In this post I include one of the immediate ‘OK/Yes’ poems from Best Australian Poems 2013. It’s a modern sonnet by Michelle Cahill, Renovations. I’ve only ever read two of Michelle’s poems (the other is in an earlier post of mine), and yet her style and content appeals to me – refreshing, because I am surprised at how few female poets are included in my list of favourites. With Renovations, it seems the poet has just separated in a divorce (marriage laws defied me), and is busy setting up her own place in
Renovations
Michelle Cahill (1969 - )
It was a summer of stinking heat, hell-fire
days,
nothing predictable but the violence of time
whistling throu a sou’ westerly, the dragon
lizard
scampering to underbrush from crops of dry
lawn.
Boxes in every half-filled room, masking-tape
rolls,
anarchic cockroaches slewing between
floorboards.
I learnt how to correct grey hair roots,
presbyopia,
leaking showers. The marriage laws defied me.
Then one tradie after another, phone calls,
texts.
in my alacrity, I’d confuse their names,
driving
from Canada Bay
to Lidcombe, Ikea to Parramatta
Road
for blackbutt, bamboo, terracotta. Scott from Prospect
gave a quote I accepted for all the drop
sheets, all
the brawn and Epoxy sealant it took to keep me
single.
Reading some notes on Michelle’s background, I find she is a
practising medical doctor – the same as William Carlos Williams was (another of
my favourite poets).
One thing I like in this poem is the running together of
lists of things (boxes ….. masking-tape
rolls, anarchic cockroaches ……. blackbutt, bamboo, terracotta ….). You see this in a number of Kenneth Slessor’s
poems. I believe Renovations in the title refers not only to our usual association
with repair of property, but also to the poet herself making new again, restoring
herself to good condition (I learnt how
to correct grey hair roots, presbyopia …).
But why wait until you’re separated to attend to these things? And there is so much to have to learn or
re-learn in coping with this emotional change.
So much, that you get the feeling at some stage the poet could have
easily given in and returned to the security of the relationship (all the brawn and Epoxy sealant it took to
keep me single.).
My
poem links into the post by way of another perspective on the often crappiness
of human relationship. Sometimes you’ve
got to have a tough skin; have a laugh.
It’s a game; it’s a grinding down; a business and you’ve got to believe
the outcome is worth it.
Keeping up Appearances
Driving
the suburbs in Sydney
and I
miss the turn at Turramurra
so we
have to back-track from Pymble
getting
lost not knowing the right turn-off
or
which BP service station it’s supposed to be
around Kissing Point Road
left into Yenko Drive
and
then Simon rings her mobile
to find
out where we are
because
he wants to know when
to put
the piece of pork on
and
that sends her into a fury
because
her mobile’s a ‘piece of shit’
and
it’s embarrassing and our sat-nav
has not
yet been returned
and
technology’s leaving me behind
because
for some reason
I
refuse to - ‘get with the program!’
but
don’t worry, as soon as the house sells
she’ll
walk out and is going to get one of those
Samsung
Galaxies on Monday
and
I’ve kept my calm right up to now
because
I don’t like being late
or lost
either
though
I am feeling very, very tired
and I
start to say a sentence beginning with the word, ‘look’
and she
says, ‘shut your fucking mouth!’
as we
smile our way down the driveway
to
where Simon and Jan and the kids
seem so pleased to see us.
J. O. White
I like it! I can just imagine the scene when you arrived and it was all smiles.
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