After Dorothy Parker

Next year I am to be thirty:
That’s one pack of shredded wheat.
But it’s all rather dirty,
Just how often I must wipe the seat. 

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In early November of 2024 Donald Trump was re-elected. This signalled a continual void of racism, bigotry, sexism, and indescribable terror in the United States. Since that day, we have seen families torn apart by ICE, people murdered by ICE, import tariffs, and a concerted effort towards eradicating vital diversity quotas. This is just a fraction of his petrifying second tenure as President.

In the wake of his re-election I quickly penned a ghazal poem called ‘Mono-America’. Out of all the poems I have posted here on Substack this received the most traction (for me at least). What I knew was that the repeated word had to be “America”. But what I hadn’t anticipated, however, was just how much it would come to apply to my own home of the United Kingdom.

We have seen vicious protests denigrating the mere existence of immigrants and asylum seekers, a staunch rise in white nationalism, the squeezing of the NHS, the cost of living soaring to new heights, and a resurgence in the discrimination of the neurodiverse. Nigel Farage parades himself around the country as a beer-drinking man-of-the-people but he is hiding a much seedier spirit; one we have seen before. He takes advantage of the public’s disillusionment with the state of their own lives—plus the country’s—and manipulates them into pointing fingers everywhere but at the government as a whole.

Political poetry is often met with eye-rolls but it is necessary in fighting these injustices in the world. From W. B. Yeats to Gwendolyn Brooks, warring with words has been second-to-none. How else does one fight the wrongs in the world if not with art?

Ghazal: Mono America is a disillusionment: a falling out of love with a country I once adored, one I truly thought was the land of the free.

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Author’s Note: This poem, originally published by Voidspace, is written in a Northern English dialect.

She were left fer dead, and me Da’ found me snotty ov’ her corpse, like. We found some poems on flowery paper in ‘er ‘ouse few days after. She were all cold, like; stiff as a bloody board. Had a reet good selection she did, all classics and that. Mad Mary used to stick tobacco in her butty and eat it for er’ tea. Aye, she was nowt to be messed with, I’ll tell ya. Din’t have a lot a brass, you see. She were always down pub askin’ for lend some. I still ‘ere ‘er voice now; like a flippin’ angel she wer’. Ar’ Tony saw her up ont’ moors t’other day, messin’ about with some kids. Tony dropped a ciggy down cracks of rock, but she stopped the wazzock meetin’ the big man upstairs. Ya know, I never would’a thought you can forget how somebody sounds. I knew ‘er voice yesterday, same for the day before, but now, it’s just a blur, like. Poets’ speak same language as the dead, but I’m no poet. Thas don’t have no words for it. She were good at all’at. It’s a cryin’ shame she went up wit’ smoke. I never got to tell ‘er how I felt.

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‘Slow, slow from the barred window

dies the light of day…’

—Slow, slow the rhythm of the moon, Sylvia Plath

My journey with Sylvia Plath began in 2014: aged seventeen. I was a student in sixth form and absolutely miserable. The last day before summer was fast approaching and our English teacher told us we would be starting our next module on a poet named Sylvia Plath. Surprisingly, I hadn’t heard of her before (surprising because I pride myself on general knowledge). To throw us in at the deep end we were shown the 2003 film, Sylvia (not at all an accurate representation).

Between lessons I sought out a copy of Ariel. Strolling through Bolton Town Centre I flipped through the crisp cream pages and lasered in on words such as ‘death’ and ‘winter’. I felt a buzzing in my stomach at the macabre delight. The strange and eerie has always been a large part of my life and to see that reflected in such decadent poesie was an experience like no other.

While I did drop out of sixth form my obsession with Sylvia Plath did not end at those heavy glass doors. Her work has stitched itself to my mind, body, and soul. At every bookshop I am on the lookout for her books. And this once paid off when I found an old copy of The Bell Jar at my favourite second-hand book stall (R.I.P.) in Manchester. I have also purchased many-a-copy of her collected poems from eBay. However, over forty years has passed since they were first published, so was it not time for a refresh?

When an updated collection of her poems was announced by Faber & Faber over a year ago I practically levitated. Poems by Plath I haven’t read before, I wondered, sign me up! The book is edited / collated by Amanda Golden and Karen V. Kukil. As the introduction states, “decades of research have led to the discovery of new materials”. Beginning with the last ten years of her life—her most mature work—and ending with poems from 1937-52, The Poems of Sylvia Plath treats us to the finer details of her life as we have never seen them before.

In the poem, Owl, Plath describes a midnight walk through a city street.

‘Clocks belled twelve. Main Street showed otherwise

Than its suburb of woods: nimbus-

Lit, but unpeopled, held its windows

Of wedding pastries,’

The vivid imagery will be familiar to almost anyone. There are indeed the pastries left in bakery windows overnight, the desolate pavements, and the crashing of the church bell.

