Carol Prepares Her Third Perm of the Day by Joe Williams

The Poetry Archive Now! WordView 2024 Entry

Poet’s Biography
Joe Williams is a writer and performing poet from Leeds. His latest book is ‘The Taking Part’, a short collection of poems on the theme of sport and games, published by Maytree Press. His verse novella 'An Otley Run', was shortlisted for Best Novella at the 2019 Saboteur Awards.

Poem Description / Inspiration
A poem portrait of a hairdresser in Ashington, Northumberland during the Miners' Strike in 1984.

Poem Text
She combs through Mrs Robson’s hair,
pulling at the silky strands.
'You’ll alwuz work,' Dad had said.
'Folk’ll alwuz have hyer wants cuttin’.'

She took his advice. It fell to someone
else to give him his last cut,
laid in a box in his only suit,
dead before he could meet the bairns
she didn’t know she was growing.

'Head back,' she says, starts the stream
of near-warm spray.

Folk’ll alwuz have hyer wants cuttin’,
but might not alwuz have money to pay.
There’s only so many IOUs
you can write off for a miner’s wife
before you end up in the same hole.

She strokes at Mrs Robson’s locks.
Mebbes he thought he’d alwuz be there,
till the night she had to call 999.
Mebbes he thought there’d alwuz be the pits.