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CAUGHT IN THE NET 84 - POETRY BY
PAUL JEFFCUTT
Series Editor - Jim Bennett
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Introduction by Jim Bennett
Hello. Welcome to the next in the series of CITN featured poets. We will be looking at the work of a different poet in each edition and I hope it will help our readers to discover some new and exciting writing. This series is open to all to submit and I am now keen to read new work for this series.
You can join the CITN mailing list at
-
http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/index.htm
and following the links for Caught in the Net.
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Choked to the lintels with briars, rotten window-frames gape: beyond dangling slates a sycamore where rooks refuse to nest. Forcing thorns apart, I step in to the parlour.
from; Homestead by Paul Jeffcutt |
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CONTENTS
1 - BIOGRAPHY
2 – POETRY
Homestead
Dad’s Bonfire
First Ascent
Abandoned Along La Ruta de Don Quijote
The Club
Habana Cabaret
Albie’s Phantom
Unpacking
Marahau
Twilight Tjukurpa
3 - PUBLISHING HISTORY
4 - AFTERWORD
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1 – BIOGRAPHY: Paul Jeffcutt
During 2000 he started to write poems in his spare time, rekindling an interest in poetry that had lain dormant for decades. His first poem was published in 2003.
Contact: poetrypaul@gmail.com
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2 - POETRY
At the end of the abandoned lane
among stubby fields of nettles,
couch-grass and docks,
the old house squats.
A muddied cattle-trail curves
to the empty gate and wanders on.
Choked to the lintels with briars,
rotten window-frames gape:
beyond dangling slates
a sycamore where rooks refuse to nest.
Forcing thorns apart, I step in
to the parlour.
A barren grate,
the tiled mantelpiece shrouded with cobwebs
and the drained bodies of insects
that kicked their last as Jim Reeves crooned on the radio:
filthy strands embrace a deserted soldier,
in the mildew beside him a teddy’s eye.
Broken tiles crunch to the thick, square sink
(where stains couldn’t be erased)
and a raddled enamel cooker
its oven door clasped by bramble spikes,
still guarding against
the ungrateful child who wanted.
Every weekend he attends
to the sacrifice:
weeds, sticks, newspapers and leaves
hauled to the site.
Torn elbow above smudged knee,
wellyboot stirruped on garden fork,
he drags on a Player's,
strides to the heap
and flicks a match.
She peers out and sighs.
He spits in his palm, grasps the haft
and forks debris to the pyre:
first a frown, then a lip
smoulders and cackles into flame.
At last, she’s ablaze.
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FIRST ASCENT
Fighting a falling sky,
the raven soars
from the summit,
quivering ebony jibs
whirlscaped in azure.
Ocean of crag and wind,
my hoarse cry glides to you.
Spanning granite ledges,
the bright cord tautens:
you begin to climb the gully,
our umbilical drawing you in.
Perched, I peer below,
your face sparkles into view:
route done, we’re reunited.
The joy of a long way to go.
ABANDONED ALONG LA RUTA DE DON QUIJOTE
A dead kestrel,
the guts of a washing machine,
mule turds, single mattress
ripped, one black boot, carcass
of a computer monitor,
wide-brimmed wickerwork hat,
Barbie y Ken se Prometen
(box empty), olive stones,
a book on chivalry, whose name
I do not care to recall,
stamped Biblioteca de Toledo.
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It’s exclusive, yet people join every day:
there’s no application form,
no interview and no fee.
Enrolment only happens at someone else’s behest,
it arrives unexpectedly
however much you might’ve prepared.
You enter an all-age community, for life.
Resignations are never accepted
as membership can only be passed
to family and close friends.
Renewals and extensions just come along
whether you’re looking for them or not.
You’re in the loss club:
soldiering on, day by day.
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The guts of a grand hotel
stuffed with 50’s Americana,
yellow-finned Chevrolet convertible
and chromed maw of Buick sedan.
The dance-floor, a protruding glitterballed tongue:
Cuban octet stuck in the throat
(sharp white suits, red bow-ties)
swinging out ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’
to tables scattered like spittle.
