aIDAN sEMMENS
PHOTOPLAY
keep the engines rolling
and the boats prepared
we clear a path
through unofficial zones
someone's here already:
screening for tropical disease
* * *
brickface
motley of red
browns : moss
and small flowers
intrude, intrinsic
* * *
leaves of paint (colour
indeterminate) bend out
from weathered boards
but it's
the random shape, lines
structure of the
(half-demolished)
buildings that excite
your draughtsman's eye
only
it's not random: innocent,
maybe, of human design;
but it hasn't fallen over
* * *
smoky face of
"your" technician
pops up
behind the screen,
framed an instant
by the cables
the projection flicks into life
imaging a corpse
blood matting the hair;
varying angles
for the catalogue,
the investigators,
or just to pick the best
stop a frame to lift a cover for this collection
* * *
oily hands on the wheel.
a long haul
overland to Hodeidah
steel, cement, piping
construction materials
sand and tar in the treads;
sheeting and roping
"battening down the hatches"
* * *
streaks of light cloud
cross the face of the moon
rippling under the oily surface
urgent quayside voices;
as the ambulance driver is pulled out
* * *
an ordinary arrest:
the youth
covers his face
as he's shoved aboard the van
weegee snaps the snappers
* * *
look at the red of that bench:
its glossy utility; what's
it doing here, among these
stained surfaces
and railway lines/
* * *
the doubledecker bus
pulling away from the queue
by the tall building
of brown glass and dull metal
into the traffic waiting at
the next lights
has become a mere dash
of colour
on the wardrobe door
you call a canvas
even upside down
* * *
plantlife behind the hoardings
where the bomb was,
willowherb and yellow blooms,
food wrappers drifting
* * *
with practised sharpness
he lifts aside
wads of fat,
baring a distended gut
chemical analyses
inform him
cause of death
* * *
feet, too white,
their rough soles
lined in yellow,
a big blob of toe;
neatly tied on with string,
the label
* * *
waiting to hurry
from the scene
huddled in the middle
of the back seat
curious faces
press against the glass
* * *
down several storeys to the yard
a fire
escape
clutching clothes,
looking back
* * *
at the end of the street
on a long pole
the camera swivels
on automatic
or remote control
environmental surveillance
* * *
chinese art
in the waiting room
signifies a cuisine
colourful small birds
hermetically sealed in
the tv screen
just out of sight
talks a foreign language
keep the engines rolling
and the boats prepared
we clear a path
through unofficial zones
someone's here already:
screening for tropical disease
* * *
brickface
motley of red
browns : moss
and small flowers
intrude, intrinsic
* * *
leaves of paint (colour
indeterminate) bend out
from weathered boards
but it's
the random shape, lines
structure of the
(half-demolished)
buildings that excite
your draughtsman's eye
only
it's not random: innocent,
maybe, of human design;
but it hasn't fallen over
* * *
smoky face of
"your" technician
pops up
behind the screen,
framed an instant
by the cables
the projection flicks into life
imaging a corpse
blood matting the hair;
varying angles
for the catalogue,
the investigators,
or just to pick the best
stop a frame to lift a cover for this collection
* * *
oily hands on the wheel.
a long haul
overland to Hodeidah
steel, cement, piping
construction materials
sand and tar in the treads;
sheeting and roping
"battening down the hatches"
* * *
streaks of light cloud
cross the face of the moon
rippling under the oily surface
urgent quayside voices;
as the ambulance driver is pulled out
* * *
an ordinary arrest:
the youth
covers his face
as he's shoved aboard the van
weegee snaps the snappers
* * *
look at the red of that bench:
its glossy utility; what's
it doing here, among these
stained surfaces
and railway lines/
* * *
the doubledecker bus
pulling away from the queue
by the tall building
of brown glass and dull metal
into the traffic waiting at
the next lights
has become a mere dash
of colour
on the wardrobe door
you call a canvas
even upside down
* * *
plantlife behind the hoardings
where the bomb was,
willowherb and yellow blooms,
food wrappers drifting
* * *
with practised sharpness
he lifts aside
wads of fat,
baring a distended gut
chemical analyses
inform him
cause of death
* * *
feet, too white,
their rough soles
lined in yellow,
a big blob of toe;
neatly tied on with string,
the label
* * *
waiting to hurry
from the scene
huddled in the middle
of the back seat
curious faces
press against the glass
* * *
down several storeys to the yard
a fire
escape
clutching clothes,
looking back
* * *
at the end of the street
on a long pole
the camera swivels
on automatic
or remote control
environmental surveillance
* * *
chinese art
in the waiting room
signifies a cuisine
colourful small birds
hermetically sealed in
the tv screen
just out of sight
talks a foreign language
Copyright © Aidan Semmens 1982
Previously co-editor of Perfect Bound magazine, Aidan Semmens founded Molly Bloom as a print magazine in 1980, reviving it in its present form as an online poetry presence in May 2013. He is the author of four books of poetry, A Stone Dog (Shearsman Books 2011), The Book of Isaac (Free Verse 2013), Uncertain Measures (Shearsman 2014) and Life Has Become More Cheerful (Shearsman 2017), and edited By the North Sea, an anthology of Suffolk verse (Shearsman 2013).
