Issue 7
June 2001
Adrian Fox
I was born (1961) in Kent England of Irish parents. My father is from Belfast, my Mother from Dublin. We returned to Ireland in 1967, which was not the best year to return to Belfast. Because my education was hindered by the troubles I left school when I was fifteen. I couldn't wait to get out there, earn my own money and experience the world. I left home when I was sixteen and went to London, then Dublin. Over the years I have had many jobs: Butcher boy, Labourer, binman, welder, metal polisher, screenprinter, electronics engineer.
I met Kitty and we married in 1984. When we had our three children I told her I wasn't going back to work and I took a few years off to become a writer and she stuck by me. I was given a scholarship to visit the Poets' House for a summer school by James and Janice Simmons and before I came away from there they awarded me a scholarship to study for my M.A. on Irish and American poetry.
Since then, I now teach creative writing and have been widely published in Ireland and England by the likes of Honest Ulsterman, Poetry Guild, The Poetry Society, The Black Mountain Review, and Coffeehouse.
Recently Lapwing Publications Belfast have published my first book of poems, Hide Dada, Hide. I also had an essay I wrote about the Troubles published by Simon and Schuster. Salmon Publishing, in Galway will publish a collection of my poems in 2002.
All work © Adrian Fox
Erika
Erika
In your eyes I saw the Danube
Move like your smile,
Drifting from the Black Sea inland
To the map you drew me in the bar.
I asked you for your language
And it swept through me
Cutting crevices and peaks.
I reached you on page 104-B7
Of the illustrated atlas of the world.
Your scent drifts through the window
Here in Ireland like the mist
From a Transylvian dew.
Air Locked
I thought I heard the sea at 5:50am
Or there abouts. I stepped out
Into the back yard and sat with the wind
Rustling through our housing estate.
The noise of tyres on the road
Fading away on the roundabouts.
A joyrider screeches a hand brake turn
Or two, while he's air locked on the road
I hear the wind in the trees.
He beeps a stolen horn seeking attention.
The IRA to shoot him, the cops or brits
To stop him and still I hear the sea
And watch it reflect the dawn.
Your boy wears someone else's tyres out.
I hear the first birds sing, a dog barks
And the morning sun reflects itself
Of the sea to create my sky. Your boy
Still out there hand braking, it's as if
He's tossing off everything he can't see
Or hear and I sit here wondering why
My sky is overcast then a gull glides by.
Lie Low 2
The visible wind moves like snow-
Flaked flies on the streetlight.
Driving home from a creative
Wrting class trying to capture
You in the millions of flakes
That pelt my windscreen.
Chekhov's "Grief" comes to mind
But you weren't on the back seat.
The last time you were there
You were flakes of ash in an urn
On the way to Laylo.
Did my wipers brush you aside
To melt in the earth?
RADIO REALISM
On the little teak Marconi
In the attic space of 73 Etna Drive
We watched Match of the Day.
The bunk beds now seperated sounded
Like a football supporters rattle.
Beside the tower of cards on the chest
Of drawers between us were two sets
Of 11 perfectly placed, Manchester United
And Tottenham Hotspur.
When the black and white images faded
Into God save the queen and the white
Dot on the TV disappeared.
The images were replaced by the frantic
Crackle of police messages echoing signals
From the street through the dormer window.
Megahertz igniting molitov cocktails
And the inferno of Farrington Gardens.
Unlike,"The War of the Worlds" the black
Screen transmitted a special powers act,
Roger, Charlie, Victor and Bravo
Brought the front door down.
LEGAHORY
As the December sun thaws the ice
Revealing; lush grass and earthy delights.
Every tree bears a scar, every walked on
Blade of grass, even the black-bird
Has a problem with the robin scouring
The earth tossing aside yesterdays rotting
Leaves to find the food of survival.
Imagine this is Legahory, Craigavon,
Northern Ireland and I'm sitting in the car
Outside the Health Centre waiting for my wife
Who will arrive any moment now
With a prescription that will help her
On her way through another stage of life.