Neoprene by Helen Bailey

The Poetry Archive Now! WordView 2024 Entry

Poet’s Biography
I have written poems for many years, and have had some work published, most recently in Cofferdam, by Tangerine Press in 2023.
I completed an MA in Creative & Life Writing at Goldsmiths in 2018.
I live in east London near the hem of where city meets marshes and am working on a mixed collection of pieces based on the humans and environment there.

Poem Description / Inspiration
I have been wondering about the narratives of history and how they affect us, especially in relation to racism and forced migration. I was having a look at what happens if I rewrite part of my own history.

Poem Text
Today's weather is the weather of transition
- of things impending
New words join the language
Impension - make it up
Impendment - leave it out

We are all made of weather
what of invisibility and silence
For the purposes of correction
is it easier to rewrite history or redirect the future?
Does one predate/rely on the other?

For example
I would redirect myself forward as a fearless climber
with strong active legs of muscle and bone
instead of fragile hourglass tubes of quicksand

So that my history rewrites me
as a fearless swimmer
strong enough to face off waves
and swim muscular
through pulling seas
strong enough to swim in the Pacific Ocean
or the Tasman Sea

So that
on that day in Jubilee Pool, when I saw the canoe tip over
and its boy go underneath
held there by his spray deck, yellow or orange I don't remember, but neoprene, that I do
I would not have sat on the side waiting for
each second to come
and bring him up with it

So that
I would have wasted no time
I would have shot through the water
like a missile or a dolphin
I would have reached under the boat and found
his seaweed arms
and pulled him up coughing out the water
coughing out the salt
throwing off the cold and the death hanging on him

I would have pulled him up out of the boat
and righted him and righted the boat
and my breath would have dried him
and my arms would have warmed him
and he would have loved me and he would have stayed.