A Map Towards Fluency

by Lisa Kelly

Overview

Shortlisted for the Michael Murphy Memorial Poetry Prize 2021

A Map Towards Fluency, Lisa Kelly's first collection, considers words, the power they impart, the power their absence withholds. Forgetting, mis-hearing, mis-remembering all challenge the imagination to find ways round and ways through. 'The idea of fluency interests me - and whether we can ever claim fluency in any language.' Her mother speaking Danish - which she cannot herself understand - is familiar and yet alienating: how Danish can she herself be when she cannot hear her mother's tongue with understanding? Her own attempts with British Sign Language are another challenge, a form of translation of sense in the absence of sound. 'I have to work hard to listen and this requires me to place you to my right side, to watch your lips, to watch your hands, to watch your gestures. How can form not matter?' The poems touch on these themes in various ways, not least in what they do with form.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781784108410
Publisher:	Carcanet Press, Limited
Publication date:	08/08/2019
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	112
Sales rank:	782,434
File size:	469 KB

About the Author

Lisa Kelly is half-Danish and half-deaf. She is the Chair of Magma Poetry and co-edited issue 63, The Conversation Issue; and issue 69, The Deaf Issue. She is a regular host of poetry evenings at the Torriano Meeting House, London, and has an MA in Creative Writing with Distinction from Lancaster University. Her pamphlets are Bloodhound (Hearing Eye, 2012) and Philip Levine's Good Ear (Stonewood Press, 2018). She is currently a freelance journalist specialising in technology, and has worked as an actress, life model, Consumer Champion, waitress, sales assistant and envelope stuffer. She teaches creative writing and poetry in performance at the Torriano Meeting House.
Lisa Kelly is half-Danish and half-deaf. She is the Chair of Magma Poetry and co-edited issue 63, The Conversation Issue; and issue 69, The Deaf Issue. She is a regular host of poetry evenings at the Torriano Meeting House, London, and has an MA in Creative Writing with Distinction from Lancaster University. Her pamphlets are Bloodhound (Hearing Eye, 2012) and Philip Levine’s Good Ear (Stonewood Press, 2018). She is currently a freelance journalist specialising in technology, and has worked as an actress, life model, Consumer Champion, waitress, sales assistant and envelope stuffer. She teaches creative writing and poetry in performance at the Torriano Meeting House.

Read an Excerpt

CHAPTER 1

Scale and Accuracy

Whitewash

The faded Swastika on the side of the barn is showing through the latest layer of paint and must be painted over by the owner again.

Our generation is generous it seems.
Over dinner we discuss how the farmer's daughter was a victim of her beautiful genes,

no choice but to take the Nazi officer's seed.
What would you do? The sort of moral dilemma sorted over a second bottle, until resentment breeds.

Your great uncle a prêté serment –
swore an oath to Pétain – and was préfet
of Calvados. I translate this to an easy life in Caen.

I ask if, after the war, he was detained.
You say, surveillance gardée, (is there a difference?)
but his possessions and farm were returned.

I boast of my Danish uncle who fought in the resistance.
You stress yours was an uncle only by marriage.
Where is this going? Nowhere, but we are persistent,

stripping off layers of skin to expose raw nerves,
find iron in blood, the cross in the rib cage –
what of us that shows through, what it proves.


Bureau Mazarin

It stands like a tragedy And the locks were forced
Strikingly teased data Weathercocks end or fled

Apart from its creator Left in the attic
A rip at comforter's art Theft intact lie

Walnut, olive-wood, brass Furniture restorer
A wad blows revolutions Retrofit rerun ruse

We are shabby observers Restores
Everywhere basso barbs Or resets

To this noble narrator Late seventeenth century
Betrothals rain on rot Evanescent they lute rent

The mob would have Your pretty legs
Behaved owl mouth Surgery yet plot

Broken and burnt it Their pitilessness
Drunken ribbon tat Litheness its spire

Or used it in the kitchen The cheap Kandinsky print
Kinesthetic oh red unit Hyphenated pranks ink tic

The legs were broken Gallops away in embarrassment
Berserk genteel who Rams a man powerlessly abating


Aubade for an Artist

Of course, the morning came; it always does,
but before was an evening, and it was such an evening I felt already afraid of morning before the light began to fade.

