Seven Poems from 'Babydoll'
Eva Griffin
The Client
[redacted] (hereafter referred to as ‘the client’) continues to be concerned with recurring dreams of childhood. Now herself a grown woman of [redacted] age, she says she would like to just get on with it (‘it’ referring to ‘life’) and believes that the dreams show a lack of progress. When asked what she thinks ‘progress’ looks like, the client says normal stress dreams about work or my teeth falling out or trying to fly but falling or driving on the wrong side of the road or I don’t know but it’s not this. When asked if she has had those dreams before she says no but I heard about it on TV. ‘It’ now referring to the dream, not life.
The client continues to chew gum during sessions as it fills the silence. When she arrives she takes a tissue from the box on the table next to the couch and folds it as small as possible before beginning to tear into it. Small, difficult tears.
Life under the sheet
Constant, like a favourite
shirt stuck to the same chest.
Eyes move from insignificant thing
to thing: an empty and stained mug,
a photo of an unidentified woman
stuck to a wall of flaking paint.
May as well be chasing phosphenes
in the blue-dark. That familiar pressure.
Ear to the wet pillow, waiting. Silence.
It’s always a first-time-around kind of night.
No matter how gentle the fingers,
the body patterns purple.
As sudden as sunshine, as hot.
I asked if he could see the entry lines
or feel the lightning on my cheek but he
had already burrowed into the earth
and my head was shoved deep in that same
tuft of stars I see when I close my eyes.
At Play
Beyond dolls but still accustomed, the post-school girl takes up familiar
space on floor/bed/window-seat where the line-up awaits. Always
there is a special one selected. The beauty du jour resembles
a classmate/actress/herself. The choice is telling. Child psychology, you see.
At play we are so often just ourselves. Although of course, there is little
difference from doll-to-doll. An illusion of choice, really. Dark/blonde,
long/short hair is usually all there is to it. Most girls believe
there is an element of control in play that they do not exercise in daily life.
You and I know, however, that the doll was bought to occupy the child
in this precise moment when dinner is being prepared or a fight is about
to break out between the two parties charged with raising the girl.
Yes, of course I mean to say the mother and father. Psychology, etc.
Well, today it appears Barbara will be wearing her Christmas best,
despite it being high Summer, and better suited to shorts.
Control
the man only took something from me
because I had something to give
thought that generosity
could become a love language
our love language:
the way we say goodnight
not in words but in the silence
that takes the room as he
pulls my body closer
try to remember
what’s real and what isn’t
the pillow: real
the sheets: real
the darkness under the duvet:
if I can’t see it
is it there?
memories come like a story
I read once
but I’ve forgotten
the title
who wrote it
how it ended
all I have are pieces
a girl through a window
a swimsuit dripping on a line
a man watching
I play a game
in which I solve a series of crimes
by re/visiting locations to look again
the cursor moves over
a room I was once in
a girl I once was
the way my eyes stayed open
if I can’t see you
are you there?
the game tells me
this is over
you can move on
return to title
I press A to start again
my thumb coming down hard
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Living Room Floor
Degas dancer chin. Eyes trained from the pillow to the blinking TV. Unwavering. Flat chest strained upwards. Wonder if it would split in half neatly, like a piece of fruit, or come crumbling into hands like bread. Christ. Pomegranates, you would imagine. Really? Who would imagine the heart of a girl breaking in two right there on the living room floor? Cartoons turned up to blasting. Everything is so loud from the moment we come slicked into the hands of a stranger. Mother lying there in the pose of a dead and roasted chicken. I almost said that it would be white. The room, I mean. Thinking back, it was probably magnolia. Or blue, but a sickly kind. The colour of medical gloves. Latex. Astonishment when the rubber snaps.
To Be Clean Again
a damp cloth
is brought to plastic
skin, rubbed in
circular motions
the length of the doll
’s arms, legs, and torso.
Take care
around the face
so that the paint
does not fade—
detail like that
is expensive
hard
to come
by.
Set her down
to dry in the sun.
Watch that she
does not catch
too much light.
Dream Where The Hallway Is A Continuous Line
days were a too early waking began the world as white opened to a thinner portal of white in which the same figure stood where it had stood often before a figure also of white but furred-dark or at least with the appearance of fur for eyes adjusted never quick enough though in hindsight aren’t you glad the body is slow to some things the body cannot process god could not predict that the animal would make such an animal of itself blinking down at something smaller it had dared to bring into the world thinking himself godlike but not worth the prayers don’t you still light a candle these days regardless your well-earned gold coins dropping into the box loud as a door but his name always comes to you last if at all the guilt to think of him the guilt to not leave him out in the cold hallway on the seventh day eyes shut as fast as a coin falling to its holy palm crying out it must be a dream it must be a dream it must be a dream it must be a dream it must be a dream it must be a day where you slept in and were not woken after all ah thank god for those golden boxes of answered prayers thank god for all that money can buy thank god for blue blue sky and a small flame lit, enduring
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