_{Rodney Wood     "Writing to me means freedom, a place for discovery where I can find out what and how I think, see how the world works, write poems that are alive, human, honest, in a language I understand all within a narrative framework." Rodney…}    

 
_{LOOKING AFTER THE FIRE}
 

_{The fire
licks half a tree
and I hear it crackle
like the sound of
mother telling me to stop
playing with myself.
A few days after
her funeral
 
I made a bonfire
and burnt her handbags,
fur gloves, discoloured
shoes, reading glasses,
 
bras stained with cancer,
pre war hats and unworn dresses.
I stroked each one before
tossing it into the fire.}

 
 
 
 
 
_{THE PROSTATE OPERATION
 
It's barely morning in the ward}

_{with the sun over the windowsill}
_{dim as hospital soap.}

 
_{I look at my watch - 5:30}

_{and the cleaners are racing with their mops}
_{to shave the blue lino floor.}

 
_{With each stroke they smile like Cool Hand Luke and look across the aisle  
at old Mr Forster who's getting out of bed}

_{with his plastic handbag}
_{filling with drips of urine.}

 
_{After a few minutes he starts shuffling the frame making so much noise you'd think it was ill.  
Mr Forster stops by my bed This is what you've to look forward too when you're older -  
parts that don't work and the channel tunnel stuck up yer privates.  
 
 
 
 
QUARRY}
 

_Huts

_{falling apart}

_{since the last war.}
 _{A fox}

_{rippling with rice,}

_{yet no sign}

 

_{of what}

_{I'm looking for - thunder flashes,}  

_{spent rounds.}

_{Instead I find}

_{little silver coins,}

 

_{useless things}

_{I throw away because I'm young enough to know everything.
 
 
 
 
 
THIS MORNING ON THE TRAIN
 
The moon hangs over
the gibbet of morning
as I read some
 
poems by Feyyaz Fergar.
The phrase a shroud
has no pockets makes
 
me stop and light
a last cigarette: the
nicotine hits my corpse.
 
I put the book
away and get ready
for my station but
 
the train keeps going
in a westerly direction,
unstoppable as the dawn.
 
 
 
 
 
XANADU
 
There's only one way to go. Not west}

_{across Comanche country}

_{but past the recreation ground,
  where the grass is sharp as rhetoric,}

_{and down Ayling Lane to an off-licence.}

 
_{It sells wine. Not your ordinary}

_{red, white, sparkling or vintage stuff}
_{but bottles engineered}

 
_{to produce an Asia of emotions.}

_{I usually get some poetry}

 
_{but someone's just bought}

_{the last caseload so I'll have}
_{to make do with this}

 
_{East European stuff,}

_{I'm told it's very popular.
 
 
 
 
HAIKU
 
When green in judgement
the rose of youth
was in my hair.
 
 
 
 
 
THE LEGACY
 
While Peter Mortimer reads out a poem
and every other line shouts Ted Hughes
I think that in the next room sitting
with tea and biscuits really is Ted Hughes.
 
As soon as Peter Mortimer ends his piece
I run next door to find Ted Hughes
but there's only a seat still warm from his bum,
slops and a plate of crumbs left by Ted Hughes.
 
Peter Mortimer follows me into this empty room
says something about the smallness of Ted Hughes
who can't even clear up after himself
but I won't hear a word said against Ted Hughes
 
especially not by Peter Mortimer, not now
I've tasted what was left by that primeval
barrage balloon of a man Ted Huge.
 
 
 
 
 
ASCENSION DAY
 
To scream with pain, to cry, to summon help, to call generally - all that is described here as "roaring". In Siberia not only bears roar, but sparrows and mice as well. "The cat's got it and it's roaring" they say of a mouse. Anton Chekov "Across Siberia"
  Three days after his death I stumble
in a daze through the new hospital
to the Chapel of Rest to find my father-in-law.
 
There's a Gideon's bible open
next to him displaying gold lettering
and he's beneath a blue velvet cloak
with only his head showing.
 
I didn't expect to see him like this
with thick make-up and teeth bared
like Bela Lugosi's in Dracula. He's roaring
that is, summoning help or calling generally.
 
I'm lost and for some reason think of the daughter
of the Burgomaster of Leipzig who after the war
committed suicide and was found on a leather sofa}

 

<sub>mouth open, teeth powered with plaster
from the ceiling.
I touch my father-in-law's
body on the forehead and cry out with pain
- this also is described as roaring.</sub>