Bridled Vows
by Ian Duhig
I will be faithful to you, I do vow,
but not until the seas have all run dry
et cetera. Although I mean it now
I’m not a prophet and I will not lie.
To be your perfect wife, I could not swear;
I’ll love, yes; honour (maybe); won’t obey,
but will co-operate if you will care
as much as you are seeming to today.
I’ll do my best to be your better half,
but I don’t have the patience of a saint
and at you, not with you, I’ll sometimes laugh,
and snap too, though I’ll try to show restraint.
We might work out. No blame if we do not.
With all my heart, I think it’s worth a shot.
From The Blind Roadmaker. Reproduced with kind permission from Picador.
Forward Prizes for Poetry
Shortlisted for Best Collection 2016
The Blind Roadmaker
Ian Duhig
About Ian Duhig
Ian Duhig (b. 1954, London) is particularly celebrated for his poem ‘The Lammas Hireling’, which won both the National Poetry Competition and the 2001 Forward Prize for Best Single Poem. Having worked with homeless people for fifteen years and finding, as he writes, that ‘location and poetry dissolve into each other for me’, Duhig has inserted a rare depth of understanding of his native Leeds into his poetry.
‘Poetry drew me in because it can contain so much so easily in its own paradoxical compass’, he has written. Certainly paradoxical clashes frequently find expression in his poetry, including The Blind Roadmaker, his shortlisted collection; modern chatter alongside myth and lore, litheness of thought alongside strict metrical forms, a mischievous humour alongside a devastating sense of tragedy. Chosen as one of the Poetry Book Society’s New Generation of poets in 1994, with Carol Ann Duffy and Simon Armitage, Duhig shares those poets’ ability to dramatise contemporary concerns in technically accomplished verse.
Duhig’s advice to aspiring poets is practical: ‘learn to live on very little. Never underestimate what a massive pain in the arse you will be to your loved ones and everybody else. Be lucky and be kind.’
Forward Prizes History:
- 2003 Forward Prizes for Best Collection, shortlisted for The Lammas Hireling (Picador)
- 2002 Forward Prizes for Best Single Poem, shortlisted for Rosary (Poetry London)
- 2001 Forward Prizes for Best Single Poem, Winner for The Lammas Hireling (National Poetry Competition)
