published poem, ‘The Black Lie.’ ” The goofy student said,
“That explains the uncertainty of tone in that poem, the
sense of loss which is actually an expression of guilt.”
“Exactly,” said Bob. One of the day trippers raised his
hand and said, “Can you tell me how long this is going to
take? We thought we might try to catch the ferret
juggling at midday.” “Not long,” said Bob, “it’s not like
we’re talking Samuel Laycock here, right?” Adopting what
I hoped was a Russian accent I cleared my throat and said,
“Are you sure about the lych gate story? Armitage could
only have been a toddler when that funeral took place.”
Bob said, “Look, pal, don’t start splitting hairs today, all
right? I’m only standing in for my wife. When it comes
to Simon Armitage she really knows her onions, but her
brother’s gone down with the shingles—big scabs right
around his middle like a boxer’s belt—so she’s playing
Florence Nightingale in Market Harborough while
muggings here is left holding the baby. So don’t shoot
the messenger. I was supposed to be supervising the
Bouncy Castle. Anyway, where do you come from?”
“Moscow,” I said, then added, “Actually a small town
about twenty miles to the east,” intending to give the
falsehood a kind of detailed veracity. Bob said, “OK, folks,
if Leonid Brezhnev here hasn’t got any more questions,
let’s move on.”
We walked up to the stagnant canal, where, according to
Bob, my pet Yorkshire terrier had drowned while retrieving
a tennis ball. Bob said, “Armitage never got over that dog,
and the whole sorry incident is recorded in his sonnet
‘Man’s Best Friend.’ Who knows, maybe he should have
gone in himself instead of sending that poor mutt to its
death.” “Presumably that explains some of the emotional
retardation in his later work,” said the goofy student, whose
front teeth were getting longer by the minute. “Exactly,”
said Bob. We waited for one of the day trippers, who’d
wandered off along the towpath to read a noticeboard
about horse-drawn barges in the nineteenth century, then
the tour continued. With Bob spouting his stuff at every
lamppost, we walked to a dilapidated cowshed where I was
gored by a bull when I was nine, supposedly, then to the
escarpment where I’d seen my father bring down a fieldfare
with a single stone. Then to Bunny Wood where I’d found
Gossip John hanging by the neck, then to a meadow where
I’d fallen asleep and woken up with a grass snake curled on
my chest, then behind the undertaker’s parlour, where, Bob
confidently announced, I’d lost my virginity to a girl called
Keith. The two ladies tittered behind their hands. We
wandered in a big circle for a couple of hours before
arriving in the park, and congregated around the bronze,
life-size statue of Simon Armitage. “Of course it caused a
huge stink at the time,” said Bob, lighting a cigarette and
tossing the spent match into the bandstand. “It looks like
something to be proud of,” I said, from behind my beard.
Bob rounded on me: “Oh really? Well maybe that’s how it
looks from the Kremlin, but as it happens a lot of people in
this village said the money should have gone to the
Children’s Hospice instead. Those kids with their big eyes
and shaved heads—breaks your heart. But don’t ask me,
I’m only a taxpayer.” Goofy said, “And once Armitage had
packed his bags for Los Angeles he never came back.”
“Exactly so, son, exactly so,” said Bob. Then with the tip
of his cigarette he pointed towards the white splodge on
Armitage’s scalp and the white streaks on his metal face
and said, “But at least the seagulls like it.” And everyone
laughed. Bob said, “All right, people, that just about wraps
Homestead Experience?” I wanted to know. Bob sighed,
impatiently. “OK, Boris, take the keys and post them back
through the letterbox when you’re done. It’s the one at the
top of the hill with the broken windows. There’s a
compulsory donation of five pounds and be sure to wear
the plastic overshoes. And don’t touch a thing—it’s just as
he left it.” I said, “You mean with the tin of mustard
powder on the kitchen table, and a line of his father’s
ironed shirts hanging from the picture rail, the fancy ones
that he wore on stage. And a folded newspaper propped on
the arm of the chair, the cryptic crossword laddered with
blue ink. And his mother’s reading glasses, one arm folded
the other outstretched, next to the silver pen?” Bob said,
“You tell me, you’re the expert, Mr. First Monkey in Space.
Now, if you don’t mind, I want to see Martin Amis opening
the Duck Race, and we’re running late.”
Last Day on Planet Earth
Lippincott takes a photograph with his eye.
Wittmann paints in the crust of salt with a
finger of spit. Yoshioka wheels the last
piano onto the fire. Owens throws stones at
a rock. The afternoon turns over in its sleep,
then sleeps.
Kirszenstein trades her kingfisher skull for
a tinned peach. Jerome traps air in a screw-
top jar. Bambuck plants the last of his teeth.
Johnson dresses his gangrenous wound with
a carrier bag. Bolt pulls up the ladder,
secures the hatch.
Acknowledgments
Acknowledgments and thanks are due to the editors and organisers of the following publications and projects: Salt Magazine, Blackbox Manifold, The Literateur, The Rialto, Grist, PN Review, Poetry London, Yorkshire Sculpture Park (“The Twilight Readings”), Fiddlehead (Canada), BBC Radio 4 “Writing the City,” Cent, Tatler, To Hell, Poetry Review, The Colour of Sound—Anthony Frost Exhibition (Beaux Arts), Love Poet, Carpenter—Michael Longley at Seventy (Enitharmon), Loops, TriQuarterly, The New Yorker, AGNI.
A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Simon Armitage was born in West Yorkshire in 1963. In 1992 he was winner of one of the first Forward Prizes, and a year later was the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year. He works as a freelance writer, broadcaster, and playwright, and has written extensively for radio and television. Previous titles include Kid, Book of Matches, The Dead Sea Poems, CloudCuckooLand, Killing Time, The Universal Home Doctor, Homer’s Odyssey, and Tyrannosaurus Rex versus the Corduroy Kid. His acclaimed translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight was published in 2007. He has taught at the University of Iowa’s Writers’ Workshop and is Professor of Poetry at the University of Sheffield.
ALSO BY SIMON ARMITAGE
POETRY
Zoom!
Xanadu
Kid
Book of Matches
The Dead Sea Poems
Moon Country (with Glyn Maxwell)
CloudCuckooLand
Killing Time
Selected Poems
Travelling Songs
The Universal Home Doctor
Homer’s Odyssey
Tyrannosaurus Rex versus the Corduroy Kid
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
DRAMA
Mister Heracles (after Euripides)
Jerusalem
Eclipse
PROSE
All Points North
Little Green Man
The White Stuff
Gig: The Life and Times of a Rock Star Fantasist