Jackself Read online

  as Jackself slams Lamanby’s front door behind him

  Spring-heeled Jack

  above Jackself, the night’s

  night all the way to the moon

  and stars

  he’s on tiptoes,

  scrabbling a crater-rim

  for finger-holds

  if I can just climb

  into her face,

  I won’t have to suffer

  her one sad stare

  Wren’s at the ghost-hole

  watching Jackself as he dangles

  by his fingertips, kicks his feet,

  then lets go

  and drops

  oof

  to the stubble, claps

  the dust off his hands, then leaps

  again for the uppermost

  edge of the moon

  but the sky’s beguns

  to float it further and further

  away from him

  into the blue

  I wish you weren’t a ghost

  I know you do

  The Desk

  Jeremy Wren sings

  under his breath

  gone gone

  the sabretooth

  and gone

  the mastodon

  you don’t have any breath,

  Jackself says

  it’s a figure of speech,

  Wren says

  Jackself, have you something

  to say to the class

  no Miss

  then put your hands on your desk

  where we can see them

  inscribed

  with pen-knifed knot-work,

  its underside fabulous

  to the touch with carbuncles

  of gum, his desk is where

  Jackself keeps what

  Wren has bequeathed him

  I didn’t bequeath you anything,

  Wren says

  my rubber, my calculator, my shatterproof

  ruler and my spider

  in a matchbox

  you just took them

  what were you going to do,

  Jackself murmurs, spend your death

  catching up on your maths homework

  it’s not long enough,

  Wren says, and Jackself snorts

  JACKSELF!

  it’s Jeremy, he says, and the class goes stiff

  with fear

  they all think you’re going to cry

  and embarrass them, Wren says

  do it

  and I’ll let you keep my stuff

  Jack Snipe

  Jackself tramps down

  to the water’s edge

  in time to watch the day go

  out of the estuary

  a goose honks

  from way up

  in the night that laps

  at his feet and he drops

  after it a pebble

  he’s brought from the mainland

  of sunlight, then heels off

  his trainers, balls up his socks,

  rolls up his jeans and wades

  in among the stars oh

  oh

  how cold the heavens are

  and squidgy between his toes

  Skipjack

  the fish owe Jackself

  he wants gills,

  another element

  for a home, the sea

  to hold him for a good long while

  these demands he takes to the rocky shore

  at low tide, where the pools gaze

  with new lenses at their grotto walls

  flinching with jellies

  Jackself rives a limpet

  from a crevice in the shell-inlaid floor

  the sole of its yellow foot

  is a callus that flexes

  and draws in

  as he cranks his rusty blade around the socket

  what comes out is neither eye

  nor tongue, but has salt tears

  and a root

  Jackself chews and swallows it,

  then drinks a palmful of sea

  from a trap of stone

  in the distance the great gears

  full of cockleshells turn

  and the pool at his feet begins to churn

  and swell, then swivels round

  to look at him, and roaring in his ears

  a voice from fathoms down

  speaks coelacanth and dead zone

  and conger in a cannon mouth

  and in no time the tide is in

  and lifting into the dark

  brown blistered ropes of bladderwrack

  and tiny velvet crabs

  but guess who’s nearly halfway home,

  the big noise at his back

  The Comeback Deal

  it’s not as if this is a Jesus-type

  comeback deal

  Wren is not Jesus

  have you thought of a new name yet,

  Jackself asks

  I think Jesus

  has a good ring to it, Wren says, Jesus Aballava

  Jackself doesn’t laugh

  this is not a resurrection situation,

  and we have to stop saying Jesus, he says

  Jesus, don’t get your sackcloth

  in a twist, Wren says

  you know you can’t just walk in

  to the life you had, Jackself says

  cats will hiss,

  light-bulbs flicker,

  your mum get a feeling of impending doom

  every time she picks your dirty pants and socks up off your bedroom floor

  which would be loads

  of times, Wren says, and squints

  at the fields stricken

  with crispiness and cold smoke

  Tithe

  hullo

  Jackself says

  cocks his head

  nothing

  without

  doors

  slammed curtains

  soot-fall certain

  silence

  his

  smooth end

  searches his

  middle room

  nope

  ear-pop

  of absence

  how

  this morning

  tripped

  the kettle

  without

  giving

  nothing

  months

  dead now

  his due

  Jack O’Bedlam

  Jackself is squabbling in the rookery

  he’s bald and black and stroppy

  the wind was wound

  six times around

  before he hatched his copy

  Now I can make him do my naughty

  his eyes will not betray me

  they’re just like mine

  but minus nine

  times twelve to the power of maybe

  Who dropped that eyelash in the basement

  who thought that thought behind the door

  with phantom ears

  poor Jackself hears

  the dandelions roar

  He’s up in the lofts of Lamanby

  rifling through the sun

  I pick my way

  from day to day

  undoing what’s been done

  For heart, Jackself has a hairy nettle

  his face is greener stuff

  a long time goes

  between his toes

  but never feels enough

  Sow the darkness, grow a stone

  Jackself is fishing for worms

  he baits his hook

  with a dirty look

  and lowers it into the germs

  Tell a story, Doublejack

  until our sofas burst

  the words are cold

  but get it told

  or it will tell you first

  Bind these days in the book of moons

  poor Jackself needs to sleep

  if north is south

  then Jackself’s mouth

  is fifty fore
sts deep

  Line a coat, unlace a shoe

  Jackself, take off your belt

  your mighty skin

  is mighty thin

  when your studs and buckles melt

  I’m in the house of Bethlehem

  lying in a manger

  it’s my turn then

  to turn again

  and meet myself a stranger

  Jackself, please write an inventory

  of all your moving parts

  there’s only one

  and it’s not my tongue

  but my stillness never starts

  Just like the rain on holidays

  it’s guaranteed to fall

  Jackself decides

  to stay inside

  which is really no choice at all

  Wren is hopping on the window ledge

  come out, come out, he cries

  poor Jackself swears

  there’s no one there

  and fills in both his eyes

  Underneath my keyhole suit

  I’m nothing but a knock

  if I go through

  will you come too

  and snap off the key in the lock

  Jackself is dancing down the lonning

  at the bottom of the world

  the day is dust

  and Jackself must

  be back before he’s old

  Jackself

  JACOB POLLEY was born in Carlisle in 1975. He is the author of three poetry collections and received the 2012 Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize for his most recent, The Havocs. His first novel, Talk of the Town, won the Somerset Maugham Award. He teaches at Newcastle University and lives with his family in Newcastle.

  ALSO BY JACOB POLLEY

  Poetry

  The Havocs

  Little Gods

  The Brink

  Fiction

  Talk of the Town

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  I’d like to thank Bare Fiction Magazine, Ploughshares, Poetry (Chicago), The Poetry Review and The Verb on BBC Radio 3 where versions of a few of these poems first appeared. Thanks to John Alder, for his magnificent and provocative setting of the poems. Jackself had the privilege and benefit of two early readers, Jean Sprackland and Katharine Towers, who gave me great encouragement and to whom I am most grateful.

  First published 2016 by Picador

  This electronic edition published 2016 by Picador

  an imprint of Pan Macmillan,

  20 New Wharf Road, London N1 9RR

  Associated companies throughout the world

  www.panmacmillan.com

  ISBN 978-1-4472-9045-2

  Copyright © Jacob Polley, 2016

  Cover illustration inspired by Franz-Josef Holler

  The right of Jacob Polley to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

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