68. Bess Linnet

No master's degree? No problem! A fine poet who crossed an ocean to come to the UK, and stayed!

Bess Linnet was rejected from every creative writing master’s degree course she applied to, but nonetheless self-published a book of autofiction (a real genre!) — Three Before Nine: A Story of a Childhood. She crossed the tracks to poetry when Covid lockdown limited her writing time to an hour in the park with her dog. Born on an Air Force base in Illinois, Bess has lived in the UK for over twenty years and learned enough about quangos to become a British citizen in 2019. She took her pen name from her mother-in-law’s pet beagle, Bess, and the birds on Innisfree.

Poems

Astronauts
Helena
Like any Other
Weald
Degrading
Whitney
Bells

Astronauts

There’s a black hole where your tooth should be 
And too much space between my hairs
My knees crack like meteors
Crashing when I rise from chairs

Not that you can hear that 
Because of the hum
Of your tinnitus, as constant 
As the fusion of the sun

Some details are lost to me 
I would need to search
As far for them as Saturn 
Is from Planet Earth

Your stubble’s salt-and-pepper
Your eyebrows need a trim
But you still love the moon, and call me 
To come look at him

We both retrieve our glasses 
And squint up at the sky
Our wrinkled flight suits crinkle 
As our hands touch, and we sigh

<<< 

Helena

Helena Bonham Carter’s hair
Is here, and there, and everywhere 
At her interview with Woman’s Hour 
Which, in no way, usurps her power 
She remains most magnetic
Her appearance is prophetic 
Proclaiming— to open ears— 
Don’t give in to fear 
Accepting imperfection 
Should not lead to rejection 
Every hair out of place
Each fine line on my face
Does not make me less a queen 
Of either life, or silver screen

<<<

Like Any Other

she kept on going, until she just couldn’t 
until her legs refused to help her stand 
until the spinning of the room just wouldn’t 
stop - until her lungs both filled with sand

surely human hearts must have their limits 
surely hers could not stomach more pain 
surely her body, and the soul within it 
had reached a turning point—
to start again 

seemed impossible, until her breath 
slowed, to regular from ragged
her vertigo expired, and in her chest 
even her wayward pulse became less jagged

this would not be the day she didn’t recover 
this could still be a day like any other

<<<

Weald

my best friends are gnarled 
their exteriors are tough 
but inside, their green 
hearts beat, offering me air 
asking nothing in return

<<<

Degrading

i only want to wear black 
no other shade is right 
no blues or reds— no white 
like the suffragettes
who fought so hard to get
vote equality for women
if they saw him winning 
replacing our democracy
with his unjust autocracy 
rising above his station 
degrading our nation
would they be ashamed, like me 
and wonder whom to blame, like me 
would they mourn, 
the same as me, 
and only want to wear black

<<<

Whitney

We had to see the Hoppers
Her clearly stated goal
Was to locate the collection
And stand before those walls
When we did, she was transported
Her eyes widened, her breath slowed down
And I thanked my lucky stars
That I was with her, in this town
Getting to know my child
Who would soon be an adult
While she admired Edward’s paintings
Empty as my heart was full

<<<

Bells

call me to church on
sunday morning from across
the park with your peals
of metal upon metal
i won’t come, but i might pray

<<<