Poetry Review – Aunts Come Armed with Welsh Cakes. Kate Noakes rather enjoys the contents â as well as the intriguing title â of Thirza Cloutâs pamphlet collection
Aunts Come Armed with Welsh Cakes
Thirza Clout,
Smith|doorstop
ISBN 9781912196678
ÂŁ7.50
Great name for both poet â I had a great, great grandmother named Thirza a propos nothing in particular â and her pamphlet. This one is as chosen by Carol Ann Duffy for smith|doorstop, so that is some recommendation to start with, but at ÂŁ7.50 for 25 pages of poems, perhaps not exactly a bargain. When did pamphlets become so expensive?
Putting aside such considerations, Clout serves up a treat of poems on her largely Welsh family relationships, both good and troubled, âbuoyed up on the bosoms /of plentiful aunts.â These are the same aunts who come armed with the Welsh cakes of the title, recipe included, although thankfully she leaves out the secret ingredient known and used in my family. These are interesting narratives in the sense that everyoneâs family is worth writing about, each unique, mad and bad in its own way, but what really engaged me in this collection were the poems where Clout lets her sardonic wit rip.
âGirlsâ is inventive in its layout â right justified â and itâs content: a strident list of all the girls âwho go beyond the pale to change the worldâ. I am sick of watching women die is another list poem wishing for a feminist rewriting the canon of opera and classical theatre: âI want Hedda to get a job and enjoy multiple orgasmsâ. The subject continues in the next poem,â Henrick has so much to say at book groupâ, that by the end of the poem the women hilariously âstuff his mouth with hummusâ in an effort to be heard.
The final few poems are tender in their memorial, and not without humour. âWhat you would not want discovered after you dieâ starts with the sock draw â âyou donât want to die wearing pop socksâ â before going on to âthe faux leather basque/and anything else from Ann Summers/ even if the batteries are flatâ, and more touchingly the box of hankies with her motherâs initials â âthe only thing you didnât stuff /into black plastic bin bagsâ. The penultimate poem is a moving one about fat shaming, where slender people sip skinny lattes and nibble pomegranate seeds in its narrowly lineated first part, while the fulsome lines of the second part belong to the fatties, âflesh primed to destroy the NHSâ.
There are new discoveries along the way, such as the final poem, âHoneyâ, which speaks of honey made by birds, or in âA Presentâ, where the last gift from the speakerâs mother is, surprisingly, even shockingly, her death, by which she means mother did not linger, or in âAll Soulâs Nightâ when her deceased parents stop by for tea.
This is a short collection of unadorned, clear and punchy writing. I rather enjoyed it.
.
Kate Noakesâ seventh and most recent collection is The Filthy Quiet (Parthian, 2019). Her first book of non-fiction, Real Hay on Wye, will be published by Seren in 2020. She lives in London.
London Grip Poetry Review – Thirza Clout
November 19, 2019
Poetry Review – Aunts Come Armed with Welsh Cakes. Kate Noakes rather enjoys the contents â as well as the intriguing title â of Thirza Cloutâs pamphlet collection
Great name for both poet â I had a great, great grandmother named Thirza a propos nothing in particular â and her pamphlet. This one is as chosen by Carol Ann Duffy for smith|doorstop, so that is some recommendation to start with, but at ÂŁ7.50 for 25 pages of poems, perhaps not exactly a bargain. When did pamphlets become so expensive?
Putting aside such considerations, Clout serves up a treat of poems on her largely Welsh family relationships, both good and troubled, âbuoyed up on the bosoms /of plentiful aunts.â These are the same aunts who come armed with the Welsh cakes of the title, recipe included, although thankfully she leaves out the secret ingredient known and used in my family. These are interesting narratives in the sense that everyoneâs family is worth writing about, each unique, mad and bad in its own way, but what really engaged me in this collection were the poems where Clout lets her sardonic wit rip.
âGirlsâ is inventive in its layout â right justified â and itâs content: a strident list of all the girls âwho go beyond the pale to change the worldâ. I am sick of watching women die is another list poem wishing for a feminist rewriting the canon of opera and classical theatre: âI want Hedda to get a job and enjoy multiple orgasmsâ. The subject continues in the next poem,â Henrick has so much to say at book groupâ, that by the end of the poem the women hilariously âstuff his mouth with hummusâ in an effort to be heard.
The final few poems are tender in their memorial, and not without humour. âWhat you would not want discovered after you dieâ starts with the sock draw â âyou donât want to die wearing pop socksâ â before going on to âthe faux leather basque/and anything else from Ann Summers/ even if the batteries are flatâ, and more touchingly the box of hankies with her motherâs initials â âthe only thing you didnât stuff /into black plastic bin bagsâ. The penultimate poem is a moving one about fat shaming, where slender people sip skinny lattes and nibble pomegranate seeds in its narrowly lineated first part, while the fulsome lines of the second part belong to the fatties, âflesh primed to destroy the NHSâ.
There are new discoveries along the way, such as the final poem, âHoneyâ, which speaks of honey made by birds, or in âA Presentâ, where the last gift from the speakerâs mother is, surprisingly, even shockingly, her death, by which she means mother did not linger, or in âAll Soulâs Nightâ when her deceased parents stop by for tea.
This is a short collection of unadorned, clear and punchy writing. I rather enjoyed it.
.
Kate Noakesâ seventh and most recent collection is The Filthy Quiet (Parthian, 2019). Her first book of non-fiction, Real Hay on Wye, will be published by Seren in 2020. She lives in London.