He cooked while I looked out of a sash window.
As he set the table, I said, There's a rainbow,
and he replied, I painted the sky for you.
Such a perfect response: too good to be true.

So we ate, and I remember it was fish,
which I don't much like, but again the dish of tarnished silver was so perfectly placed on a crushed red velvet curtain, draped

over a folding table in the room's centre that the flavour meant less than the gesture,
the blunt edge, notched tip of a fish knife –
I thought, Can we possibly still our lives.

Of course, the morning came; it always does,
but before was an evening, and it was such an evening I felt already afraid of morning before the light began to fade.


Life Model

I can't look him in the eye because I'm naked.
And I can't look down because he's naked.
So I look at the circle of people, who aren't naked,
but are nakedly impatient for me to take my place on the podium,
so they can cover their naked canvasses with charcoal.

My back is skin-to-skin with his back;
there's not a cigarette paper between us,
and I curl my legs around myself to try and look like the statue of the Little Mermaid and create interesting contours,
and stare out, motionless, at the sea of blank faces.

And I hope I don't sneeze.
And I hope I don't sweat.
And I hope I don't secrete.
Because I'm fish naked.
And there's no-one to mop me up.
And there's no-one to dab me down.

And this is what it feels like to cease to exist,
to be naked and have no-one ask,
Are you ok?
to have no-one say anything,
to have a partner who lies against you naked and doesn't care what you think, or feel,
who doesn't know you, or want to know you.

Four hours later, clothed, and £16 cash-in-hand richer,
I leave to meet my artist boyfriend, in the gallery with naked canvasses on the walls, and guinea pigs,
like little muffs, running around the floor,
dodging boots and heels, stopping to nibble carrots,
and snuggling down in beds of pubic straw.

And I think, maybe I'm an artist,
or at least a crucial part of the artistic process,
like a naked canvas, or a mermaid, or a guinea pig.

Maybe I do exist.

And maybe one day there will be a picture of me in an attic,
which will stay young forever, and I feel so confident,
I answer the exhibitor's question, What do you do?
with, I'm a life model.

And he replies, You're a stripper.
You strip off for £4 an hour.
You're nothing but a strip artist.
And my boyfriend, who's in our group, says nothing.
His face is a blank canvas.

And this is what it feels like to cease to exist,
to feel naked and have no-one ask,
Are you ok?
to have no-one say anything,
to have a partner who lies against you naked and doesn't care what you think, or feel,
who doesn't know you, or want to know you.

And at that moment, I decide to exist, and I say,
You're nothing but a ripoff artist,
dressed in the Emperor's new clothes.

And I don't feel naked.
I feel like I'm wearing steel-capped boots,
and a breastplate, and a leather jacket with studs.
I feel like I'm wearing the Arc de Triomphe as a knuckle duster,
and the Statue of Liberty as headgear.

And I think, forget trying to look like a statue of the Little Mermaid,
and forget not sneezing, or sweating or secreting,
and forget the blank canvasses on the walls, and the blank faces,
and forget staying young in an attic, and totally forget the guinea pigs.

And forget having a partner who lies against you naked and doesn't care what you think, or feel,
who doesn't know you, or want to know you.


Slant of Summer

There's a black and white photo of my half-siblings stuck in my memory, their legs in wooden stocks.
My sister's head is tilted. She is half-smiling.
The white bow in her hair matches her white dress,
although what is white could be pink or powder green in that slant of summer. Our brother, laid-back,
leans away from the lens. This is his time to dream,
fringe falling over one eye, on half-term break from boarding school, where he was force-fed maggots and sat half-asleep to warm the toilet seat for a prick of a prefect, and there's a cuteness-
cum-cockiness in his eye which might or might not antagonise the man who will cuckold his father –
who may or may not already be part of the picture.


