Over 400 poems published in magazines and journals in the UK and
abroad; plays broadcast on BBC Radio 4 and others staged in
theatre. Volumes of poetry published include 'Suffer
Suffolk' (joe soap's canoe) and 'Blood in the Thistle
Bowl' (Redbeck Press).
Have held a number of writing and mixed arts residencies in
schools and the community, and have delivered hundreds of
projects, workshops and courses.
Recent work includes: 'Rant Score' (pavement poems) shown
at the Taxi Gallery 2004; 'The Town Hall Installation,'
SeaChange Studios, 2004; the Air Field Collaboration 2004–5;
'Site Specific Project,' 2005; Waterways' 'The
Dragon Hall Project,' 2006; and work for Norfolk Arts
Partnership (a series of youth democrary projects), 2006-7.
Something immense and lonely
Divides the earth between us this evening.
I have placed the photographs of you
In my inside jacket pocket
As every lover does perhaps,
A million miles and four nights out of touch.
I have cut up turf
At the back of my mother’s house
And have watched the way earth
Turns itself over like my restless sleep.
You understand double your years
My soul as it breaks surface
And I imagine the rich soil in your palms,
Would that it could be
Just the distance between us tonight.
I thought I heard you crying.
Or the sky.
I thought gulls were cracks in canvas.
Or their cries.
I thought tears were hanging from your lashes.
Not from mine.
I thought I heard you screaming.
Or a jet.
I thought I caught seas jumping from a brush.
Or finches twisting in a net.
I thought I heard you dreaming.
Or the earth.
I thought I would catch you falling from your blushes,
Not in death.
I thought loaded knives of light were life,
Not beached anguish in the nightmare
Of this breath, this breadth
Of skin – this 'scape of sky and sea;
This falsity, these lies.
I thought I heard you dying.
And the sky.
I thought gulls were cracks in canvas.
Or your eyes
In strokes of noiseless gashes
Bloody from the vine.
I just thought I heard you crying,
Girl of my ashes.
Rupert Mallin
Chalk and charcoal net these images,
Hard edged or smeared with fingers:
A bottle wrapped by lines laid
Line over line to restrain
My interpretation of the real.
Yours is 'truth to materials.'
You pick up steel and see steel,
Not the stain of a black forest
In a sheet of tarnished aluminium.
Yours is 'truth to morals.'
You handle wood and see wood,
Not the pain of a breach–birth
In the handle of a hammer.
Yours is 'truth to money.'
You model clay and see clay,
Not murder's grey estuary
Or worms going down for air.
There is no denotative tool or bag of tricks
For reality has no measure but the quick
Of gestures marked upon a pane of light.
I scratch and scrape at the sun to escape
But in line upon line I am caged.
Rupert Mallin
I am the black line beside each vein,
Leisurely, luxurious, deep as an ocean,
Thinner than cotton.
I hang from horizons
Behind breeze teased underwear,
Flat and fluttering upon the land.
Or curl up beside bones,
Orchestrating my growth to violins
Within the scaffolding.
I tighten the skin drum,
Lie thick in napkins,
Bleed all corners
Of simple symmetry. I am
Neither fillet nor feather,
Though I am that to which I cling.
Am a cavernous ghost
In a crevice, impossible to fill.
Emptiness is my fuel
In the cold ash of ovens,
In a duct not a tear,
Too small for forensic.
Am beneath all, invisible,
Until lifted from the soil,
Like stories, like holes.
I hog fridges and kilns,
Make a home of a scream
And am paint's illusion.
I am essential.
