked) and soldiers, politicians, vicars, presidents,
the actors’ mothers, sisters, brothers, the actors’ fathers to burst in,
sprint past the blocks of seats, beat the corpses, rape them, set dogs
on them – judges and juries would look on through gleaming faces
as we look on now for fifteen minutes, breathing out, breathing in.
Years pass. Some shout their pain from a soundproof box
until, startled by the score from the pit, the light peeled back,
a triangle struck, we see ourselves rise from the stage and play on.
© 2016, Ruby Robinson
From: Every Little Sound
Publisher: Pavilion Poetry, Liverpool University Press, Liverpool
From: Every Little Sound
Publisher: Pavilion Poetry, Liverpool University Press, Liverpool
Ruby Robinson
(United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 1985)
Ruby Robinson’s debut collection, Every Little Sound (Pavilion Press, 2016) has received critical acclaim, shortlisted for both the Felix Dennis Forward Prize for Best First Collection and the T.S. Eliot Prize. The book’s title is indicative of her approach; scrupulously attentive and especially interested in the aural. She writes from personal experience, but the perspective we are afforded is...
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Interlude
During the interlude, nothing is found or figured out. Minds unhitchorbit-less. Eyes forget to blink. Plastic spoons, Häagen-Dazs, lipstick,
urinals, red curtains, left and right brain hemispheres are floating
in the gap between one universe and another, between a platform
and a train. A streetlight falters, an oak tree sheds its season in one breath,
black T-shirts reposition the world, clothed bodies descend,
pinned in place by tubes of searchlight. You hear somebody
refolding their legs, the squeak of a shoe’s leather, a boiled sweet
rolling from one cheek to the other and it feels like – were the actors
to drop dead (from an after-party in the theatre bar last night,
that someone spiked) and soldiers, politicians, vicars, presidents,
the actors’ mothers, sisters, brothers, the actors’ fathers to burst in,
sprint past the blocks of seats, beat the corpses, rape them, set dogs
on them – judges and juries would look on through gleaming faces
as we look on now for fifteen minutes, breathing out, breathing in.
Years pass. Some shout their pain from a soundproof box
until, startled by the score from the pit, the light peeled back,
a triangle struck, we see ourselves rise from the stage and play on.
From: Every Little Sound
Interlude
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