Carole Coates
WHEN THE NEW WORLD PRESIDENT WAS ELECTED
RITA AND I WERE PLAYING WITH THE TAROT CARDS
Oh don’t we know his sort the manspreader man
legs splayed to give it air
CARD ONE THE FOOL
she’s the blowjob baby with bubble-gum lips
a PRESS HERE tee-shirt large pink Stetson
a small dog Confederate flag a Glock 45
a woman comes out of the lavatory he’s waiting on the stairs
CARD TWO KING OF SWORDS
he’s a cheery old card but the background’s mud
mud and flooded ditches and trees like forks
expert on perfumes he’ll sniff all the “girls” let them know he knows
CARD THREE 10 OF SWORDS
he couldn’t be more dead with ten swords in his back
pinned down in the snow and nothing else but stars
whatever your name is he’ll call you Tammy or Peggy Sue
CARD FOUR 9 OF SWORDS
the ones who survived are bound with barbed wire
trudge through a litter of mud and broken blades
he’s the lively Santa with Rohypnol candy
and he’s hauling out the trumpets and the guns
CARD FIVE 5 OF SWORDS
a hooded figure on the beach and he or she’s collecting swords
from the thousand dead men thrown down on the sand
and that hair like a lid will open wide and tentacles writhe up
CARD SIX THE TOWER
an island of towers and the highest the wide golden one is falling
with a spray of bodies and glittering chairs and reddish smoke
and more and more towers falling in the cracked and failing city
he’s got a secret room full of blonde dolls hanging up by their hair
they might not be dolls but how could you tell
CARD SEVEN THE HERMIT
green child of a glacier the ice growls sun-ward
like a melting emerald with wet collapsing slopes
and a solitary man at the top with a flag
what flag is that?
AND WERE THERE TENTS
she forgot her name and they were kind and gave her another
but this isn’t her home the past is her home and these fragments of map
are spotted with names she can’t read and she remembers
white-out only white-out scratched and torn a place of holes a wind blowing
and her mother once outlined then gone present only as absence the shape of her absence
in a white space framed by shadows so frail it will tear if she thinks too much about it
and were there tents once people crouching in tents triangles of white or was that a picture
with a man on a mountain arms outstretched and a great bush behind him
why is he waving his arms and why are they hiding?
LANDSCAPE WITH CRANE AND ANGEL TWO BOYS IN ARMY SURPLUS MAEVE AND AN OLD MAN
the crane is trigonometrical models angles obtuse and acute its golden verticals glow in the early
morning when roofs are grey has a weight like a hanged man which lifted slowly beyond the
scaffolding is like a creature ascending
while the angel by the cemetery wall points with her lost fingers at the winking red star on the top of
the crane in the care home site is a ladder herself for the boys in big boots her waist/ her arm / her
wing are scuffed rungs
above the tee-shirt shop by the cemetery Maeve fifteen moulds Rimmel dark ginger round the old
man’s cheeks flabby rubs it in and rubs it in picks up the green mascara
the boys in army surplus drop over the wall one two kick the wall one two kick the wall their boots
are as big as their heads
semi-circles of silver in eye sockets rubbed on eyelids baggy and loose keep still dotting of gold
behind lashes band of green in the eyeball hollow eyeliner pen close to his ear
one two kick the wall one two kick the wall
round pink cheeks where are your cheekbones and a Cupid’s Bow mouth the colour of new blood
and he wants an earring to finish it off she sprays him and sprays him with Au Printemps
the boys in army surplus live next door over the philatelist shop they have a trumpet sound The Last
Post in amateur quavers
Maeve washed her hands under the cold tap pushes the cuticles down hard Hearts and Bones she
sings Hearts and Bones
Copyright © Carole Coates 2017
Carole Coates’s 2016 collection Jacob was published by Shoestring Press, as were her three earlier books, The Goodbye Edition (2005), Looking Good (2009) and Swallowing Stones (2012). Her pamphlet Crazy Days appeared in 2014 from Wayleave Press. www.carolecoates.org.uk