Googling Former Homes (3)
18/10/06 18:11 Filed in: Web
Aha! Found another one (in fact, No. 3 will be
along shortly – how strange that it’s
possible to find images of previous houses on the
web).
Known
by the inhabitants as ‘Squash Court
Villas’, here is an image of the house I
lived in from shortly after I was born to the age
of 5 (1962-67). The house is in an Army enclave
called Blenheim Village, in the
Dhekelia Cantonment
in Cyprus. It appears to be still used as Army
housing.
A poem from a visit to Northern Cyprus a few years ago (the first time back since the age of 5). This poem has never met with the approval of editors etc., but I wheel it out at readings:
Postcards from Famagusta
I.
Haloed still, the Saints’ purged faces
Still raimented, if that’s the word
for colours draining down the walls
towards the rubble, weeds and turds.
Map-marked still, the streets you named me
Yes, still extant, if that’s the term
for pockmarked hulks of wired-off houses
where rats and sentries take their turns.
That jetty’s there – the one you swam from.
It still strides out, if that’s the phrase
for broken pilings stripped of planking
within the watchtower’s arc and range.
The hill-road’s open. The uplands offer
cool relief, if that’s the point
of all this earth-art angled Southwards:
Flags and slogans. Threats and taunts.
II.
We’re out of season.
The chairs are cleared.
The pool stays flat.
The lobby’s dull with uncut wax.
A cane-and-cut-glass chandelier
lies outspread like a polypod.
Our mornings flutter by with books.
The barman makes his brasswork glitter
with vinegar and a twist of cloth.
At night, the headlands push out arms
pricked with beads of coastal lights.
They bleed a little of what lies behind:
the South shines orange; the North glows green.
The night we crossed the plain to here,
the hills tracked us like arcing fins.
The driver nodded to the shattering flares
of some wired compound, turned and grinned:
“Your country! Your country, over there!”
A poem from a visit to Northern Cyprus a few years ago (the first time back since the age of 5). This poem has never met with the approval of editors etc., but I wheel it out at readings:
Postcards from Famagusta
I.
Haloed still, the Saints’ purged faces
Still raimented, if that’s the word
for colours draining down the walls
towards the rubble, weeds and turds.
Map-marked still, the streets you named me
Yes, still extant, if that’s the term
for pockmarked hulks of wired-off houses
where rats and sentries take their turns.
That jetty’s there – the one you swam from.
It still strides out, if that’s the phrase
for broken pilings stripped of planking
within the watchtower’s arc and range.
The hill-road’s open. The uplands offer
cool relief, if that’s the point
of all this earth-art angled Southwards:
Flags and slogans. Threats and taunts.
II.
We’re out of season.
The chairs are cleared.
The pool stays flat.
The lobby’s dull with uncut wax.
A cane-and-cut-glass chandelier
lies outspread like a polypod.
Our mornings flutter by with books.
The barman makes his brasswork glitter
with vinegar and a twist of cloth.
At night, the headlands push out arms
pricked with beads of coastal lights.
They bleed a little of what lies behind:
the South shines orange; the North glows green.
The night we crossed the plain to here,
the hills tracked us like arcing fins.
The driver nodded to the shattering flares
of some wired compound, turned and grinned:
“Your country! Your country, over there!”
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