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Gap Year in Thailand

by Paul Isthmus 

Posted: 08 August 2006
Word Count: 473
Summary: Thi is pronounced the same as 'tea' or simply, 't'.


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Her customer is a tired man from the city.
Under the shade of the green twisted trees
she presses him into the soft sand.

She stands on his back. Her feet are worn
by years on the beach, her face is old in the sun,
ripened like midday fruit.

I sit at a table and I cannot read my book.
The eyes of Thi and all they've seen
are watching me.

Under the green canopy of her tree
I sit on her shady, sand strewn mat
and she tells me we must fight for our life.

And in the sea of night we meet outside the 7/11.
I am holding donuts and we talk under the strip lights.
She invites me back to her house -

would I like to see it? Her boyfriend is away,
the one she told me about on the beach,
the middle aged man who beats her and calls her a stupid bitch.

We will grow drunk in each other's eyes.
Later age won't mean a thing,
and she will ask, softly, 'what?'

I will know all my history
in the lingering touch of her unsure kiss.
And later I will ask,

after I have lain with her in a hostel bed
and known her body, aged by childbirth,
belly like an old scarred sack,

ravaged with too much violent love,
with love, I will ask
'Do I love her?'

And Thi is the face of God
under the stars,
her eyes glint like soft jewels cushioned in the night,

tropical with the silhouettes of palm trees
against the dark blue
beneath an egg moon.

-

I went with another girl home to her room,
took her from a neon bar and the yellow warm night.
We showered in a concrete cubicle off the muggy hall

where she hosed me down. She hardly spoke a word
of English and pretended to be scandalised by my erection.
I couldn’t come and woke in the middle of the night

with the fluorescent light on over the bed still
flushing its sickness over us.
She was holding my cock like a child’s hand.

-

I am a child and my means are poor.
I can do nothing for her.
I will soon leave

her shady sand strewn mat
under the boughs, her green kingdom of leaves.
Soon I will realise that I have fallen in love

and I will be a stranger in every street back home.
I have known her wounded heart,
the lovers who have died and gone apart.

-

It ended with a polaroid and a wooden box,
to hold letters never to be sent,
and five or six slow phone calls

ringing from the travel agent
across the street from the beach,
where she is running towards my tinny voice

never quite able to reach me again.






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Comments by other Members



NinaLara at 09:38 on 10 August 2006  Report this post
This is a fantastic story, Paul. I was reminded at once of a Roddy Lumsden poem about him picking up an older woman (I think the age of his mother) and her taking him home. However, your poem has much greater depth to it and is more beautiful .. if not quite as polished (but the imperfections of a poem can be very charming).

High points for me, apat from the over all unfolding of the story were:

And Thi was the face of God
under the stars,
her eyes glint like soft jewels cushioned in the night,

tropical with the silhouettes of palm trees
against the dark blue
beneath an egg moon.


and the contrast of the other girl that follows - so harsh and unromantic in comparison.

I also like the fact that you point to the attraction being about her pain - her ravaged body, her wounded heart, her violent relationship. The sense the speaker has of being a child - in no position to 'save' her (if she wanted him too ... which seems doubtful) creates a real sense of longing and inadequacy which makes the ending very powerful.

The final section is wonderful.

I found myself wondering about your line breaks ... for example, why is

She stands on his back. Her feet are worn
by years on the beach, her face is old
in the sun, ripened like midday fruit.


not

She stands on his back.
Her feet are worn by years on the beach, her face is old in the sun,
ripened like midday fruit.
?

Perhaps the rigid three line form is holding you back? or perhaps it is a sign that some words could be cut?

She stands on his back:
her feet worn by years on the beach,
her face ripened like midday fruit.



there is a repetition of the second line which made me stumble - you could loose either of them.

Great poem though Paul. I have really enjoyed it.


Paul Isthmus at 10:01 on 10 August 2006  Report this post
Thanks Nina,

I think you're right about those line breaks. Have gone back and changed them.

I had a very strange dream the other night, and met you in it! Or at least someone called NinaLara. You were a curator in a strange art gallery, with a mysterious piece of art that was invisible that everyone was trying to see. Eventually I figured out that the art was projected onto the walls when you stayed still long enough. Bizarre. I don't normally have dreams about people I meet in internet forums.

NinaLara at 14:08 on 10 August 2006  Report this post
Sounds like a great idea Paul and wish I could claim it as my own. On reflection, I think I have probably spent more than my fair share of time standing still!

Nina

Nell at 15:17 on 10 August 2006  Report this post
Hi Paul,

This feels quite unlike anything of yours I've read before - more lyrical perhaps, and very beautiful, not only in in the story itself and the way it unfolds but in the language and the truth that comes across as one reads.

