POETRY

POETRY

‘EAST END GIRL, DANCING THE LAMBETH WALK’: BILL BRANDT

David Selzer By David Selzer4 Comments1 min read2.9K views

the-lambeth-walk

‘East end girl, dancing the Lambeth Walk‘ Bill Brandt, 1939

 

He’s set it up, of course. Or, rather, framed it.
There’d be no feigning this young woman’s delight
in being ‘free and easy’ and doing
‘as you darn well pleasy’. She’s got her best blouse on,
with shoulder puffs, her sister’s shoes, which fit her now,
black ankle socks and shoulder length, unpermed hair
freshly washed – and waved, probably with Kirby grips.
Doin’ the walk, she lifts the hem of her skirt,
revealing her slip – and smiles coquettishly.

Beside her is a line, a queue almost of
female acolytes. (The only boy looks away).
They’re pre-pubescent, excited, nervous at what they see:
grown up clothes, shapely legs, unimaginable bust,
a sensuousness that, unwilled, will be theirs.

Down the street of terraced houses, symmetrical
as barracks, a woman strides, her back turned
on this miracle: a girl who knows
she will never grow old – ‘Any ev’ning,
any day…Doin’ the Lambeth Walk.’ Oi!

 

 

 

Pages:

Share

David Selzer By David Selzer
4 Comments
POETRY

PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST

David Selzer By David Selzer1 Comment1 min read2.6K views

The hardback quarto exercise book opens
at ‘Funny Valentine’, an unfinished,
blank verse piece – full of Auden, Larkin, Yeats –
in thick-nib fountain pen on feint ruled lines.
Four decades old and more – and pristine:
‘Today, at best, brings scented, satin hearts,
Numb messengers of somebody’s desires…’

I can see the back room in the shared flat:
sagging bed, faded armchair, torn carpet,
wobbly table; I’d brought a large ashtray,
a glass fronted bookcase and a small, handmade
Chinese cabinet; a tv blared upstairs.
Through the sash window stuck fast with paint
was the littered garden – out of sight and
sound, all of Liverpool, swinging city.

I google Lorenz Hart’s lyrics – ‘Your looks
are laughable, unphotographable,
Yet you’re my favorite work of art’- and hear
Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald.
The cabinet – carved drawers filled now with years
of love – was a woman’s gift to a man
coming of age. But I was a boy, full
of fears and words. ‘Stay little valentine, stay…’
Borne on the leafy fretwork of the doors,
two gilded, lacquered kingfishers in flight,
sun catching on their iridescent wings,
fall together into oblivion.

 

Note: this piece has been subsequently published in ‘A Jar of Sticklebacks’ – http://www.armadillocentral.com/general/a-jar-of-sticklebacks-by-david-selzer

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pages:

Share

David Selzer By David Selzer
1 Comment
POETRY

THE OUTING

David Selzer By David Selzer1 Comment1 min read2.4K views

Each Armistice Day, she remembered it.
A walk along the riverbank. Her teacher took them –
one Saturday when the hawthorn was out
and the river slow after weeks of sun –
her and three of the other older girls.
Miss Davies’ young man came too –
in his uniform, on leave from the front.

When they all rested in the shade of a willow,
he unwrapped a large bar of chocolate
slowly, looking away, or pretending to,
across the river.  Suddenly he turned.
‘Voila!’, he said, holding it out to them.
‘Pour vous. From plucky little Belgium.’

Miss Davies and her young man went and sat
at the river’s edge, their heads almost touching.
Two of her friends began whispering – another
pursed her lips and kissed the air. The others giggled.
She lay back – and squinted at the sun through the branches.
‘Look’, said one of the girls. The soldier was pretending
to dip the toe of his boot in the water.
Miss Davies laughed.

On the way back, ‘Listen’, he said, and they stopped.
On the dappled path, blocking their way,
a song thrush was striking a snail on a stone
again and again and again.

 

 

Note: this piece has been subsequently published in ‘A Jar of Sticklebacks’ – http://www.armadillocentral.com/general/a-jar-of-sticklebacks-by-david-selzer

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pages:

Share

David Selzer By David Selzer
1 Comment
POETRY

Contact

designdylunioSELZERD-CLEAN By designdylunioSELZERD-CLEAN58 Comments2 min read0 views

My links are now available here.

The site has been running since April 2009 and attracted visitors from:

Afghanistan, Argentina, Austria, Bangladesh, Bahamas, Barbados, Belarus, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Cape Verde, Cambodia, Cameroon, Canada, Chile, China, Columbia, Croatia, Cyprus,  Czech Republic, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Egypt, Faroe Islands, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Grenada, Guatemala, Honduras, Hong Kong, Hungary, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Iran, Ireland, Isle of Man,  Israel, Jamaica, Japan, Kenya, Kuwait, Lebanon, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macau, Malaysia, Malta, Mexico, Morocco, Namibia, New Brunswick,  Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Norway, Oman, Pakistan, Palestine, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Singapore, Slovenia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Syria, Taiwan, Thailand, Tonga,  Tunisia, Turkey,  Ukraine, UK, United Arab Emirates, USA, Venezuela and Vietnam.

If you would like to get in touch with me, please mailme@davidselzer.com – or, if you have a thought, comment or message regarding the site as whole, particular pages and/or specific pieces please enter it below. (Your email address will remain private and confidential. If you would like me to post a comment on the site but withhold your name, please let me know).

To post a comment directly on a specific piece of work, put the cursor over the title. A window opens: ‘Permanent link toFAR ABOVE RUBIES’, for example. Click on the window. Below the text of the poem, you will see, highlighted in blue, ‘leave a response’. Click on that.

I had thought originally that I should respond to each comment posted – not least, out of politeness. Then I thought that I was in danger of seeming like the troll under the bridge in the Grimm fairy tale – and therefore should only respond when it was appropriate to do so. I am, nevertheless, very keen to enter into conversations.

Many thanks.

David

Pages:

Share

designdylunioSELZERD-CLEAN By designdylunioSELZERD-CLEAN
58 Comments