The Rose of Toulouse

Fred D'Aguiar

• Publisher: Carcanet Poetry
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9781847772299
• eBook ISBN: 9781847777799
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: African Poetry
• Index: Literature

Abook of geographies, this collection chronicles the poet's history as it traces the places where he has lived and taught. Written by an immigrant, this book also masterfully tackles political topics, including the war on terror and terror itself: its causes and effects. Through sonnets, ballads, free verse, and a sinuous long line, this honest, thoughtful, and exciting compilation presents poetry that spans the English languages of Guyana, the Caribbean, the United States, and Europe.

The Giant of Land’s End

The giant of Land’s End

Lives far from our town

Where the river bends

Towards barren down.

He shuns consensus

Malls and traffic jams,

Dodges the city census,

TV and dotcom scams.

His peat and thatch house

Crouches on a hillside,

Like a foxhole or dugout

Hidden from prying eyes.

His front door faces the sea,

His backdoor kisses the banks

Of a twisting, warbling estuary,

Where he fishes and thinks.

When he’s far from home

It’s to hunt wild game

He clobbers with a stone

If they keep still when he aims.

But he catches only what

He can eat and eats only

What he needs to live so that

Everything he touches solely

For life understands him,

Including trout hooked on

The end of a fishing line,

Held by him in his reflection:

A face of bunched features,

Big nose and fat lips,

Hair of a wild creature,

Broad shoulders, broad hips.

How our paths crossed

When I least expected

When all I’d heard said

He never existed,

I cannot explain,

I know he never wanted

Me to experience his pain

Or to leave me haunted.

I skip town with my spars

For a day in the country,

For some R and R far

From our town’s hurly-burly

That gets little done,

After a lot of plenty

Put in by everyone

Running on empty.

We drive till roads

Turn into tracks,

We park and unload

The SUV’s roof-rack.

Next we walk single

File and laugh till we hurt

At our bursts of jingles

From famous adverts

Stop for lunch by a bog

Beside a stream and drink

All the brews we lugged

This far, and give thanks

To Bacchus, for his smarts

About fermenting grapes,

To the country for its art

Putting up us town-types;

Pick a tree each to piss

Against and the same wind

To whistle into as we piss,

Wind whispering leaf and limb.

We’re tipsy, otherwise

We would not have done

What we do next, as unwise

As any drunk decision:

We decide to split up, go solo

For a while with the country,

For the quiet and rococo

Of our own company.

(Big mistake some say,

What were you guys thinking?

We weren’t. We were at play,

Our sole guide was instinct.)

There seems no harm

In it, and with cellphones,

Not hard to keep within arm’s

Length of a safe zone.

We draw straws for a pole.

I ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Acknowledgements
• Contents
• Politics
• Rigged
• Key West
• Excise
• Boy Soldier
• War on Terror
• Wartime Aubade
• Trace
• Monday Morning
• Shoes My Father Wore
• The Lady with the Purple Glove
• Underwater
• Wednesday’s Child
• Yesterday’s News
• The Dream Giver
• Letter from King Ferdinand of Spain to the Tainos in October 1493
• Legal Tender
• Dreamboat
• Wish
• News from Nowhere
• English
• Life
• Dalí on Dickens
• Calvino
• In Memoriam
• Love
• 19 Victoria Street, Shrewsbury
• A Concrete Walk in the Woods
• The Rose of Toulouse
• Saturday, Ocean Creek
• Calypso History Lesson
• From American Vulture
• Emily Dickinson, How Does Your Garden Grow?
• The Storm
• The Fence
• Night Swim
• The Giant of Land’s End
• About the Author
• Also by Fred D’Aguiar from Carcanet Press
• Copyright