‘What moved the pale, raptorial owl

Then, to squall above the level

Of streetlights and wires…’

The words wrap round one’s lips like a gauze; like gum popping. Sylvia Plath is much like the owl in the poem: swooping down to capture images and metaphors. In an empty street she asks what stirs the predatory owl and makes it squawk. It is the only sign of life in a dead silence.

‘Rats’ teeth gut the city…’

This particular line can be interpreted in two ways: as the stars in the sky or literal rats eating their way through. Plath is known for her cosmic inclusions. This much is clear in one of her most famous poems (though never included in her previous collected oeuvre), Mad Girl’s Love Song: a villanelle.

‘The stars go waltzing out in blue and red…’

The villanelle is obsessive and repetitive. This 19-line poetic form consists of five tercets with two alternating refrains (the first and third lines of the first stanza) and a final quatrain (finishing with the two repeated refrains). Its complete omission from the collection edited by Ted Hughes himself is still a mystery to all. Despite it reportedly being one of her favourite poems she wrote, Mad Girl’s Love Song, has—you could say—has been locked inside its very own asylum until now. But Amanda Golden and Karen V. Kukil have freed the poem to be plumped up by more than just anaesthetists.

They also include numerous notes for various verses; sometimes providing variations on titles and specific lines. These details are a dream for die-hard fans of Plath and scholars everywhere. This is not a book for the casual reader. Photographs of submission lists give you a little breathing room before diving back in. But what I find most intriguing about The Poems of Sylvia Plath is just how reachable she feels. I, like many poets, find a sense of immortality in having written and published a poem; and I think Plath did also. When I read her work I feel her ‘sticky pearls’ on my neck. The sound of her mid-Atlantic drag is an ear seed.

In her poem, Eve Describes Her Birthday Party, Plath uses the first man and woman to describe a kind of stasis.

‘But as I pierced the primal sleep of man, Caged in a strict white rib, He called my name:

And green and sweet the sudden world began.’

If one were to compare it to the second line of her poem, The Hanging Man, (‘I sizzled in his blue volts like a desert prophet,’) can it be argued that she is actually speaking about her experience with psychologists, doctors, and electroshock therapy? If you look at photographs of patients being shocked, the electrodes applied to the temples do resemble a bone of some sort severed in the middle.

‘A thunderclap, and voluble visitors

Vanished in fandangos of blue flame…’

Here she appears to illustrate the violent onset of thrashing often described by patients; like marbles in a glass. At the time of Plath’s treatment, it was usually done without adequate pain relief, thus causing both physical and emotional damage. The effects of such trauma informed much of her work, including her novel, The Bell Jar.

‘It had nothing to do with me, but I couldn’t help wondering what it would be like, being burned alive all along your nerves. I thought it must be the worst thing in the world.’

What The Poems of Sylvia Plath achieves is mammoth. The book captures the evolution of poetic genius. From villanelles to sonnets, from odes to confessions, Amanda Golden and Karen V. Kukil have put the pieces together, finally rendering Sylvia Plath a living thing.

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After Vida, the runaway police horse

The day I closed the chapter of your final letters,
an arctic horse bled through the eyes of London. 

A coat of fly agaric knocking glass into prisoners of time. 
The scrim disturbed; refined to a crackle. 

This pegasus martyred herself beneath the abbey, 
hailing the collective lens of a parochial dream.

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After ‘Vegetarian Vampire’ by Remedios Varo

The languid vampire chose to leave the table. 
Giddy with fiendish delight from the sun-cloaked gable. 
After a portentous lunch of meat and cream,
Altair Corpus Christi cut a pair of scissors along the seam. 
A yellowed bile grew fingertips and played the lyre,
And when they tried to run, he gave them hellfire.

But when that quixotic morning came a-calling,
A creature called Lumen found it all so appalling.
“Dear god man, we mustn’t shut out the light!”
With a weighted sigh, Altair snuffed his candles out of spite.
Doctor Lumen was thus served a sickly bowl of soup,
Out of brown apples, rotting bananas, and child of croup. 

“There there, let it clasp the tears in your tiny throat.”
Just when he was about to sip, a girl stood in her petticoat,
Red-shoed and hair full of spiders did she extend a hand.
“Do set me a place at your table, for my belly is in demand.”
Both vampire and man pulled out their seats in a start,
Thoroughly unnerved by such visitation from faint of heart.

She ravaged all that was put in front of her, sweet or salt. 
Doctor Lumen was in awe of the devil in a little dolt. 
Beyond the moon juice and star powder, the abashed
Three exchanged vows, insults, and coins for their stash.
Miss. Red took a spider from her hair and ate its legs.
Altair turned away towards the light among the dregs.

“Little Stain, you are a beast, a fiend, an ironside,”
Said Lumen as he tore at his napkin, eyes open wide.
Yet she smiled with every black tooth presently bared, 
And even though she starved again, Little Stain always shared.
The sudden glare of god came a-stomping through the pane,
Rivets of snow painted the glass a lyrical shade of wane. 

