Five Poems by Irene Cunningham

 

INTOXICATION 

 

 

Isabella lives in the ether     fingers spidering  

a keyboard. She’s an electronic woman 

busy in pixels     lolling in boxes     versed  

in universal couplings. Titus is real     a voice  

that cements red bricks into walls. 

 

When he enters the building     she vibrates 

     switches off and on. Sometimes she’s barely  

bubbles in his arms     a froth of love.  

Some days her voice is so high only dogs can hear.  

She’s afraid the air won’t hold everything together.  

 

Choosing footwear for spring     she’s arty romantic 

for shoes that curl over her toes     an elfin look  

for people to ask where she’d come from     check 

for pointed ears     peer into her eyes as if 

her world floated iris nebula.  

 

Her feet charm     in naked leather     smooth orgasmic  

fit to send thrills up her legs     entice them to walk  

in tantalising rhythm causing hips to sway 

     suspend time     distract drivers,  

bring a day to a lurching halt. 

 

A queen with personal assistants     she breezes 

     through journeys like perfumed air     is a mobile 

art installation     forward musing skipping gaily. 

Ads flash for pineapple     bamboo     arrest bounce 

     make her calculate worth in physical presence. 

 

Her presentation     relevant history     intention 

as an ethereal being orders language     assumes love 

wears it like skin gloss    peers in on people      

examines their enduring selves and how 

they direct     choose which scenes important.

 

 

 

Satisfaction not Guaranteed 

 

1                                                            

I am a sofa, with skin that hugs. 

I lounge here, allow room  

for inner growth, stretch nicely. 

 

In this bag of skin, bulk or ballast  

we wear each other. I’m waterproof,  

hold babies, men in my arms. 

 

There are tiny scars, thickenings.  

Thinning on hands, forearms denotes  

the beginning of the end but 

 

tenure was always mine. I won’t be  

re-upholstered; the meat within  

may be a burnt offering, 

 

the stuffing, a feast for science. 

There can be no re-invention; no  

mind-ablutions can regenerate old me.

 

 

2 

If I said I wanted to be a torso  

with a head would you think me  

mad? No extremities to catch  

 

or gather. I’d need constant people,  

attention. I like peace and quiet, time  

to muse, become lost in fiction 

 

not snacking on ice-cream. So  

leave me between meals to ponder,  

nod the head at a wall of remotes. 

 

I’d be a rebel without a cause,  

a stuffed trunk topped with a brain  

that didn’t live in the world – 

 

if we all have the right to live as  

long as we live, let’s admit everyone 

already contracted by birth certificate.

 

 

 

SHAPESHIFTER 

 

 

One minute he’s blowing his trumpet 

the next dropping to his knees 

enveloped in orange 

black & white striped fur.  

A young woman calls 

Grab the tiger by its tail. 

The next voice roars 

Stay exactly where you are!  

Tiger watches 

is not immediately dangerous 

but who would think a tiger wasn’t?  

This entertaining man who’d harped on  

about his versions of truth 

is now a beast with issues. 

He raises his head 

shakes his whole body right out  

to the waving tail and prowls off stage  

gazing deeply every face 

muscles forcing eyes to follow  

as he moves on and on 

satisfied with the response.

 

 

 

DIRECTIONS 

 

 

She imagined truth as an  

impossible thing… a lemon ant,  

something to interrupt fate,  

a boat drifting like an invite, 

a flimsy dress and time-limit. 

Always a fairy tale. 

 

Back in herself,  

the sun smiled at her curling 

cold fingers in her armpits  

feel the early spring sun’s  

intentions; each finger a wand  

to wave to meet the dream.

 

 

 

LIMBO 

 

 

I’d expect dancing  

                         with naked     limber men 

muscles shiny with effort     and music  

thrumming through our so-called souls. 

 

I’ll choose that before a heaven  

                                          as long as  

I revert to my younger self 

but if still this elderly thing Heaven might suffice.  

Would Hell be too     rabble-rousing  

even for younger Me?  

 

I expect nothing for these selves in their shells.  

They die.  

           If there’s anything     it is leaving 

the existence of the body in human minds. 

 

I can see it having a good rest  

before diving back into a new venture. 

 

Limbo would be a holiday resort. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Irene Cunningham, a Glaswegian living in Brighton, has been anthologised, magazined & collected, nominated for the Pushcart Prize, won Autumn Voices memoir competition, and decades ago, won a week at Arvon with Roger McGough & Libby Houston. Books: SANDMEN: A Space Odyssey, Hedgehog Press. No Country for Old Woman Dreich Press. Fiona Was Here, Talking to Walls, Up@Ground Level, and A Lush Visit, Amazon. She is building small collections to clear space in her life and concentrate on neglected novel-writing. At the moment drowning in poems, kidnapped, mobbed.