Noras erstes Gedicht

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One of the winners in the Scottish International Open Poetry Competition
(1999 – 2000)

Vinegar

I saw them, once, on her dressing-table.

Woven round the minutest matter
(sandcorn or small splinter, I am told),
growing to perfection in shape and size,
when her slaves ripped them
from their mother’s womb. I believe
they were a present from him:
the fool, the coward, the brave,
the beloved, the scorned, the bastard.

I must admit I tried them on.

She wears them in her ear today;
this festal day, as she ignores the
silverware and pots and all our efforts
contained therein, seeped in honey;
pomegranate juice; wine;
noting that the brave general (and fool)
watches her lips and majestic palate
which refuse to eat.

A tantrum is boiling in her earlobes.

“We are not amused. Not amused.”
She twists one round and round,
as if the shimmer of its beautifully
hardened skin will rub off onto her
finger which has never done a day’s work.
The other hand taps a little space
(a little space, for it is a vast banquet)
on the table. The tantrum gallops nearer.

I can almost see the heat of anger.

“I want a glass of vinegar,” she snaps
at the gawping fool (and general.
The order, repeated round the table
in whispers, reaches me in fig-like
soft tones; but I am a hard person,
having served her so long, and know
that she would pickle herself
in attention, if she could.

Those earrings should have been mine.

I bring the vinegar, hoping she will
drink, and choke. The pearl dissolves
murkily; disappears in one gulp.
He applauds. A sour taste, bittersharp
like vinegar rises to my throat,
turning all feeling of love for him
into acid; fermenting my blood
into vindictive flow.

She must have felt the cold venom
diffuse her being, years later, in much
the same way. Naja haje.
Her face was pale, like the pearl.

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