Anne Askew & Amber Heard
Plain speaking
a woman of few words, is a gift of God (Sirach 26:14)
Rack and stretch her, loosen flesh
from bone. A jointed bird will not squawk.
Each turn and pull will tighten
the denial in her lips.
Pop the sockets of her shoulders and her hips.
She’ll howl in a tongue you do not know.
Twist her limbs from their hinges.
She will not let a single name breed
from her screams. She has known worse
than this, a woman’s body’s made for pain.
When she is broken, when you have wrenched
the last of her, but still you are no wiser,
carry her. Chain her upright to a chair, bring a crowd
to see her suffer. Light the taper
She will burn her body slumped and beat
snapped upright by the noose of
paparazzi flash
listen to the crackle of a virtual match
the Tik-Tok of the minutes
counting down
her face on every paper the rustling chatter
look at him fleshed out
a monster of a pirate swagger and joust
his face swollen and puffed yet hard and proud
and the crowd
their stones and sticks
ready for the fix of an internet high
hands him the light
Gill Connors is from North Yorkshire where she lives and works. She is working on a third collection which will be the result of her PhD, on the subject of the links and parallels between sixteenth century and twenty-first century women. She is a managing editor of Yaffle and Yaffle’s Nest.