Rupert Mallin
I had a good friend once
a friend once
but he kept following me around
following me around
like an echo
an echo
so
so
I told him to his face
lovely face
Why do you keep following my words
following my words
like an echo
an echo
Look, if this doesn't stop
doesn't stop
we will be friends no more
friends evermore
It didn't stop
stop
so
so
I began following him around
following me around
following him around
following me around
like an echo
an echo
echo
echo
echo
echo
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
Rupert Mallin
it was a week a
GO
that I broke
HER
Dalton tea p o
t
HAND
le
& I glued the p o
t
to
get
her
& now it is
as good as n e
w
as good as
Rupert Mallin
IT STOLE HER BREATH AWAY
STOLE HER WORDS AWAY
STOLE HER LETTERS
OPENED HER MOUTH
FILLED HER PEN
HIT HER KEYS
SHE FOLLOWED THE PEN WITH HER EYES
FOLLOWED THE WORDS IN HER MIND
BUT HER WORDS WERE NOT IN HER BOOK, HER NOTEBOOK OR ON
SCREEN
SHE COULDN'T HEAR THEM
COULDN'T MOUTH THEM
COULDN'T SCREAM
BUT IT WAS HER MOUTH
HER NAME IN THE PAPERS
SHE HEARD THEM TALKING ABOUT HER
THEY QUOTED HER DEMISE
SPOKE HER WORDS
SHAPED HER MOUTH
WHAT HAD THEY DONE TO HER MOUTH?
THE SCREEN WAS A SCREAM
HER EMPTINESS ON SCREEN
SHE FELT BLOOD RUN FROM HER IDEAS
FELT INK SQUEEZED FROM BETWEEN HER FINGERS
SHE WROTE INVISIBLY
SHE WROTE WITHOUT EFFECT
& THEY LOVED & ADMIRED HER
& SHE FILLED HER IDEAS WITH HER EMPTINESS
& SHE WAS SO, SO CONFIDENT
Rupert Mallin
SHE WAS SO–SO
SHE WAS WORSE THAN SO–SO
BUT SAID SHE WAS SO–SO
SHE WAS SO SORE, SO LOW, SO
SHE TOOK TO WRITING ABOUT DRUGS
WRITING ABOUT SMOKING
WRITING ABOUT ALCOHOL &
WROTE HERSELF REPEAT PRESCRIPTIONS & LINES &
METAPHORICALLY HUNG HERSELF TO A WASHING–LINE
AS IF HER SKIN WAS HER WASHING &
HID HERSELF BENEATH HER DRIPPING SKIN
ON AN ENDLESS LINE &
WANTED AN END, SO
SHE CUT OUT BEGINNINGS &
COLLECTED UP THE ENDINGS
WHICH IMMEDIATELY UNRAVELLED &
FOUND THEIR WAY INTO OTHERS' STORIES, SO
SHE SLUMPED DEEPER INTO THE BASEMENT OF HER WRITING:
SHE WANTS WINGS BUT FINDS HERSELF A SYRINGE,
SHE WANTS A CIGARETTE HOLDER NOT THE ASHTRAY OF IFS &
BUTS,
SHE WANTS A COCKTAIL NOT AN EMPTY BOTTLE,
SHE WANTS THAT CONFIDENCE, SO, SO MUCH,
SO...
Rupert Mallin
if we row we qui
ckly make up & making
up is the best part of our relation
ship & our argu
ments are but preludes to making
up & sometimes we argue over no
thing just to make
up, though once we nearly did break
up because she broke an orna
mental vase – so we could arg
ue to make up – but I had a senti
mental attachment to the vase,
for it was a gift from my
MUM
MUM
MUM
MUM
MUM
MUM
yet I knew we would make
up & I keep all the frag
ments to remind my
self what true
love is:
a vase
Rupert Mallin
With brush, pencil and stick her poem makes an appearance:
a made up, out of bed, out of the shower, out there poem;
an eye–lined, lip lush, highlighted bright poem;
a 'go to work on a poem' kind of poem;
a made up poem.
With cream, tissue and water her poem makes an appearance:
an indoor, into the shower, into her bed poem;
a red–eyed, lip cracked, pasty poem;
a "real me" poem;
a broken poem.
Tossing, turning, sweating her poem makes an appearance:
the boat of her life is ever sinking
& family & friends always knew she had pulled the
plug
& her favourite brush is matted with hair
& try as she does she can't pull this terrible poem
from its teeth, from her appearance, but...
With brush, pencil and stick her poem makes an appearance:
A made up, out of bed, out of the shower, out there poem;
an eye–lined, lip lush, highlighted bright poem;
a 'go to work on a poem' kind of poem;
A lady luck club loving poem;
A made up poem
Rupert Mallin