I noticed three instances of 'later' (stanzas 7,8,9) - you could certainly lose one.

There's what seems like a tense discrepancy ('was' and 'glint') at:

And Thi was the face of God
under the stars,
her eyes glint like soft jewels cushioned in the night,


It may have been deliberate, but it jumped out at me a bit, although the stanza itself is particularly lovely. That and the following one seem to cast their mystical quality backwards over the whole first section of the poem.

I like the tone of the second poem of the sequence - no justification or excuses - just the facts conveyed in a straightforward way. It really brings home the strange beauty of the first experience in which that spiritual connection was made.

The conviction in the words:

I am a child and my means are poor.
I can do nothing for her.


is quite extraordinary, yet one feels that perhaps the narrator is taking refuge behind them, reverting to childhood because the alternatives are too enormous to contemplate.

...lovers who have died and gone apart...


In the final lines of this section, 'gone' is an enigmatic choice and works beautifully I think, suggesting that all sorts of forces may have parted the different lovers stretching back over the aeons that he now feels akin to.

Fantastic stuff, Paul, marvellously poignant too.

Nell.





Paul Isthmus at 16:02 on 10 August 2006  Report this post
Hi Nell,

Thanks for the compliments - I actually wrote a version of this years ago and found it unexpectedly on an old computer disc. I recognised it had potential and did a heavy revision of it, with the advantages of age and emotional detachment, and I'm really pleased with how it's turned out. It's very honest, but with that cold, clear eye that cuts through sentimentality, I think, and gets at something deeper.

Have got rid of the second later - as far as the glint line goes, I am loathe to change it. I like the word glint for one (I don't want to say glinted as it sounds all wrong) and the mixed tenses serve a sort of timeless quality - but maybe I'm clutching at straws. I'll leave it in for now and see what others think.

Thank you very much Nell, I'm glad you enjoyed it.

Paul

Nell at 13:15 on 11 August 2006  Report this post
Paul, I agree about 'glint' - you don't want to change that. I wondered if 'was' in that first line could become 'is' - a tiny alteration that would lose the tense change and not interrupt the flow of words.

And Thi is the face of God
under the stars,
her eyes glint like soft jewels cushioned in the night...


But it's just an idea - see what you think.

Nell.



Paul Isthmus at 14:41 on 11 August 2006  Report this post
That works! I think it's pretty much finished now, unless you have any other suggestions. Thank you very much for your help Nell, and Nina. You're superstars.

Paul

Mac AM at 14:30 on 17 August 2006  Report this post
Hello Paul,

This is such an intriguing narrative that I was engaged from the start. I think there is such a wealth of richness to the poem which everyone has commented on. I think Nell is right about the repetition. The use of ravaged twice is a little over-egged. I know repetition can work, but sometimes it can feel like hammering home an image instead of letting the reader get there themselves.

I enjoyed glint – it works beautifully here.

Mac


Xenny at 13:12 on 18 August 2006  Report this post
Paul I think it's wonderful. There's such a feeling of realness here - I loved reading it.

There were one or two little things

We will grow drunk in each other's eyes.
Later age shall not mean a thing,
and she will ask, softly, 'what?'


I think I would like 'won't mean a thing' more. For me it fits better with the honest feeling of the poem. 'shall not' sounds a little removed and less real. In general I wondered how it would be changing some of the 'will not's to 'won't' etc. Because I did find it a very honest-sounding poem, and if anything took away from that it was those slight formalnesses.

Like Mac, I also wasn't sure about the two 'ravaged's. I wasn't really comfortable with the first one and the second one would have sounded better on its own for me.

That said, those are titchy little picky things. And I really did enjoy it.

This bit really impressed me - it sounded so untampered with:

We showered in a concrete cubicle off the muggy hall

where she hosed me down. She hardly spoke a word
of English and pretended to be scandalised by my erection.
I couldn’t come and woke in the middle of the night

with the fluorescent light on over the bed still
flushing its sickness over us.
She was holding my cock like a child’s hand.


Thanks for such a moving story

Xenny

Paul Isthmus at 19:03 on 19 August 2006  Report this post
Hi Mac and Xenny,

Made the changes you suggested, changing the first ravaged so that it now reads
aged by childbirth
, and
Later age won't mean a thing
.

I was wandering about submitting some stuff to a poetry mag. Does anyone have any ideas which ones might be open to my style of writing? Suggestions would be much appreciated.

Paul

Xenny at 01:41 on 24 August 2006  Report this post
Hey Paul

I like the changes - I think those two stanzas work better without the two 'ravaged's. Great.

Xenny


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