Six Perspectives on Lilian Kjærulff
2 April 1934 – 17 July 2010

i. second daughter from second marriage

I know why you married so young.
You curtsied to him, offered your gloved hand with your girlish good manners,
straight off the Esbjerg boat.
Your signature move: that dip.
You were a tall girl; your mother warmed to see another top you by an inch.
You told me once, if out together,
you walked in the gutter,
so she didn't feel so small. Nothing bitchy meant by her remark,
Se, en anden giraf!
That's why curtseying came so naturally:
maternal inculcation. Of course,
when you made yourself small for him,
he had to fall in love; and you were trained to please.


ii. first husband

It wasn't the height gap; it was the age gap that bothered me: 13 years, I grey, you blonde.
Your accent I found charming,
Wheel for dinner darling?
but then tiring. I was a golfer, not a teacher.
I liked your sportiness. Your height must have helped:
Danish Junior Tennis Champion at 15.
Imagine. You at full stretch smashing a ball, your dress rising.
When we met, you dropped a bunch of marguerites,
(well, that's what we told the children)
bent at the same time, bumped heads,
and hearts.
You told me 13 was a lucky number in Denmark.
Sod the age gap:
I wanted you.


iii. best friend

I called you Great Dane; you called me She.
Both with two children, both golf widows,
both with frightful mothers-in-law –
yours called you The Hun.
Bound to become friends darling.
Of course I knew. Everything.
You covered for me, I covered for you.
Friends do that. I often brought my lover to lunch. You served champagne and Smörgåsbord.
There was that time you said Dickie tried to kiss you,
but he liked to tickle a lady with his moustache. Just his way.
Nothing meant by it. All fun and games.
We got over it. Great Dane, such a sport!


iv. second husband

Other men's wives:
neglected, grateful for attention,
but most importantly no bother.
You were different.
He was a drinking pal at the club.
We had handicaps in common,
not much else. Until you.
I want another drink.
Will you dance with my wife?
Of course, I obliged.
The club tolerated affairs,
but it treated divorcees like the Irish. We had to move.
I never regretted anything.
You were my Lil.
Jeg elsker dig.


v. first daughter from first marriage

I was 11; it was a bit of an adventure packing.
I knew you were unhappy,
the last two years sleeping in my room,
making yourself small to fit in the bed,
long summers in Copenghagen.
You left dad a Dear John note.
I understood, but I loved him.
The adventure was soon over:
I missed school, my friends, London.
Buckinghamshire was just leafy. I went home.
He married the barmaid at the club;
she was nice until she took his name.
You phoned him once to tell him to tell her to stop.
He said, If you hadn't left we wouldn't be having this conversation.


vi. mother

You were my only child.
And you left.
I saw you just two weeks every year:
in one house, and then another. Imagine.
Four grandchildren I couldn't speak to.
I'm not trying to make you feel guilty,
but imagine. You broke my heart.
You could have had anyone, a Danish anyone. I'm not trying to make you feel guilty, but imagine what it was like when I became ill. Your father on his own.
My memory going, repeating myself over and over. I was so proud of you.
I want you to know that. Imagine how proud:
a champion at 15, beautiful manners.
And so tall.


A&E

If this waiting is hellish, then the sick are limbo dancing;
only those who are bent double, or on the floor, puddles of their former selves, have a hope of getting under the bar,
progressively lowered as more contorted squeeze through.

If the woman in a white coat is god, then the boy with bleeding hands has stigmata, the man with closed eyes on the stretcher is Lazarus,
and the toddler pushing donkey-on-wheels up and down,
up and down, is one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

If this is a place of worship, then the grey kidney-shaped receptacles are donation plates passed around for contributions from the faithful,
hopeful they are worthy of saving. If this is where you think the wait will end within four hours, then think again, the end is always waiting.


