Confession
-Alex Shaw
That he’d dragged his heels with the DIY.
That choler had lit in him, that afternoon
when the clutch burnt up along unnumbered
French roads. That his humours had swung
out of balance and he’d seized her wrist,
when his anger was an autopilot, doing
the steering. That he’d feigned a love
for mountain scenery, seizing her wrist
only to point out vineyards on the slopes.
That before the accident he already knew
the house was rigged out without an earth.
Note:
This week, Alex Shaw submitted this cryptic piece, reminiscent of the increasing incomprehensibility of 8th week. There is a sense that there is a story here, incomplete amongst the fl owing lines, much like an Oxford term. Alex Shaw is a second year, reading English and German at Jesus, and Vice-President of Oxford University Poetry Society. He won last year’s Martin Starkie Prize, and has been commended in the Christopher Tower Poetry Competition.
