Guardian reviews Alan Jenkins
Poemanias missed the launch of A Shorter Life at the Rebecca Hossack gallery last thurday (blame it on flu, on snow), but it's safe to assume Alan was wearing his traditional black woolen turtleneck, long on the booze and short on the actual reading...
"Galatea", which brings most of these preoccupations (loss, the vagrant tide, the dissatisfactions with self) bleakly together, ends with a desperate, italicised memento mori, in which a woman's voice metaphorically connects the poet-as-mariner to the work itself: "Whenever you go out, in your little craft of wood, / Your little craft of words, it will be me you hear, / It will be me reminding you of how you scorned your mother / And all women who loved you (God knows why), / It will be me reminding you that you will die, / It will be me reminding you of everything you fear."
"Galatea", which brings most of these preoccupations (loss, the vagrant tide, the dissatisfactions with self) bleakly together, ends with a desperate, italicised memento mori, in which a woman's voice metaphorically connects the poet-as-mariner to the work itself: "Whenever you go out, in your little craft of wood, / Your little craft of words, it will be me you hear, / It will be me reminding you of how you scorned your mother / And all women who loved you (God knows why), / It will be me reminding you that you will die, / It will be me reminding you of everything you fear."
posted by Edward Barker at 3:58 AM
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