Death Certificate, Burnt Oak

Dealing with the paperwork of dying,
the registrar looks dead bored, and, sighing,
he asks for my dad's place and date of death and birth, job, names, and last usual address.
As he writes it down, his signet ring gleams on his little finger. He looks up, leans towards my mother, and his pen is poised,
as he asks her, as wife of the deceased,
her name, and, at last, her occupation.
Housewife, she says. A hesitation,
he wrinkles his brow, and, again, he sighs,
taps his pen, Is that all? Yes, she replies,
and in her voice, there's no hint of recoil,
while I said nothing, but boiled. And still boil.


The Shadow Cast

'I'm not casting the human figure,
but the shadow that is cast.'
— Alberto Giacometti

I did not sit in the car watching the nervous grass,
the bush in full swell,
waiting for it to crash into the windscreen.
I put down the book with its blank white cover,
took off silver sandals,
placed dark glasses in the cup holder, opened the resistant door,
ran at full pelt across the field. I did not flinch when a nasty, little stone chipped off the road,
burrowed into my sole.

I did not discard shorts on the shore, tear off top,
revealing goosed flesh in bra and pants, did not think how my mother would never have behaved like this,
would sit in her deckchair windcheatered, headscarfed,
in sensible sandals,
watching nervous Giacometti figures wading out at ridiculous angles to the Atlantic crests arms flailing in a last-ditch attempt to wave her in to join the undeniable fun.
I did not resent,
succumbing to a grey-blue wave the colour of our lips later,
that she never came in as she towelled us hard to rough up blood.

I did not smack into the surf, scream as it took me and my knickers down. I did not cut my wrist on a nasty little stone, swallow salt, choke, stand up to my children's laughter at my demi-nakedness,
pull up pants full of shale.
I did not think, At least I'm fun,
did not wrestle with a khaki-coat briefly turned kite casting a shadow on the sand,
before I could zip myself in,
and wait huddled on a rock.
I did not say,
Can I go back to the car?


Ø

Danish for island a new word new world to explore

My tongue tastes the sound of Ø
touches its shores its limits

I dream of Ø, wishing it in my blood as the English sound that comes so easily, it is thoughtless

Ø floats like those white blood cells that gave my mother
& her tongue life

My mouth has a Caliban look monsterish in expressiveness and more ridiculously round than Ø

Surrounded by a sea of white
Ø is what it means but I can't possess even this small word

The axis cutting north-east to south-west makes Ø
a No Entry sign

I will navigate Ø
the line going through is a river perhaps and will lead to fresh water

CHAPTER 2

Coordinates

This Is Not a Road Trip

Today, the day I learn Patrick Minaud is dead,
  a boy picks up a stone and hurls it into the sea,
    as if he is angry with the sea,
  as if he wants to show the sea what he can do.
There is no eternal note, just a plop.

I do not know the boy beyond being dark-haired,
  defiant. Go boy!
    Go throw another stone into the sea.
  Today, the day a boy hurls a stone into the sea,
the tide is out in the bay, as if the sea has learnt its lesson to obey.

A horse and rider are in the middle of the bay
  as if they could, in time,
    walk on water.
  And the dark, wet sand is a salve to the horse's hooves,
as the rhythm of the horse is a salve to the rider.

Minaud's house overlooks the bay,
  boundaries fortified by granite boulders.
    And the boulders sit hard on the pale, dry sand
  for they will never succumb to the sea. Far out at sea,
an old man rows for shore with pregnant nets, waiting to spill silver.

And there will always be an old man rowing for shore
  with pregnant nets, waiting to spill silver.
    And a horse and rider will always be in the middle of the bay,
  almost able to walk on water.
And a boy will always be hurling a stone into the sea.

And the sea, having learned its lesson,
  will always be in retreat,
    scared of the boulders
  guarding Minaud's land which will never blow hither and thither like the pale, dry sand.


