Surreal-Absurd Sampler Luke Kennard
“The surreal/absurd has always played a huge part in my work, I guess as a tool or a strategy or a thought experiment. Something I like about it is that it’s so easy to go wrong. You could write an ostensibly surreal line like the green penguin swam backstroke across the giant glass of milk and it would be humiliatingly bad and everyone would hate you, and rightly. So you’re taking a risk; there’s already something at stake in sharing some idiosyncratic or ridiculous part of your inner life and there’s an immediate energy to that, and a puzzle in how you make it convincing, how you keep a reader with you while pushing towards something strange and unconscious. I think the poems I really love are the ones where the thought is happening (or being reanimated) in front of you.”— Luke Kennard
NO INCOMMENSURABLE SIGN
for M.B.
Body-swap movie in which absolutely everyone swaps bodies.
Oh, you’re a flautist? Well now you’re a pilot land land land land
land land the fucking plane. You were applying raspberry coulis to
the edges of a big square white plate, now you’re trying to take
out somebody’s appendix; you were riding a horse now you are
undergoing an appendectomy performed by a sous chef; you had
acute appendicitis now you are being thrown from a horse because
horses always know; you were married to me well now you are
married to yourself. But the film isn’t really about heavy-handed
reversals of fortune and spends most of its 106 minutes on people
swapping from one fairly similar situation to another (you were
hungover, now you’re hungover and your leg is shaking) initially
seized by a desire to go find the self they just swapped out of but
then gradually coming to the realisation that it’s probably a bad
idea. Best to leave them. Yours were the only eyes I could look into
very long – look away now. You were trying to keep your balance
on a crowded train now you are trying to sell the option on your
body-swap screenplay.
THE MEANING OF OBJECTS HELD BY SAINTS IN ICONS
Four years ago I met a bishop in a black monastic robe and his face
was just a skull with some ribbons of flesh and he raised one hand
and I lay face down in the gravel before him and he said, ‘Lower,’
in the sweetest, firmest voice. I thought nothing of it at the time.
Transparent glass orb. Lost Sheep. Model spaceship. The motorway is not
a good place to cry but anything below an A-road is pretty much
fair game if you could hold it together a little longer for the sake of
other motorists. Long staff. Open book. Their own severed head. This is
because they keep finding new moons orbiting farther and farther
out; this is because you don’t have any self-respect. Honestly. It is
best to prepare a written statement: ‘How is it even possible to feel
this sad with a head that is more or less the same size as any other,
how much longer are you supposed to tolerate my sadness, how
can you forgive the love stolen from you, still stolen, being stolen
right now, never to be compensated?’ Alsatian puppy. Basket of baked
goods. Icon of themselves holding an icon of themselves holding an icon
of themselves holding an icon of themselves holding an icon of themselves
holding an icon of themselves holding
TRUE STORY OF MY OWN DEATH #4
When they cut me open they found a little gold figurine, more
free gift than Oscar statuette. They wiped it with an oily rag. They
removed my skin and spread it on the beach to dry, but that was
really force of habit – a hat, some children’s slippers – and they
threw my organs in the chum bucket with the muscles and fat. The
bones were a problem but not theirs: they stashed them in a box
marked ‘bones’ and left them for the people who deal with bones
to deal with. So then it was just my head, which already looked
smaller and sort of pitiful, not worth sticking on the prow of the
ship or a giant cocktail stick in the sand – you’d barely notice it and
it wouldn’t even horrify you. After some discussion they tossed it
into the trees. Then they took the tiny gold man they had found
right in the middle of my chest cavity. And they walked back to the
city and they took turns to carry it and they jostled one another
to be the next in line; they fell to squabbling and a fight broke out
between three of them and they dropped the tiny gold man and
it bounced down a dune and into a termite hole, but they kept
fighting and if I’d been there I’d have said
A Pergola of Exceptional Beauty
‘That’s the last time I have sex with a ghost,’
declared Patrick, but the ghost knew better.
After four years failing to come up with a slogan
Patrick’s focus-group were sick and listless;
they lolled sideways in their chairs,
stirring the same cups of tea for minutes on end.
‘My notebook is digging into my stomach,’
one complained. ‘It’s too cold in here.’
After eight hours of that, Patrick was demoralised
and just about ready to have sex with the ghost again.
Despite various cultures warning that it damned you
Patrick placed his fingers on the ghost’s back.
The ghost took Patrick to a pergola of exceptional beauty;
A tower-block collapsed in his chest.
Variations On Tears
I realise you never cry because the last of your tears have been
anthologised as a Collected and you can’t stand the idea of appendices.
But what am I to make of the demonstrators playing cards
with your daughters ? Have they betrayed your estate ? Go tell
the children to gather their strength for the inevitable backlash.
I realise you never cry because each one of your tears contains a
tiny stage on which a gorgeous, life-affirming comedy is always
playing and it cheers you up the minute you begin. But what am
I to make of the bare interior of your house ? You’re waiting for
inspiration, right ? Go tell the children to gather dust on the
shelves of archive halls.
I realise you never cry because to do so would be to admit defeat
to your harlequin tormentors — wringing their hands at the sides
of their eyes and making bleating sounds — and you don’t want
to give them the satisfaction. But what am I to make of the Make
Your Own Make Your Own ______ Kit, the first instruction of which
is ‘Have a good idea for something’ ? Could I have not worked
that out for myself ? Go tell the children to gather followers for
our new religion.
I realise you never cry because you are a total arsehole who cannot
even muster enough compassion to feel sorry for himself. But
what am I to make of your red, blotchy eyes when, as your pharmacist,
I know for a fact you are not allergic to anything ? Have
you, after all, been crying ? Go tell the children to gather my
remains from the ditch and look out for the white bull who, I’m
told, is still at large.
I realise you never cry because the last time you cried four separate
murders were reported on the evening news, each one more
grisly and inexplicable than the last, and you incorrectly assume
there was a correlation. But what am I to make of this terrifying
breakfast ? Are you trying to get rid of me ? Go tell the children
to gather the farmers from their taverns to gather the new crop
of thorns.
I realise you never cry because when you do, you are beset by
birds with long tails and brightly coloured plumage and sharp,
hook-like beaks who are uncontrollably drawn towards salt. But
what am I to make of your statement, ‘The world is not built on
metaphors’ ? What exactly do you think the statement ‘The
world is not built on metaphors’ is ? Go tell the children to
gather in the clearing and await further instruction.
Luke Kennard is the author of seven collections of poetry and two novels. His most recent collection is Notes on the Sonnets (Penned in the Margins, 2021) and his most recent novel is The Answer to Everything, (4th Estate, 2021). He was shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best Collection in 2007 and has been shortlisted again this year, in 2021. He lectures at the University of Birmingham.
These poems were selected from:
“No Incommensurable Sign (for M.B.)” The Meaning of Objects Held by Saints in Icons & True Story of My Own Death” from Mise En Abyme, Tungsten Press, 2019.
“A Pergola of Exceptional Beauty” from The Harbour Beyond the Movie, Salt Publishing 2010.
“Variations on Tears” from The Migraine Hotel, Salt Publishing, 2009.