The abashed three divided beneath the table, bundled lame.
When it occurred to both men she had no name,
They would call her Little Stain—sentimentality trespassing,
Just as Lumen had done in various states of crashing.
The hours went by, each calmer than the previous one,
But tragedy was never far away as Little Stain was gone. 

All that was left was the gilded clasp of her red shoe,
Rusty and well-loved, most unlike the abashed two.
Birds of smoke flew through the room with unbridled rage.
Breakfast had been poisoned with bad blood and rotten sage.
Altair grew thirsty for the spoilings of Lumen’s boredom,
Launching across the room, he performed a postmortem. 

“Why did you sit at my table, Doctor Lumen? Why come here?”
Asked Altair, shaking Lumen by his flea-ridden ears.
His heart was full of milk, sweet like pea and pickled sour.
The first bite was the greatest of all, spraying a crimson shower.
As he drank his last drop, Little Stain came jiving round the door.
She squealed in horror at the beastly scene there on the floor. 

“You fool in your red shoes—must I help you find your way?”
Little Stain reached behind her back and named her price to pay:
Two silvers and both of his fangs, but they mustn’t be cleaned.
Altair felt the autumn moon rising above the fatty sheen. 
Impatient, she tore him away from his meal and into the light.
He cried out in pain, choking on the charred skin dulling his fight.

Had she known what lay beyond the speared gates, 
She would never have dined on croup soup and manic states.
Now Little Stain had the vampire frozen in the greatest scare—
The phantasmic ghost of Lumen gave her a smile to wear.
When he shivered or moved so slightly, Altair cried like a cockwell:
“Please, please leave this place as it was before your wicked spells.”

In the beginning there was the abashed three,
But now the screws have turned on those weak at the knees.
Then there were the abashed two, full-bellied and smug too soon.
And when the third returned from vacating the whims of a spoon,
She pledged her allegiance to suffering the pangs of hunger he 
Had led her to believe they were the offspring of democracy!

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For many years, the words ‘See you at Christmas’, left my mouth on many occasions. Round my grandfather’s oblong table; aunts, uncles, cousins and family friends pulled crackers, told jokes, and got silly on sherry. The goose-greased turkey would be fossilised by the end of the night. But once I turned thirteen, I didn’t find much opportunity to say it anymore. By fifteen I had stopped altogether. Now, the Christmas cards I buy come in small packs. The turkey is much smaller: now coated in oil. Last Christmas, mother told me a joke, and I sobbed into my trifle.

In the kitchen I melt the last of the sealing wax. Mother washes the dishes; the nice ones with the gold trimming.

“I should start on the prep soon.”

I nod, pouring the molten green into a rough circle. You must stamp quickly, otherwise it will crust up and you’ll have to begin again. As mother prepares Christmas lunch (to be cooked on the day), I head out to post the neighbour’s cards. Stepping out, I notice Rodram from three doors down.

“You all ready for tomorrow?”

“Yes, Rodram. How about yourself?”

“Oh, you know…plodding along.”

He waves as he goes back inside.

“Have a good one!”

After posting the cards I catch the bus to the disused funeral home. Hovering by the front door and nursing a cigarette is Soulis. He wears overalls, pike boots, and a red cap.

“What took you so long? I’ve been chewing my nails off here!”

“Calm down, Soulis. I live with my mother, remember? It’s meant to be a surprise.”

As we open the doors, we are hit with the unsettling stench of patchouli and formaldehyde.

“Alright, let’s be quick.”

We undress.

“Aren’t you always,” I say.

Soulis treats these moments like minor miracles. I moan and groan to tide him over and send him over the edge. For myself, I find comfort in the cross on the wall. Can you imagine if it flipped upside down?

“I’m a lucky man.”

Post-coitus, he adjusts his cap and goes to light up again. He offers me one, which I decline.

“Smoking is immoral.”

He laughs like Santa Claus: a great heaving guffaw that could raise the dead.

“I need three by the time mother starts on lunch, ok?”

“You have my word.”

When I return home, mother is sitting on the stairs.

“Where have you been?”

I hang my coat on the hook.

“I went to see a friend. She called me when I was posting the cards.”

“And you didn’t think to call me?”

She follows me into the kitchen where I boil the kettle.

“There wasn’t time. I’m sorry, ok?”

With a grunt, she retrieves a stocking from the fireplace.

“You can open this tonight,” she says, grabbing the milk from the fridge.

I have had a Christmas stocking every year since I was old enough to appreciate it. At the very bottom is a piece of fruit. What was once a satsuma has now become a pink dragonfruit. My refined tastes have proven problematic with mother’s finances, though I don’t ask for anything.

We take our tea to the sofa. For the next hour I read my book while she relishes in one of those cheesy Christmas films that cost pennies to make. I think of my great surprise. Soulis will bring the corpses in the early hours. If this is the case, we will need to be stealthy.

