A world by Vahni Capildeo
A world
Vahni CapildeoIn which the hands of people changed to things like flowers
for which new, uneasy forms of consideration
by which that iron-suited man, foolish and careful,
negotiates crowds, his two wrists bearing red hibiscus
necessarily bruised, a little raised, a little forwards,
a rivelled fountain their corollas accompanying him.How approach the cockroach-gripped revoker of contracts?
How approach him whose sand crab hands try running askew?
How approach him? or how near the one mobbed by seagulls,
helpless to pull a glove on leaking packets of corn?Ah whose iced hands disappear, condense, remade droplets…
instant, lasting blister-silk, should he once touch a heart:
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This poem appeared in Utter by Vahni Capildeo, published by Peepal Tree Press Ltd., 2013. (Available direct from Peepal Tree Press Ltd. • Also on: Amazon • Bookshop)
DESCRIPTION
“Exploring a universe where anything can happen, because there is nothing that can’t be imagined and there’s no connection between different experiences that can’t be made, Utter breaks down old boundaries: between the past and present, between human and animal, animate and inanimate, between the Caribbean and the global elsewhere, between the experienced world and the world of books. Vahni Capildeo rarely appears to speak in her own voice but creates a whole range of striking and sometimes mysterious personas; in the dialogue among the voices in the poems, a way of seeing, multifarious as it is, begins to emerge. The poems express a view that finds much in the world that is unjust, cruel, corrupt, and hypocritical but also finds moments of community and tenderness; there is darkness and there is humor, and sometimes the latter seems the only possible response to the former.” (Source)
ABOUT VAHNI CAPILDEO
Anthony Vahni Capildeo is a queer Trinidadian Scottish poet. They are the author of several poetry collections, including Polkadot Wounds (Carcanet, 2024) and Like a Tree, Walking (Carcanet, 2021). They are the writer in residence and professor of English and related literature at University of York, England. (Source)
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ENDNOTES
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