Eyewear is very glad to welcome Jacqueline Saphra (pictured) this crisp and wintry November Saturday. Saphra has won several awards including first
prize in the Ledbury Poetry Competition. Her pamphlet, Rock’n’Roll Mamma was published by Flarestack in 2008. Her first full
collection, The Kitchen of LovelyContraptions (flipped eye) was developed with the support of the Arts
Council of England and nominated for the Aldeburgh First Collection Prize 2011. It was reviewed recently here. She lives in London with her partner Robin and four children.
Retainer
You left a scattering of dark mascara,
scent of artificial tropics, no room
for negotiation, front door, oddly, still ajar.
I remembered too late, called, but you
were i-tuned out of it. Your plastic palate
with its list of Do’s and Don’ts rattled on
inside my bag, a disembodied replicate
moulded to force a smile. And you were gone.
It all comes back now; I can feel the marvel
of your mouth at work with its voracious tongue,
hot mix of blood and milk, the flinch and thrill.
Here we go again: the let-down, nothing new:
thin, bluish leak of memory, a gush of cradle song
the shade of gin perhaps, or sap, or glue.
poem by Jacqueline Saphra; reprinted with permission of the poet; from The Kitchen of Lovely Contraptions. Naomi Woddis is the photographer of the portrait above.
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