“Mother, I have a surprise for you,” I say, lifting up my head.

She pauses the TV.

“Oh? When do I get it?”

“Tomorrow. But you can’t come down in the morning. I will come and get you.”

She claps her hands and rubs them together.

“I’m all excited!”

#

It’s ten o’clock by the time she goes to bed. There’s not enough time for me to sleep and prepare, so I ply myself with coffee granules. Keeping the TV on low, I manage to snatch twenty minutes here and there. The blue light soothes me with its ominous output.

Hours pass and I, having busied myself with a crossword, receive a text.

I’m outside.

Creeping to the back door, we drag the corpses through the kitchen and stack them up. I often wonder how many screams are trapped by the stitches, how many blinks are suppressed by eye caps. Soulis props up the first body; an elderly woman with a large nose. We attach them to wooden planks and tie their arms behind their backs.

Exhausted, we pour two pints of whisky and cola.

“Soulis, forgive me, but they don’t look as though they’re enjoying themselves?”

He chokes on his drink. Before he can wake up mother I cover his mouth.

“Well, they won’t, will they?”

Pondering, I notice a bottle of cake glitter on top of the microwave. The corpses shimmer beneath the overhead lights.

“That’s better.”

Soulis says he has to leave, but he will pick them back up tomorrow evening. I nap on the sofa for two more hours before making breakfast for mother. She likes her eggs boiled until the yolk greens. Her toast must be burned; charred really. When I open her door, I find her sitting up in the dark.

“Don’t do that! You almost made me drop everything.”

“Oh, do you have to shout so early in a morning,” she says, covering her ears.

I hand her the breakfast tray, tucking my hair behind my ears.

“Eat your breakfast then call for me. Don’t come down until I say so, right?”

Downstairs I arrange the ingredients for lunch, line up the presents, and check that all the corpses are secured. Though, if they aren’t, I’m not sure I can do anything. The whole house smells like pine because of a candle I lit. A home that smells like a man makes me feel untouchable—invincible perhaps. I slice open a few crackers, careful not to touch the explosive strip, and pull out the paper hats. I place them on the heads of our new friends: red for the old lady, blue for the young man, and gold for the middle-aged woman with the hourglass tattoo.

“Mother! Mother! You can come down now!”

Her footsteps shake the ceiling.

“Close your eyes, mother,” I say.

Guiding her down the stairs, I feel my heart beating and my knees falter.

“Keep them closed.”

I sit her at the table.

“And…open.”

When she does, I pop up from behind the elderly woman.

“Surprise!”

She yelps at first. Then she starts to laugh uncontrollably, slapping her knee. She wipes her tears with the back of her hand.

“Do you like it?”

“Oh, Tanzy. I don’t know what to say,” she shrieks.

“Say you like it at least.”

“They’re so realistic!”

I freeze.

“…They are! Erm, do you want a cuppa?”

What should I do? Do I tell her the truth? Do I let her exist in the lie? The crucial thing is to consider the aftermath.

“I should start on lunch.”

#

Just as the king’s speech is about to begin, mother instructs me to set the table. The turkey is browning, the vegetables are roasting, and the gravy is warming on the stove. Christmas songs play on the radio. Mother plates up our lunch, and I—stomach rumbling—give our new friends an extra coat of glitter.

“All done! Let me get this apron off,” she says, pinching my cheeks.

Over the next hour, we eat, pull crackers, and sing. It almost feels like Christmas once did.

“Do you remember how busy it used to be?”

Mother holds up a finger as she necks her wine.

“Every year, at your grandfather’s house, was just bustling. There was always someone new to meet.”

“What happened?”

Mother stands up, sighing.

“Who’s for pudding?”

Before she can pour the brandy, I take out my phone.

“Light her up!”

The flames sparkle. Through them I see the elderly woman’s face: stoic, peaceful.

“Look at that, Tanzy!”

The little sprites wane, leaving a gently smoking pudding. I never have Christmas pudding without brandy cream to drown it in. But it is much smaller now. Our guests pose like sprinkles atop buttercream sheets. Mother clears the table; sweeping the crumbs of our year into her cupped palm. Like she said when I was little, “one must get every little bit”.

Suddenly, my phone vibrates.

I’ll pick up at 5.

I shovel the rest of my pudding down my throat, scooping the cream in one fell swoop.

“Why such a hurry?”

“…Films!”

“Well, I’ll just record them. You’ll get heartburn doing that.”

Will she suspect something? Will Soulis slip up?

Over the next hour, we complete a jigsaw, watch The Snowman, and play charades. I’ve had diarrhoea twice. Mother looks over at me, then she asks,

“Are you hiding something?”

“What makes you ask that,” I say, biting my cheek.

She hates unexpected guests. She asks everyone who plans on visiting to call hours ahead.

“…A friend.”

She jumps to tidy up.

“It’s Christmas Day!”

“He’s just picking up the—”

“The what?”

“The dolls.”

