{"id":171,"date":"2012-11-08T10:10:38","date_gmt":"2012-11-08T10:10:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/?p=171"},"modified":"2014-07-02T16:40:08","modified_gmt":"2014-07-02T16:40:08","slug":"two-poems-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/?p=171","title":{"rendered":"Two Poems"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/strong><\/p>\n

PYRAMID<\/strong><\/p>\n

All along the skyline, cranes
\nquiet above rooftops,
\nconspicuous as knives dropped
\nvertically into carpet,<\/p>\n

folded ironing-board-upright
\nor set at right-
\nangles, corner brackets
\nbolting the sky to the ground.<\/p>\n

They dangle claws on chains,
\nunbaited hooks
\nbalanced by elevated breeze-blocks,
\ninto the unfinished town,<\/p>\n

fishing a pond
\nthat hasn’t been stocked.
\nTheir paint-work\u2019s bright as macs
\nin rain, or the mops and pans<\/p>\n

a woman once persuaded me to sell
\ndoor to door,
\ndescribing in the air
\nof her living room a pyramid,<\/p>\n

most mysterious
\nof all mysterious extancies, her red
\nnail climbing floors
\nto the vertex, where it stood,<\/p>\n

or floated,
\nas she effortlessly said
\n\u201cin no time at all
\nyou’ll have a lifestyle just like mine…\u201d<\/p>\n

Through the cranes’
\nnecks the cloudburst rings,
\nacross the clad
\nstone hotel still missing<\/p>\n

its penthouse, its punchline,
\nbucketing down
\nlike the old cartoon
\nwhere a skeleton drinks champagne.<\/p>\n

 
\n
\nATTICA<\/strong><\/p>\n

We have noticed the house at the end’s
\noriginal golden shell of smoke-discoloured stones
\nbeing elaborated upon \u2013
\nthen the funds, the pretence of funds, ran dry.<\/p>\n

New cement buttercreams the breeze-blocks together.
\nThe tough blue tub it was mixed inside
\nmatures to found sculpture, a reverse mould for rainfall
\non permanent display in the yard;<\/p>\n

those grey runny hollows, like pinnacles of guano
\nat a cliff’s foot, if cast would turn out an architect’s model
\nso spectacular, so irregular,
\nno-one could think it possible to execute.<\/p>\n

Seven flexible silvery extractor tubes flop
\nfrom the chimney stacks,
\nthe arms of a villain in Doctor Who, never as new
\nas you wish it would be, a riff on a form,<\/p>\n

and finial tiles, faintly martial,
\ndecorate the ridge with a crest of spikes, four-pointed stars
\ntouching tip to tip, a string of paper dolls
\nholding hands forever, all cut from the same sheet<\/p>\n

by someone who also peels oranges in one go.
\nTerracotta warriors, Tanagra figurines,
\ntheir fin-de-si\u00e9cle welcoming party interrupts the sky
\nwith its colour-wheel opponent, orange on blue;<\/p>\n

and a gallon jug of paint-stripper, colourless and violent,
\nstands forgotten on the tar paper roof.
\nIt must be a reminder someone left for themselves
\nof something they meant to do.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

All along the skyline, cranes
\nquiet above rooftops<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":324,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":[]},"categories":[1,10],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\nTwo Poems - The Manchester Review<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/?p=171\" \/>\n<link rel=\"next\" href=\"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/?p=171&page=2\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Two Poems - The Manchester Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"All along the skyline, cranes quiet above rooftops\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/?p=171\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Manchester Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-11-08T10:10:38+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2014-07-02T16:40:08+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/JKimforFrancesLeviston.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"604\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"402\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Frances Leviston\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Frances Leviston\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/?p=171\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/?p=171\",\"name\":\"Two Poems - The Manchester Review\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2012-11-08T10:10:38+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2014-07-02T16:40:08+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/#\/schema\/person\/d547d793b5729b11b78ebf349d04018c\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/?p=171\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/#website\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/\",\"name\":\"The Manchester Review\",\"description\":\"The Manchester Review\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/#\/schema\/person\/d547d793b5729b11b78ebf349d04018c\",\"name\":\"Frances Leviston\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"http:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/wp-includes\/images\/blank.gif\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/wp-includes\/images\/blank.gif\",\"caption\":\"Frances Leviston\"},\"description\":\"Frances Leviston's first book of poems, Public Dream, was published by Picador in 2007 and shortlisted for the T. 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