Lady and Fox
by Beatrice Garland
You, dog fox, dancer in the dark,
snapper-up of unconsidered trifles,
don’t look at me like that.
You’re curling your lip at me, moon-hunter,
backing away needle-toothed,
winged ears flattening against the bone.
Stop fretting about those sleeping pigeons
and hold my gaze. You’re a handsome beast
for a city dweller: could turn a lady into fox.
I want to grab you, mouse-catcher,
in your marvellously-tailored dream-coat,
dig my fingers into your furred lapels
and hold on tight for a rough ride.
And we could join forces, bone-cruncher:
I’d cook up those chickens for the two of us.
So show me the foxtrot, rats’ bane,
and I’ll teach you the slow waltz.
Before you disappear into the dark
let’s go out on the razzle –
you in your carnival mask,
me in my red fox fur.
From The Invention of Fireworks. Reproduced with kind permission from Templar Poetry.
Forward Prizes for Poetry
Shortlisted for Best First Collection 2014
The Invention of Fireworks
Beatrice Garland
About Beatrice Garland
Beatrice Garland (b. 1938 Oxford) describes writing as ‘a marvellous part of one’s interior private life’ and cites John Donne, John Clare and Seamus Heaney as inspirations. At school, she was punished for misdemeanours by being forced to memorise poetry. ‘Whole lines and particular individual words themselves became, like sweets, something that could be saved up and enjoyed for their marvellous taste,’ Garland explains.
In 2001, she won the National Poetry Prize. She wrote no poetry for a while afterwards, but focused on her work as an NHS clinician and researcher in psychological medicine. She won the Strokestown International Poetry Competition in 2002 and was shortlisted for the inaugural Picador Poetry Prize. The Invention of Fireworks contains about 50 of the ‘several hundred’ poems Garland has scattered all over the room where she writes.