I open the back door with my finger on my lips. He shakes his head.

“Mother, this is Soulis.”

She shakes his hand, sweaty and pink in the face.

“So, you’re responsible for the dolls?”

Soulis whips his head towards me. “Dolls? They’re not—”

“What he means is that they’re like his children.”

Mother boils the kettle, humming along. Soulis takes the bodies out individually. The elderly woman is the last to go. As he struggles through the door, her eye caps pop out of her skull and onto the floor, where they roll and come to a stop next to mother’s foot.

“What are these,” she asks, picking them up.

She looks to the ceiling as if recalling something.

“Dolls don’t have these, do they?”

Soulis snatches them from her hand, and I begin to usher him out the back door.

“Tanzy, what is going on here? I am not to be made a fool of.”

“I’ll see you next week then,” Soulis says, making haste.

Mother locks herself in the living room.

If only the eye caps had stayed put.

For the next hour she refuses to speak.

“Mother, I can explain if you would stop this charade!”

With no answer, I let myself in. She is laid out on the sofa; eyes wide open and left arm across her stomach. I lie with her, wrapping my arms around the buckle of her belt.

“Do you remember when we would get up at five in the morning on Christmas Eve? Just to catch the bus? Then we’d find somewhere to have tea and toast. And sometimes, it would snow. Do you remember?”

I smell the wine on her breath. I taste the regret. Half-conscious, the crooning of carol singers bleeds through the walls like a love letter. This is our now. This is our fortune.

END

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Author’s Note: Here is the first part of my select diary entries for March.

Sun, 1st March:

Why must I dream about C again? I’m sick of being drawn to his mind games. My heart is not a marionette.

Mon, 2nd March:

I have finished filling in the PIP form. This has stressed me out to the max. It’s driving me quite insane.

Tue, 3rd March:

Why is that narcissist still around?

Separately, C still hasn’t messaged me. How have I let myself be drawn in again? What are these games? I won’t be his toy any longer.

He previously went silent for an entire five years. Who does that?

I am working on Project X with Dad. There are interesting photographs of egg cups and oyster shells.

Thur, 5th March:

I often wonder when my health anxiety first began. It got greatly worse when Mum and Dad split up that weekend in 2018.

It has certainly been a woefully intense week. If only it would go away completely. Maybe then I could relax?

I didn’t anticipate finishing the work in the night but I did. This means I get paid £75 tomorrow.

There’s still radio silence from C. What is wrong with that man?

I started rewatching ‘The X Files’ last night. What a show that was! I have always wondered if I wasn’t abducted by aliens…

When I was little, I had a recurring dream where I am stood in front of my parent’s bed as they sleep. I look to the alarm clock and see it’s about to be midnight. I am filled with total fear as the white lights shine through. Then they come for me.

And when we drove up to the gates of Area 51 in 2012 I completely freaked out and clung to Mum until we got back to our hotel.

Sat, 7th March:

I am writing a short play about my dealings with the council about our stolen bin. It will satirise the council and explore the lunacy of having to pay to replace a stolen bin. The title will be ‘Who Let the Bins Out?’.

Wouldn’t it be funny if the council came to see it? Would they find it amusing? I very much doubt it!

Mum is at work today. I hope she manages to bring home some food. The Spaghetti Bolognese from the restaurant is delicious.

On another note, I was recently reminded of my interest in Chinese myth. Doing more research will certainly be beneficial to me. I first became fascinated when I watched Mulan (1998) and Wendy Wu (200?).

Dylan Thomas’ ‘Under Milk Wood’ is a genius text; so inventive and as rich as toffee.

Sun, 8th March:

It’s International Women’s Day but I feel both male and female. My sensibilities are feminine but my temperament is male-centred.

These types of days are always a little strange for me. They mean to celebrate just one aspect of myself.

It is quite apt that ‘Courtenay’ is a unisex name. But I adore men. They quite fascinate the mind, body, and soul.

So where do I belong on a day like today?

I have always felt at odds with my species. Is this down to my autism perhaps?

Though I identify as female I write about the male species an awful lot.

Tue, 9th March:

I had a dream I was in a place similar to the Trafford Centre. What I remember is that Mum was working in one department. I asked Laurence Fox (hateful man) where she was and he told me she was on her lunch break.

Then I find myself playing this extremely physical arcade game to win some kind of candy from a very handsome man.

To do this I must tear into the neck of some creatures and prod them with a meat thermometer to find some specific items.

In the midst of this I find myself exiting briefly to insert star-topped candles into micro cupcakes. Additionally, I come across a man who works for a theatre company. And when he finds out I am a writer he asks if I have any scripts to hand. As I happen to have a copy of my real-life short play, Pigeon Winter, I pass it over. Opposite his desk is a ruby jewellery shop and a strange spa that has a reading room and a dog.

When I return to the arcade game I pass a shop with exotic fruit and items for extremely cheap. Blue Curacao oranges catch my eye and I purchase them for 70p.

