When we published our latest shortlist, we noted that it looked to the displaced and the vulnerable so it is perhaps no surprise that Rachael Smart’s ‘Waiting’, a poem that speaks to the vulnerability that is personal to so many of us, is our Pick of the Month for January 2017.
Rachael’s short fiction and poetry have been published online, in literary journals and placed in competitions. She is currently studying for an MA in Creative Writing at The University of Nottingham. She writes best when the pencil loses its point.
And, in January’s spirit of looking to the vulnerable, Rachael has asked that her £10 ‘prize’ be donated to The Railway Children, a charity that provides ‘protection and opportunity for children with nowhere else to go and nobody to turn to’.
Waiting
At Swanpool
the sand is Demerara sugar
a dark heart floats: cocoa
on a cappuccino scurf.
Out there, the horses break
relentless, Shire hooves kicking up
pasts. Fairy lights string
the ships in, a bistro siren
big on gratuities and gulfweed.
The sea has taken a pea-green boat
and my son out with it,
he is only a dot. It isn’t that
I don’t trust his father’s rowing, only
his feet don’t touch the bottom.
I see goggles – lost
a midnight vigil
tiny rib bones
hooked on a rock.
*********
Voters’ comments included:
It captures a parent’s habit, almost need, to envisage catastrophe in the midst of the mundane, almost as if preparing for the unthinkable. The description of the scene is both precise and mythical. evoking fairy tale, so appropriate for the child, and the wildness that the parent fears may overwhelm the child. It haunts the reader in all senses of the word.
Beautiful evocation of a mother’s love. The lines took me in an instant to a memory of such a moment. My mother feared open water. 🙂 Imagery shimmers. Tingling last lines and perfectly formed.
This poem stands out in a sea of amazing poems. It’s a concise, tight study of an unnameable worry that I could totally relate to. I can’t ask for more.
I find I’m often floating around in a bubble of beautiful words then she pops you abruptly out of it with her dry sense of humour, then in a few words can make you heart wrenchingly sad. It’s a little roller coaster of a read.
Wonderfully poignant…startling images. A lot said in few words. Love it.
Struck a chord with me, thought provoking
…the horror-laced edge, a sugared seaside idyll spoiled by maternal anxiety
Concision allied with the sheer intensity of such remarkable, memorable imagery make this the stand-out pick in a very strong field.
Beautiful play with words, could visualize everything. Really lovely
And one final, very personal comment which shows even more why it struck a chord with so many of you:
She’s my girlfriend and my son is in this dark poem with me on the boat. We were on holiday in Cornwall. When she nailed the last line, we drank red wine. Makes my heart hurt to see it in this list. Just that.