I think today I’ll wear my dresser,
the oak one with my grandmother’s
china, the set her father bought for her
in Aberystwyth. I fancy lustrewear
and cake plates. Royal Albert’s the future
of punk. Not everyone has hardwood to wear,
a set of brass-handled drawers.
But I have inheritance. So there.
I dreamt about us last night, my dear.
You were a wardrobe. Behind your doors
hung velvet dresses, satin shirts,
wet-look raincoats, watered-silk skirts
scented with lemon. You offered me more
than I’d ever dared to want before
and were capacious. So I picked out
a soft, well-tailored, shimmering suit
that sat just so then I made my way
out through the door and into the day.
The sofa bride is a pair of hips
for two to sit on. Upholstered lips
are plumped-up for love. She is a chaise
he yearns to be longue on. A promiscuous phase
has been polished over, a cabriole limb
that was gymnastic, restored to be prim,
fit for one owner. She’ll take the strain
of his violence. Later he’ll claim
that she tricked him, that they married too soon.
Settees with a past shouldn’t wish for the moon.
In battle all men shall remember
never to endanger the Admiral’s furniture
on pain of death. It is essential
that the commander’s gate-legged table
be stowed in the hold. It is worth far more
than the chap who made her. In times of war
chattels come first. If the hold is full
and the orlop deck cluttered with terrible
bodies then, seamen, be sure to launch a boat
and fill it with hautboy and with sideboard
for the enemy has agreed not to fire
on his fixtures and fittings. For, to be fair,
which of you can say that you’ve shown
such loyalty to a man of renown
or such service as his china and silver?
Lord Nelson’s desk? Lord Nelson’s easy chair?
There have been tales of great self-sacrifice
on the part of furniture. Take that chest of drawers
in the Kōbe earthquake. When the building fell
it flung itself down the tumbling stairwell
across its mistress who, pregnant, lay trapped
in the rubble for days. Its rosewood back
took the strain of girders. Its sturdiness
became her pelvis, allowed her to press
down on her daughter, helped her give birth
out of pulverised concrete and earth
by marquetry’s artifice. Those dovetailed joints
gave life to another, though the effort meant
total collapse once the rescuers came
with shawls and shovels, ruined the frame
that had saved the baby. Now, once a year
on a certain date a woman and daughter
visit the grave on a building site
where fine wood was burnt. Lest they forget.