It is at this point the dream takes me to a café where I hope C will be. Instead I find Paul Hollywood who takes a liking to my t-shirt, saying:

“Get your mam to buy me that.”

There is a switch to both dreams merging into one. Mum and I find ourselves in a glass lift. Then I am on a bus absolutely adamant I will read ‘Lord of the Flies’.

Wed, 10th March:

I wish my health anxiety would go away. It drives me utterly insane. I know the brief wheezes are due to a mucus build up. It goes when I clear my throat but my mind won’t stop racing.

These particular anxieties make it difficult to work. Alas, we must press on, must we not?

My desperation to complete a piece of work addles me. I am dissatisfied by incompletion. Why am I like this? My perfectionist tendencies interfere with my work.

I most hate the stench of Spring.

My life feels at such standstill right now. I keep daydreaming about the one I wish I could lead. Sometimes I think about drawing the final curtain but then I remember the face of the most important player: Mum. She wouldn’t survive if I took myself out.

Mum brought Spaghetti Bolognese home from the restaurant.

My eyes are suitably tired today.

Thur, 12th March:

It’s very early and I am quite hungry. If only we could afford a McDonald’s breakfast.

As I write this Mum is fast asleep and Barney (the cat) is cleaning himself.

I have a copy of ‘Alice in Wonderland’ and ‘Through the Looking Glass’ next to me.

Doesn’t time go slow these days? Why do I feel so lost within myself? I may be waiting for my own rabbit hole.

Fri, 13th March:

I’ve not been doing any work on the plays recently. My head just hasn’t been in it at all. It’s all down to my health anxiety. I can’t seem to regain control over my mind. I just sit and dwell on every bodily sensation. It’s driving me insane!

I did have a dream in which I tried to save people at a bus station.

Do I write a poem again? But reading poems I don’t like sucks the desire right from the wound. I just read Elizabeth Bishop’s ‘In the Waiting Room’ and I both hate it and love it. The plainness of the language disgusts me but the surrealism is completely delightful. It should be totally great but it’s not. Where did Bishop fail here? Where is the ambition? It is an almost gutless poem but there is a peculiar appeal.

I ate pizza and painted my nails silver.

Sat, 14th March:

It’s very cold today. I am dreading the warmer weather.

This is the final year of my ‘20s. How have I reached this point? I’m turning thirty next year! This will bring a whole new decade. What will life bring to me? I will be the same age as Sylvia Plath was when she killed herself. And to be quite honest, I’m surprised I’m still here myself. If it wasn’t for Mum I would have left a long time ago. Dad can live without me but Mum cannot.

When I had that dream about bombs falling on Tehran I realised that I had been thinking about war subconsciously. Will we ever live in a world free from war?

As I write in this notebook, the birds chirp and amid the condensation and pre-spring ice. The trees remain grey and skeletal. Mum sleeps across from me; lamb-white jumper billowing out. There is a shape of frost plastered against the window pane like a ghost in a Charles Dickens novel. Barney (black cat) snores just a few inches away.

Mum has work today; which will be busy due to Mother’s Day. I hope she returns with pasta again.

I must plan adequately for my satire about the council and waste management. Where might the play go in the end? There are three neighbours in purple robes sitting around a crystal ball. Who / what might come through instead? This would represent what happens when you question authority. Perhaps a hitman? Would that be too on the nose? But who else might come through?

Mum just called to ask if I wanted Yukio Mishima books from the charity shop.

Sun, 15th March:

It is chill-filled again. My nose is running like a river. Mum brought home the Mishima books yesterday. I have made a start on ‘Thirst for Love’

Mum told me that the woman at the charity shop was impressed by my eclectic taste and asked if I could give them a list of books I desire and my phone number in case any come in.

It’s Mother’s Day and I just finished writing a handwritten letter for Mum to read when she wakes.

I manifest money for us. Then we won’t argue. Then we can finally relax. Then we can pay everyone back and regain our relationships. Then Mum can stop feeling so bad about everything. Then we will finally be free.

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After ‘Untitled (Scissors)’ by Jannis Kounellis

I wish my nails were sharp enough to cut the day

Into fractured atoms so profound they crash instead.

Morning’s ghost shrouds himself in buds of disarray.

The lunate wolves dribble and drabble through fields of wed;

Grocer’s green taking their tongues from blush to stone.

Poison! Poison! They shout to the shrews living in the wood.

To a carousel of fables the wind carries a spirited moan.

What a dream it would be to jump from the ship of good,

To fall into beaten panels of bluebottles and ruthless cargo.

Under pestle I am moulded into a rounded star, slant

Like my hairdresser as she hooks the scissors somehow.

Inhuman is this double-image, my budding sycophant.

Tell me I am a fallen star losing my shine thick and fast.

Tell me I am yours as the runes thread their forecast.

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“Everyone contributes a basket of lunch;
Each person has it all figured out
That no one else will think of bringing hard-boiled eggs.”

