{"id":1198,"date":"2008-03-24T17:20:16","date_gmt":"2008-03-24T17:20:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=1198"},"modified":"2008-03-24T17:20:16","modified_gmt":"2008-03-24T17:20:16","slug":"two-poems-by-amanda-weeks-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/two-poems-by-amanda-weeks-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Two poems by Amanda Weeks"},"content":{"rendered":"

Scrubber<\/p>\n

<\/span>From the minute I wake up<\/span>
I can hear her sweeping brush against the pavement<\/span>
And wonder how many particles of dirt<\/span>
Have settled since the last cleansing exercise<\/span>
Eight hours ago.<\/span>

Then she moves on to the windowsill<\/span>
The paint faded through constant rubbing.<\/span>
Next is the turn of the lamppost<\/span>
All graffiti is executed<\/span>
And Goldie the labrador\u2019s piss is bleached.<\/span>

Her windows, already gleaming<\/span>
Are wiped to within an inch of breaking \u2013 <\/span>
Nothing must spoil her view of the street.<\/span>
She needs to see if litter is dropped<\/span>
Or blown from less clean terraces.<\/span>

The ice cream man parks outside<\/span>
And she watches like a hawk.<\/span>
Once, his predecessor dropped a wafer<\/span>
She is on tenterhooks until the van<\/span>
And its unruly customers have gone.<\/span>

She waits for her husband to come home<\/span>
Through the back door \u2013 <\/span>
He\u2019s not allowed to use the front passage<\/span>
For fear of spoiling the carpet.<\/span>
But he doesn\u2019t come home, so she cleans some more.<\/span>


~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~<\/span>


Hindsight<\/span>


If I knew then what I know now<\/span>
I\u2019d wear short skirts and sleep around,<\/span>
Because when you\u2019re young and good looking<\/span>
With big tits and can drink more than the boys<\/span>
People call you a slag.<\/span>
So with hindsight I should have done Darren<\/span>
And Paul and Craig and all the others<\/span>
Who said I\u2019d done them<\/span>
And got some pleasure to compensate<\/span>
For the annoyance<\/span>
Of being called a slag,<\/span>
And squares whispering about me<\/span>
And boys constantly phoning me <\/span>
And hanging around my house<\/span>
Which made my father shout<\/span>
And call me a slag.<\/span>

If I knew then what I know now<\/span>
I would have gone on tour<\/span>
With that rock star I snogged, back stage<\/span>
In Newport Centre in 1994,<\/span>
And said \u201cbollocks\u201d to you<\/span>
And seen the World, had free drugs<\/span>
And good sex. Probably.<\/span>
If I\u2019d known that all the while<\/span>
Whilst I felt guilty and dirty<\/span>
You were seeing someone else \u2013 <\/span>
A fat girl with crooked teeth<\/span>
I would have gone to San Francisco,<\/span>
Left you crying, smashing up our home<\/span>
With all your friends comforting you,<\/span>
Giving you free drugs<\/span>
And calling me a slag.<\/span>


\u2022 <\/span><\/font>Amanda Weeks lives in Pontypridd, South Wales. She began writing eight
\nyears ago when, at 27, she decided to pack in her job as a collector,
\ninvent a pile of A levels and study creative writing and drama at
\nuniversity. She has had several short stories published in anthologies.
\nShe has written for several music magazines. Her Welsh-language
\nscreenplay Catastroffi<\/span> was
\nbroadcast on S4C in 2006, and she's had a further two screenplays
\noptioned to Tornado Films.<\/span><\/font><\/span>


<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Scrubber From the minute I wake upI can hear her sweeping brush against the pavementAnd wonder how many particles of dirtHave settled since the last cleansing exerciseEight hours ago.Then she moves on to the windowsillThe paint faded through constant rubbing.Next is the turn of the lamppostAll graffiti is executedAnd Goldie the labrador\u2019s piss is bleached.Her […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1198","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1198","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1198"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1198\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}