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Zebra
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About This Book
Zebra is the debut collection from Hebden Bridge-based Ian Humphreys. These acutely-observed and joyful poems explore mixed identities, otherness, and coming-of-age as a gay man in 1980s Manchester. Humphreys is a fellow of The Complete Works programme (which aims to promote diversity and quality in British poetry) and was highly commended for his work at this year's Forward Prizes.
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Information
I
touch-me-not
this flower
doesnât belong
on the canal
hiding
in an airless tunnel
where no-one goes
before dark
rooted
to a thin layer
of dirt
head bowed
butter bloom
an open mouth
that faint smell
of sherbet
when someone
passes
it brushes
a thigh
springs back
against the wall
careful
just one touch
triggers
a scattering
of seed
into the night
Coalscar Lake
Night-time throws me back again
to Coalscar Lake â silenced birds,
midges fat as flies,
the broken plough
and sunken car, a playground dare,
that first dash across the field of Friesians,
blankness in their eyes, a child-size hole
slashed through barbed-wire,
my cousinâs
torn parka, one pasty to share,
felled warning signs,
âDangerâ, âNo Swimmingâ, âKeep Outâ,
the twenty-yard march
of thorns
that hook our jeans and score flesh bare
and then the greasy slick of water,
black as the poacherâs shotgun,
coffin black with a lid of green,
keep back,
donât look, thereâs something there,
the policeman shedding his hat,
a rowing boat, voices cast across the lake,
shadows dripping,
dragging it
to shore. The chaplainâs prayer.
Spaceboy
I remember Orion shimmering like a hundred promises. Or was it the glint of the Christmas tree lights against my space helmet visor? Viewed through indestructible plastic, Auntie Joanâs hand-knitted jumper became a cosmic spectrum. My spacesuit materialised a month after our housing development crash-landed into the Cheshire countryside. Our homes glowed like our colour televisions. Parents toasted their good fortune with Party Seven, Blue Nun and Snowballs. Children sharpened their pedigrees on freshly laid tarmac. I wore my spacesuit non-stop for six days. Slept in it. On the second day, I stole my brotherâs Spacehopper, hoping to bounce all the way to Jupiter or Mars, or the council estate where we werenât supposed to play. On the fourth day, I borrowed my fatherâs torch and aimed its laser beam at the Jehovahâs Witnesses in the house opposite, (they had four bedrooms while we had only three). On the sixth day, my sister cut the spacesuit off my back with a pair of pinking shears she found in the loft. My mother repaired it using NASA-issued titanium thread, but the spell had been zapped. I held onto that spacesuit, itâs hidden under my bed. Whenever I feel the need for astral travel, I decant myself into it and float away.
Last poem
The first poem
I wrote was
scratched in sand on
Dymchurch beach
with the point
of a big whelk shell.
I was four or five.
It read:
HERE I AM
I AM HERE.
As I played
with syntax, rhythm,
Paddy barked
at puddled jellyfish,
mum cracked guazi
with her front teeth and
out-browned
the melon seed husks
under a waning
British sun.
After chips, I held
the hollow spiral to
my shell-like â
so startled to hear
the blood of my rush
I didnât notice
the sly tide
wash away my words
and leave beh...
Table of contents
- Cover
- Title Page
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Contents
- I
- II
- III
- Notes
- Acknowledgements and Thanks
- About the author and this book