—Parties: A Hymn of Hate, Dorothy Parker

“You’re boring,” is something I have heard many times when it comes to the fact I don’t enjoy going out drinking / clubbing. Now don’t get me wrong; I have done my fair share of downing Sambuca shots (I love licorice). However, I never truly enjoyed the experience. My old friends would text me to ask if I was coming out to one of the local pubs with sticky floors, dirty bathrooms, and people I hadn’t seen since high school.

The seminal moment came in 2018 when I went out for my friend’s birthday. There were girls in the group I had never met and we were going from our little town to the next town over. We were in a nightclub at 2am and I wasn’t having fun. The people there were much younger than those I would normally socialise with (I prefer older men) and it occurred to me just how desperate I was to be at home with a cup of tea and reruns of Agatha Christie’s Poirot. At this point in time I was twenty-one years old.

While some of my friends were drinking cider in the park, I was at home with my books and notebook. It was only when I turned sixteen that I started to drink. We went to each other’s houses loaded up on perfume and Smirnoff Ice. But the standing around stirred a sense of profound ennui within me. It did not matter whether we were at the local Weatherspoons or a bar; the feeling remained.

My main desire was to talk to older men and women about classic literature, creative writing, theatre, the world, philosophy, etc. I was increasingly unfulfilled because the people who surrounded me weren’t on the same wavelength. The extent of our conversations usually regarded the formalities and general chatter. And there is a pervasive idea that a lot of writers drink—and some did! We are well aware of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s struggles with alcohol.

Growing up, I envisioned myself writing great works in bars with wealthy older men, but in actuality I have far more interest in writing in museums, cafes, bookshops, etc. Again, there is a fierce narrative about people my age (twenty-nine) “missing out” on the clubbing life as though it is something all of us want. This is not a true representation. In fact, drinking to excess and partying have become so normalised that those who do not conform are treated as aliens. As I stated at the beginning, I have been called boring due to my disinterest in the drinking scene. I am exhausted by standing in bars and establishments.

There is a discussion—on TikTok especially—happening surrounding Gen Z’s inability to “have fun”. However, the word “fun” simply means the act of partying. What is often missing from these conversations are the myriad of ways that a person can enrich their life. Before I became chronically unwell, there was nothing more thrilling than inspecting the various artefacts in museums, staring at art in the gallery, and browsing books in the second-hand bookshop. Why would I want to go to a bar when I could converse with someone about the plays of Tennessee Williams or Sophocles?

For some reason—possibly out of insecurity about one’s own choices—regular drinkers / partygoers will believe those of us who don’t partake think ourselves above them. But none of us feel in any way special or lucrative because of our dissatisfaction. We are not “missing out” or “not living” because we would much rather sit by the fire with a copy of Sylvia Plath’s Collected Poems, nor are we “a problem” because we refuse to indulge in the act of binge drinking. Additionally, many partygoers don’t seem to realise that you don’t need to have ten shots to be an alcoholic. If your one glass of wine on a Friday night becomes three glasses by the following Thursday you may be deeper in a hole than you think.

The only thing this writer takes on the regular is an anti-depressant, probiotics, and lemon balm tincture. I often wonder what effects alcohol may have on my creativity while also remembering what Poirot always said: “The little grey cells”.

Author’s Note: Dear reader, I really need your help. My life has recently turned quite topsy turvy. I am dealing with a complicated chronic illness and extreme financial worries. This has led me to set up a GoFundMe page. If you have liked my work previously and would like to support a struggling artist, please consider donating!

After ‘Star Maker’ by Remedios Varo

The moon whines in his highchair, gurgling and garbling.
Momma says, “Stay light for mama,” as she itches her eyes rosy.
She rubs his back, rousing the gas from a resting place. 

Those soft bubbles fly high, tied up with pollution. 
Momma pays the man a pressed penny from the museum.
Baby needs sustenance, needs a strong diet of doubt. 

The moon grows large and all his friends have abandoned him.
Momma is ashamed of her little glutton, gobbling every word. 
She had hoped he would lose the dead weight, but failure came to stay.

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I’m existing on tins / cartons of soup and simple sandwiches. Though with this stomach bug I cannot eat at all.

I am hoping to get my health back on track this year so I can continue doing this and all I love.

I’m truly struggling both physically and mentally right now. If you can spare any donations towards my GoFundMe, I would greatly appreciate it.

