Bolthole
This is not my place,
every splash is her choice.
Grateful for escape,
I close my eyes, say nothing.
Borders on the walls,
slogans in the kitchen,
‘This house is a home’,
but not mine (always weird).
She cooks too much ‘chilli’,
a dense meaty mess,
it festers in the pan,
fetid fumes just hang.
The old pub nearby
is all local folk,
grimacing, posturing,
polished and primed.
RF 2021
Video/audio for this one here.
As I mentioned yesterday, things did not last long with the boyfriend in the last house so fairly quickly (in May 1991) I had to move out as it was very much his place (and I, shameless heartbreaker that I was in this instance, was already seeing someone new). Quickly, I rented the spare room of a young woman I knew at work – the attic bedroom of a small back-to-back terraced house in a part of Leeds I hadn’t lived in before (Kirkstall – nice abbey, busy roads). It wasn’t too far from where I’d lived since arriving in the city in 1989 but it had a very different feel to the areas I’d been in up to now (far fewer students, hippies and anarchists as far as I could see, though I may have missed some and it may have changed by now of course). I suppose it was still what you might have called ‘traditional’ Leeds (terraced houses, mostly white people, pubs). The owner of the house and I (again) didn’t have much in common but she was sweet to give me shelter when I needed it and she had a big, Brummie heart (and, if I remember, particularly terrible taste in men).
The new boyfriend was someone I really did like and we had shared interests (i.e., we were both dedicated fans of the groove and class A stimulants – though he also had a taste for hashish*, something I’ve never got on with, so many bloody names for it for a start). Other than that it was nice to finally have a proper partner in crime and we had an especially happy summer, if I remember. Unfortunately for him, this was also when the anxieties caused by this lifestyle were starting to make themselves known to me but this didn’t put him off (in fact it is generally my experience that good men are not put off by these things and in fact will help you recover, not make you feel bad about your problems). Throwing myself deeper and deeper into the alternative lifestyle (as I did) probably didn’t help with the growing anxieties but at this point I was in some pretty strong denial on that front. What other kind of life was there? Why would anyone not embrace the joy that was ecstasy and endless dancing? Never a religious person, I was a fairly strong convert to this particular faith. I believed, I worshipped, I was devoted.
My landlady was lovely but about as far from alternative as you could get so it was pretty soon time to move on from here too (I stayed here about 3 months). Back to the chaos of Hyde Park (and lots of students and hippies) tomorrow … and a change of workplace.
*Other names for this product are available. Most of them are ridiculous.
This poem is part of the annual Fun A Day Dundee project where participants try to do something creative every day for the month of January. You don't have to be in Dundee to take part and there are other Fun A Day projects around the world. People post as much of their work online as they want to (largely on Instagram but it can be elsewhere too). This year I am posting a whole poem a day (one poem for each of the 31 addresses I have lived at, covering the period 1967-2021). Videos/photos of the poems show the places remembered in the poems but were mostly taken from recent Google Street View. The videos are on my Instagram, maybe elsewhere too. Use the hashtag #fadd2021 on social media to see other people's online contributions.
No comments:
Post a Comment