A Desultory Day

It's the sort of day with spit but no polish,
the sort of day when a neighbour makes hay with my husband's amiable manner and extracts a maybe to sort out her fruit trees.
It's the sort of day you say, It's that sort of day
to help you get through. It's the sort of day I fall in love with a Japanese man for the way he stands magnificently in his trunks while his daughters play croquet.
It's the sort of day a towel serves as a skirt, and a jumper as a headscarf,
the sort of day eyes jump from horse rider to horse rider in the bay. It's the sort of day a father drags a pram across the sand backwards,
the sort of day a fat baby tries to catch fat feet, the sort of day when not just thoughts stray.


Trailing Spouse

Near the pool, I picked a frangipani blossom.
By the time I spoke to the maid, its petal edges were breakfast cereal brown.

Everything is either overripe or sticky –
mangoes, rice, my thighs. Except the maid.
A silk dress would slip and pool at her ankles.

Like the pomeranian, the baby must be paraded every day at least twice on the little patch of grass with all the other babies and pomeranians.

Work. The Mall. Both are air-conditioned.
Both colonise time. There are compensations,
but like the breeze, they are mostly offshore.

Battling for their place under the ceiling light,
the moths are migraine-inducing. We drink imported wine. She doesn't want sex.


Wavering

Winding back from the last tube,
  I see a girl on the kerb,
in open-toed heels, poured
  into an off-white dress in this cold,
leaning into an open window, drunk,
  pouring her heart out, and as I pass I hear the policeman,
  from the squat comfort of his seat shout, Carry on like that,
  you'll be in the back of my van,
so I stop, turn and think
  whether I should go up to her,
calm her down, ask him to lay off,
  but instead I stand there, tipsy from the half bottle of wine,
  a by-stander - and in that pause,
the girl is joined by another girl,
  who screams at the policeman: suddenly police cars are pulling up, sirens
  screaming, police spill out,
dressed in thick uniforms, not stumbling,
  just purposefully herding girls into the back of the van,
  which speeds off – the police get back into their cars, slam doors,
  rev up, drive off, and there is nothing more to do except go home,
  wonder what might have happened if I'd protested soberly, directly.

(Continues…)

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Excerpted from "A Map Towards Fluency"
by .
Copyright © 2019 Lisa Kelly.
Excerpted by permission of Carcanet Press Ltd.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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Table of Contents

Title Page,
Dedication,
I. SCALE AND ACCURACY,
Whitewash,
Bureau Mazarin,
Aubade for an Artist,
Life Model,
Slant of Summer,
Six Perspectives on Lilian Kjærulff,
A&E,
Death Certificate, Burnt Oak,
The Shadow Cast,
Ø,
II. COORDINATES,
This is Not a Road Trip,
A Desultory Day,
Trailing Spouse,
Wavering,
Corona/Cuts,
III. ORIENTATION,
Out of Order,
Philip Levine's Good Ear,
Herring Loss,
Lady Monoaural,
Best Seat in the House,
Blotted Copybook,
A Map Towards Fluency,
IV. PROJECTION,
Obelus,
Polar Observations with Anagram Shadows,
Visible Spectrum,
Cuddles Are Drying up Like the Sun in a Data Lake,
Apotropaic Marks & Bodily Parts,
Clavicle: snaps,
V. NAVIGATION,
Saltatorium,
Twenty Grains, One Scruple,
Playing Dog,
The Dogs of Pénestin,
Anonymous,
A Chorus of Jacks in 13 Texts,
Clutch,
Aphid Reproduction as Unpunctuated White Noise,
VI. LEGEND,
BASEMENT EXCAVATION,
Colchester Native,
And I Have Seen,
What Though the Field Be Lost?,
Apple Quartet,
VII. NEATLINE,
Fragmentation: Top Ten Objects, Grant Museum of Zoology,
Let Them Leave Language to Their Lonely Betters,
A Sudden Wind,
A Heart Pumps in Service,
Notes,
Acknowledgements,
About the Author,
Copyright,