In place of Lucky Luciano and the mob
indentured natives jump a generation or two,
lined white hands renting young mulattos.
A curtain call and the DJ starts,
jinetero waves across the floor to jinetera,
each confers with old, flatfooted squeeze:
sparkling, they join in ecstatic dance
and return to be yoked
to their owners.
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Without me to steer it
the indigo arm of his suit flutters and swerves.
He’s speaking on truth and reconciliation:
that hand an anchor (trapping his notes to the desk)
this sleeve a flag of passion
the vacant space that’s rightly mine.
Long after the car bomb in Mozambique
he’s told the secret agent wants to confess.
At the Commission, a chance meeting:
the agent sheepishly makes to shake,
I scream
'you’ve already taken me, you bastard'.
Albie pauses, then proffers:
'here, I have another one'.
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for Gill Banks
We begin to unload the garage,
a store-house crowded with leftovers
from my stranded years in rented rooms.
Nosing through piles of boxes,
the brother and I chuckle
at favourite shoes, scuffed
unfashionable and bent,
old albums (James Brown, Blondie,
T Rex) and, best of all,
the shirts I used to boogie in.
Under heaps for the jumble and debris for the dump
we reach the big red trunk.
In the bedroom of our house
I'd sat with it, the evening before the service,
a vigil with scraps and shreds that would not rest.
Hauled out into the light
it glowers.
I turn towards Robert
(but he must have slipped away)
then back to the trunk,
heavy with rivets
at reinforced corners in black.
I struggle forward,
grasp a stiff brass latch:
creaking, the lid cleaves open.
I kneel before the trove
and unwrap jewellery,
birthday cards, snaps, quirky souvenirs,
perfume, faded tickets:
a bundle of my love letters.
Those vital moments,
that fleeted and flew away,
return their precious cargo so gently…
Hushed, we’re talking
and I caress your skin.
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The eerie skin of a great giraffe
enfolds constellations in its hide.
Vellum mottles to Canis Major
and Aries patchworks into Leo:
firmament and parchment,
tonight the stars compose.
Dog-years of searching,
I rode foul beasts that bucked and skirled
through Orion and the Pleiades:
erratic gyrations
and obscure glimpses
sculpting the border of illumination.
TWILIGHT TJUKURPA
In a lost ocean of terracotta sand
bulges the blood-red shoulder
of an ancestral being
at rest.
As visitors clamber like ants,
bright sun crawls across the tussocked plain
of yellow spinifex,
scattered groves of mulga trees
still their agile leaves.
The land offers up its warmth.
Crimson biceps gather
and stretch,
rippling from a great scapula
six kilometres across:
the ants scatter and snap.
Over scarlet flanks
sunfire pulses, flares:
a conflagration scorches to the summit
and soars into a glistening sky.
Haloed in ultramarine and violet,
Uluru stands serene:
a beacon of the spirit
rooted in the earth’s core.
This eager heart.
tjukurpa: foundational beliefs and spiritual truths (aboriginal)
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3 - PUBLISHING HISTORY
Dad’s Bonfire - Cinnamon Press (Anthology 2006)
First Ascent - The Frogmore Papers (forthcoming)
Abandoned Along La Ruta de Don Quijote - Cinnamon Press (Anthology 2008)
The Club - Carillon (forthcoming)
Habana Cabaret - Markings No 30 (2010)
Unpacking - Cinnamon Press (Anthology 2006)
Twilight Tjukurpa - The Cannon's Mouth No 34 (2009)
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4 - AFTERWORD
Email Poetry Kit -
info@poetrykit.org - if you would like
to tell us what you think. We are looking for other poets to feature in
this series, and are open to submissions. Please send one poem and a short
bio to - info@poetrykit.org
Thank you for taking the time to read Caught in the Net. Our other magazine s
are Transparent Words ands Poetry Kit Magazine, which are webzines on the Poetry Kit site and this can be found at -
http://www.poetrykit.org/