"washerwoman" poems
THE WASHERWOMAN is a member of the Salvation Army.
And over the tub of suds rubbing underwear clean
She sings that Jesus will wash her sins away
And the red wrongs she has done God and man
Shall be white as driven snow.
Rubbing underwear she sings of the Last Great Washday.
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One day He
tipped His top hat
and walked
out of the room,
ending the argument.
He stomped off
saying:
I don't give guarantees.
I was left
quite alone
using up the darkness
I rolled up
my sweater,
up in a ball,
and took it
to bed with me,
a kind of stand-in
for God,
that washerwoman
who walks out
when you're clean
but not ironed.
When I woke up
the sweater
had turned to
bricks of gold.
I'd won the world
but like a
forsaken explorer,
I'd lost
my map.
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Lord Henry Dickenbottem
Lived among his peers
A mind of deepest arrogance
Concealed between his ears
He spent his nights in gross misconduct
Lounging in his secret quarters
Mistress, maid and washerwoman
Ousted mothers, secret daughters
Hiding sordid love affairs
His endless line of ******* heirs
***** Henry Dickenbottem
Stalked above the stairs
Lady Mary Dickenbottem
Did her wifely duty
The slenderest of all her kin
Considered quite the beauty
Though in the dusk the candle burned
Alone, she stitched a pallid face
And in the dark she sought its words
To gain her shallow masters grace
Guiding will and fooling eyes
Beseeching of the dead to rise
Demon Mary Dickenbottem
She the pure despise
Master Neville Dickenbottem
Best of all his class
Beaten all the school boys
And bedded every lass
Allies of the strongest kind
And making merry of the weak
The liberties were his to take
And never one he wouldn’t seek
His gaze surveyed that which he ruled
All logical and water cooled
Nasty Neville Dickenbottem
Devil-fire fuelled
Young Jemmima Dickenbottem
Innocent and slight
Playing on the borderline
And darting out of sight
Only ever at her ease
When no one else was close about
And etched upon her baby face
The guilty shadow of a doubt
Always blamed if something broke
And speaking just above a croak
Shy Jemmima Dickenbottem
Tangible as smoke
Old Mother Dickenbottem
Lounging in her chair
Lavender and nicotine
Are fighting for her hair
Beware, at night she ventures forth
So best keep safe your tiny tots
She’ll creep up to the windowpane
And ****** them, sleeping, from their cots
Humming in discordant tones
Nimble fingers, cold as stones
Hungry Mother Dickenbottem
Gnawing on the bones
Dear Major Dickenbottem
Five years in the ground
Hoarded every ha’penny
But frittered every pound
Long he served his king and queen
A gentlemanly thing to do
He left the port with many men
And brought back homeward very few
He died away in foreign lands
Of syphilis and swollen glands
Dead Major Dickenbottem
Killed by wandering hands
Feb 8, 2013
Feb 8, 2013 at 2:03 PM UTC
Old courtyards with tubs of laundry:
‘Go to the washerwoman and do your own washing’
I whisper to you, and the wild apricot trees
all turn suddenly white, the sky pales,
the world is ****** in a drenching buzz.
There΄s a smell of bluebags and a sulphurous bubbling.
You΄d hardly believe it — so much steam rises
that only dirt is left in the copper.
The wild apricots petrify into coral.
It΄s so easy — easy in a woman΄s way —
to wash your soul, to rejoice in the spring wind
shaking the scales on its dragon-tail
so that you΄re looking at soap-bubbles
it blows for you between your fingers.
Two children pass by, holding on a string
a balloon transparent as a bubble.
For a moment we are crouched inside it.
Grete Tartler
[Translated into English by Fleur Adcock]
New Europe Writers Bucharest Tales, Contemporary Literature Press, Bucharest, 2014
Jun 12, 2014
Jun 12, 2014 at 11:47 AM UTC
*Soap froth sprays in the air
Up down up down it goes
Rhythmic swings don’t care
If the detergent smells of rose!
She has to cleanse all dirt
Rub off the dourest stain
In it she puts her heart
Thereby forgets own pain!
Rises the lever up far
Swoops down fast with a thud
Rainbow bubbles scatter around her
She knew not when staled a rosebud!
In the tub water her ocean
She squeezes the wetness dry
She knows only this motion
Got no time to look at the sky!
Now in the sun she must spread
Fabric of brightness on sight
Her own life’s long lost thread
Is buried in the hush of night!
Does she remember the broken oaths
Her life never nurtured in sun
Worn out as all her washed clothes
Faded like all the years gone!*
May 30, 2014
May 30, 2014 at 5:51 AM UTC
The fly lit on a propellor of
a washerwoman whirligig
watched by a whisky sour wino
wearing a scratchy candied wig
he wondered about a wing-ding
under the comeuppance of rain
we struggle that way
you and I...
like ants burdened with twigs
close the door behind you
walk back in
Aug 24, 2019
Aug 24, 2019 at 9:17 PM UTC