{"id":966,"date":"2007-01-22T13:36:00","date_gmt":"2007-01-22T13:36:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=966"},"modified":"2007-01-22T13:36:00","modified_gmt":"2007-01-22T13:36:00","slug":"triptych-for-the-lone-night-gods-by-andrea-porter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/triptych-for-the-lone-night-gods-by-andrea-porter\/","title":{"rendered":"Triptych for the Lone Night Gods by Andrea Porter"},"content":{"rendered":"

Triptych for the Lone Night Gods<\/span>

 <\/span>
and<\/span> <\/span>
too much time  is spent on this<\/span>
you  only have  so  many hours<\/span>
in a day you  have  to prioritise<\/span>
because  a third of this is sleep<\/span>
or   what  now passes for sleep<\/span>
splayed out on  a firm mattress<\/span>
that if you believe   the adverts <\/span>
is rippling with  mites and bugs<\/span>
of a microscopic nature and the<\/span>
thin duck feather pillow plucked<\/span>
pummelled down to submission<\/span>
is fattened  with  sloughed skin<\/span>
from your dried cheeks despite<\/span>
the new moisturiser you bought<\/span>
when you  thought of  your age<\/span>
that long predictable  cold front<\/span>
the  passing touch  of someone<\/span>
at the sandwich counter      the<\/span>
slight electric of a  cooler  hand <\/span>
and<\/span>
too much time  is spent on this<\/span>

 <\/span>
so<\/span>
as I said you can\u2019t turn it off like a tap not this particular tap the washer has rotted and water keeps coming  hitting the drum of the plastic bowl  so you take out  the bowl  just for the sake of changing the pitch the yellow page plumber is busy for days and emergency call outs seem way too much for such a small thing such a common place thing the imprint of metal embeds in your hand as you turn it and twist it clockwise and tighter everyday fighting to make it all stop even then you know your logic is skewed but you need to do something to be in control to seem undefeated the sound stalks you to bed at 3.23 you hear it downstairs through two skins of wood long after the plumber the exorbitant cheque you lie in the silent stretch of your bed arms flung to edges catching ghosts dropping hollowing stigmata in the grasp of your hands as I said you can\u2019t turn it off like a tap not this particular tap the water keeps coming  keeps coming  keeps coming keeps coming keeps coming  keeps co<\/span>


to bed<\/span>
where sounds jump into bed  like the old fridge<\/span>
that shudders  awake  at 3am  hums mmmmm<\/span>
it can sense what I am failing to be this sleeper<\/span>
lit up by the radio red  half-life  of the LED  dial<\/span>
the silent electronic tick  prods the air  my face<\/span>
I  can  taste  its  finger in my mouth  the sweet<\/span>
deep colourant buzz  of pick\u2018n\u2019mix   cola bottles<\/span>
shrimps      flying saucers    fluorescent red lips<\/span>
Sleep   the star of the peep-show  is downstairs<\/span>
I can hear her watching TV   a gaudy quiz show<\/span>
time  has  become  the  slow   smell of his neck<\/span>
washed from  these sheets  both of us  bedded<\/span>
down  in the back seat   of a clapped out Fiesta<\/span>
the fridge can\u2019t see me now    I have poked out<\/span>
its  eyes  with  a gherkin  blind-folded the clock<\/span>
mini- moto sparrows are  just  beginning to rev<\/span>
I  could  throw a  big cloth  over the cul-de-sac<\/span>
kid them its night    double dark Mrs G\u2019s budgie<\/span>
the street\u2019s pending    the corner shop\u2019s in-tray<\/span>
being stuffed with The Sun   sliced white bread<\/span>
I   am  not  asleep yet  because    Boise  Idaho<\/span>
Perth Australia     Shanghai   the Polar ice caps<\/span>
are still awake drinking tea  and  talking to me<\/span>
the Slumber land  mattress whispers  in my ear<\/span>
horror  stories  of  chicks  eaten  by fat  hippos<\/span>
I am  exchanging  fish  recipes  with   penguins<\/span>
telling  trailer park trash  about    love in a box<\/span>
this  fog-bound    grounded   journey  of  sleep<\/span>
takes  me  places  I\u2019ll never  come  back  from<\/span>
in  my  old  Nelson  blue  geography text book<\/span>
stalactites  have  to  hang on  tight   I chanted<\/span>
all of  Mrs  Hardy\u2019s  chalky   lime-scaled  sheep<\/span>
rocked  my flip-lid  desk to sleep   like  a  baby<\/span>
the  night is  going  to be pulled   like a cracker<\/span>
snapped     useless debris    no smell of cordite<\/span>
just a cheap plastic dream   a curled up  motto<\/p>\n

\u2022 Andrea Porter is a member of the poetry performance group Joy of Six that has performed in Britain and New York. She has been published in a number of poetry magazines (both paper and online) in the UK , Canada , Australia and USA . Her narrative sequence of poems Bubble<\/span> was adapted for Radio 4 as a drama by the RSC playwrite Fraser Grace. She received an Escalator Award from the British Arts Council (East) and The New Writing Partnership in 2006 to complete a novel. She sleeps either too little or too much.<\/span><\/span><\/font> www.joyofsix.co.uk<\/a> <\/span><\/span><\/font><\/span><\/span>
<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Triptych for the Lone Night Gods and too much time  is spent on thisyou  only have  so  many hoursin a day you  have  to prioritisebecause  a third of this is sleepor   what  now passes for sleepsplayed out on  a firm mattressthat if you believe   the adverts is rippling with  mites and bugsof a microscopic nature and […]<\/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-966","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/966","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=966"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/966\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=966"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=966"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=966"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}