Argot of Rye by Fran Lock
That
time I lost it among
meringues
listing
like toppled mosques, cupcakes
piled
up, knickknacks in a granny flat;
meticulously
dainty chocs, in a posh
box
like dolls’ house furniture. I said
I
couldn’t stand it,
that peevishly sweet
pretence,
every morsel over-acting,
where
whipped cream was a powdered
wig;
Candy Land rococo with added
chintz.
And you kicked me in my bad
ankle,
under the table, and hissed: what
more
did I want? And I started to tell
you,
picking at sequined itoas of seed
from
my uneaten roll, but you slapped
my
hand and I cried instead, so I’ll
say
it now: lover, I want what sent
Salem
raving, that succotash sopping
rye,
black as a bible, ripened like dark
fruit;
the dense, soaked hump of it,
steaming.
I want a mauled weight
of
bread I can heft in my hands, stuff
to
clutch; the taste of sweat and loam
and
wet sand. Lover, I want a deep
dough
swampy with figs; want garlic
barbs or olives big and black as rubber
bullets.
Lover, I want borscht, dripping,
thick
as bulls’ blood, slopped in bowls
with
baby’s head pampushky. Lover,
I
want stab vest slabs of honey cake.
But
I see from your face that something
is
lost in translation. Leave me then,
to
the sour pong of my kitchen;
my
splinters of pickle, my heavy-breathing
yeast.
Leave me to dabble my cornstarch
like
I’m dusting for prints. This is
the
archaeology of the stomach and the heart.
Fran’s debut collection, ‘Flatrock’ (Little Episodes), was launched in May 2011. Her poetry has most recently appeared in Ambit, The Alarmist, Poetry London, The Stinging Fly, and in ‘Best British Poetry 2012’. Her second collection, ‘The Mystic and the Pig Thief’ (Salt), is due out in April 2014. She owns a basenji and several moth-eaten cardigans. She is still searching for the perfect cup of coffee.
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