—Courtenay x

Mentioned:

- Complete Plays by Aristophanes

- The Birthday Party by Harold Pinter

- Summerfolk by Maxim Gorky

- The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope

- Ulysses by James Joyce

- I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out of Here

- Big Brother

- Stranger Things S5 (SPOILER WARNING)

Support The Maple Moon Podcast:

- GoFundMe

- Amazon Wishlist

• For all press / PR enquiries, please contact me via email: courtenay.editor@gmail.com

Mentioned:

- Mslexia’s Instagram Post

- Hallowe’en Ghazal by Kit Buchan

- We Blue Stars by Courtenay Schembri Gray

- The Poetry Review

- Diane Seuss

- Full Fathom Five by Sylvia Plath

Currently Reading:

- Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clark

- The Golden Notebook by Doris Lessing

Support The Maple Moon Podcast:

- Ko-Fi

- PayPal

- Amazon Wishlist

• For all press / PR enquiries, please contact me via email: courtenay.editor@gmail.com

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- The Collected Poems of Sylvia Plath (ed. Ted Hughes)

- Sylvia (dir. Christine Jeffs, 2003)

- The Letters of Ted Hughes (ed. Christopher Reid)

- Winter Landscape, With Rooks by Sylvia Plath

- Bucolics by Sylvia Plath

- Faun by Sylvia Plath

- Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath by Heather Clark

- Sylvia Plath in Devon: A Year’s Turning by Elizabeth Sigmund and Gail Crowther

- The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

- Ariel by Sylvia Plath

- Gilmore Girls

Support The Maple Moon Podcast:

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• For all press / PR enquiries, please contact me via email: courtenay.editor@gmail.com

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Author’s Note: Originally published by Libre Lit.

Language is a languid doll
poaching from a flaxen nest.
And as the blood moon moves, the vault
-ing stars come flushing in like deer.
His commands of my body swam dulcet,
like the cries of a banshee; so pale. 

He took apart my shells; those scarlet pail
-s which hold the lips and eyes of my living doll.
Our love is frozen like a stasis of dulcet 
birds escaping their horrific nest.
He was my winter, my dear
old Jack Frost sparking his white volts.

When we last spoke that mild December, my heart vault
-ed across my rib cage; the stepping stones, otherwise paled. 
From his soul to his gut, he was my i-dol. 
I hoisted him by his neckerchief, the colour of blackberries: most ear-nest.
Out in the moon-barked dark a bearded man tended to his rein-deer.
But this time, the currants rotted themselves dulcet.

He sketched me, pressing his pencils into nothingness; a rather dull-set.
I was his collage of ideals, stripped and glued to the revolt.
To have drunk from the kitchen nest;
letting it mutate into an untamable beast, pale
under the hailing influence of tramadol.
It poked holes in our dreams like a killdeer

looking for caterpillars and spiders to commandeer;
to manipulate their covers and hear them scream dulcet.
I wondered if the black cat in the doctor’s office was a medical doll;
meagre hands of god used to practise their resurrection, their volta.
For all my research, nothing can explain the pale
-ontology of love, of the templates from which I learned to obey, nest

-ing my lamb-white eyes disho-nest. 
That winter of my life spun me into a balladeer,
crooning to the moon where I im-pale. 
I was your hawk; your sparrow if my mood fell dulcet.
When it came for you that night, it stole our dreams like a rabid magpie, vault-
ing across the stars, with a thud and a whack, coming to rest on you, my i-dol.

The barren pail danced around the milk nest.
A blank dol-drum held death so dear.
The tulips, peevishly dulcet, nipple-pink, vault-ing.

‘I have no patience with the pretensions of would-be poets who contrive by toadying and underground influences to get their volumes placed on every drawing-room table.’
—The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope

Mentioned:

- Rebecca Kenny’s Instagram post

- The Rest Is Entertainment episode: 16:34

- Majority of creative jobs go to friends or contacts in ‘closed’ process – BECTU by Katie Chambers for The Stage

- NPO championing marginalised writers to close by Chris Sharratt for Arts Professional

- The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope

Places to Donate:

- Médecins Sans Frontières

- Help Kurt Transition and Survive!

Support The Maple Moon Podcast:

- Ko-Fi

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- Amazon Wishlist

• For all press / PR enquiries, please contact me via email: courtenay.editor@gmail.com

Mentioned:

- Hamlet by William Shakespeare (Act I, Scene V)

- Two Girls One Ghost

- The Hunting of the Snark by Lewis Carroll (fit the second. the bellman’s speech)

Support The Maple Moon Podcast:

- Ko-Fi

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Mentioned:

- The Machinist (dir. Brad Anderson), 2004

- Ghazal: Mono America by Courtenay Schembri Gray

- WIP by Courtenay Schembri Gray

Support The Maple Moon Podcast:

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- Pain, Parties, Work by Elizabeth Winder

- After Midnight by Daphne du Maurier

- Virago Press

- Rebecca, dir. Alfred Hitchcock (1940)

- The Signalman by Charles Dickens

- The Machine Stops by E. M. Forster

- Story of the Eye by Georges Bataille

- Where Flowers Give Birth to Snow by Courtenay Schembri Gray

- Gail Crowther

• For all press / PR enquiries, please contact me via email: courtenay.editor@gmail.com

• If you would like to support the podcast by helping me on my way to purchasing a microphone, consider donating to Ko-Fi or PayPal / Alternatively you can purchase from my Amazon Wishlist!

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