What follows isn't a criticism of the poem - it's just what I thought while reading it. The poem is in the third person, so it isn't necessarily autobiographical. It could be that the thoughts that occurred to me concerning why the relationship failed is what the poem is about.
This is a list of "unfinished business", things that never happened, which, presumably, are seen as important tokens in an intimate relationship. The only things that actually did happen were that he blushed when her name was mentioned, said things to her that he didn't mean, and never got around to saying the important things he should have said - and his heart hurts.
It seems to me that it makes no sense to call her his "lover", nor refer to her as "lost". On the face of it she never was his lover and there was never a relationship to lose. Also the list of wished-for intimacies bothers me: they might be things that would gratify a man but I can't see a woman attaching much value to them - except the one he never got around to which was to declare his true feelings.
Most women wouldn't particularly want to be soaped in the bath, go for a walk in a rainstorm, or care if you name a star after them or make love in way where the moves are planned in advance, such as the unbuttoning of her blouse etc. In my limited experience, women are more impressed by spontaneity: they prefer to think about love-making as something that "just happens" when the time is right.
People will profess to like "romantic" things such as soppy love-songs or walking in the rain. It's strange that on rainy evenings the streets aren't crowded with these romantics, mumbling love-lyrics. I suspect they're all at home watching romantic comedies on TV, consuming tidbits and imbibing favourite beverages. But I'm such a cynic.
Ultimately the strength of a relationship is the measure of how useful the parties are to one another.
Incidentally, he refers to the Bible, Song of Solomon 7:2
"Thy navel is like a round goblet, which wanteth not liquor"
There are two versions of the lines "Don't ask me how it is I like you. I just might do." The original version is "Don't ask me to say how it is I like you. I just might do."
The poem appeared originally in Simon Armitage's
1993 collection Book of Matches - there's a Kindle version too:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Book-Matches-...
It also appears in an anthologies: The Poetry of Sex ed. Sophie Hannah, also Hand in Hand: An Anthology of Love Poems ed. Carol Ann Duffy.
There is an article about the poem called "About the heart, where it hurt exactly, and how often" by Joanna Gavins and Peter Stockwell
http://www.academia.edu/1568975/About...
Here's an article about Simon Armitage's style particularly his use of everyday speech and cliches:
http://www.poetrymagazines.org.uk/mag...
The couple in silhouette is from an article on a Japanese company that offers paid "heartache leave" for staff who have suffered the painful breakup of a relationship.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2008/0...
Positions for sleeping together:
http://nurturing-relationships.blogsp...
Couple in the bath:
http://www.mommyedition.com/tips-for-...
Last picture of the man sitting on the stairs:
"Heartbreak is worse in the digital age because the history of the relationship lingers in photographs and messages posted on social networking websites..."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology...
Now they are no longer
any trouble to each other
he can turn things over, get down to that list
of things that never happened, all of the lost
unfinishable business.
For instance... for instance,
how he never clipped and kept her hair, or drew a hairbrush
through that style of hers, and never knew how not to blush
at the fall of her name in close company.
How they never slept like buried cutlery --
two spoons or forks cupped perfectly together,
or made the most of some heavy weather --
walked out into hard rain under sheet lightning,
or did the gears while the other was driving.
How he never raised his fingertips
to stop the segments of her lips
from breaking the news,
or tasted the fruit
or picked for himself the pear of her heart,
or lifted her hand to where his own heart
was a small, dark, terrified bird
in her grip. Where it hurt.
Or said the right thing,
or put it in writing.
And never fled the black mile back to his house
before midnight, or coaxed another button of her blouse,
then another,
or knew her
favourite colour,
her taste, her flavour,
and never ran a bath or held a towel for her,
or soft-soaped her, or whipped her hair
into an ice-cream cornet or a beehive
of lather, or acted out of turn, or misbehaved
etc..
Информация по комментариям в разработке