I don’t normally take much notice of New Year, or bother to make any resolutions. But this January is a special one for me. It means that Edinburgh is the city I have lived in the longest as an adult – longer than Paris (10 months), Prague (3.5 years), Dubai (4 years almost exactly) or, finally, London (4 years 4 months). For some reason that freaks me out a little. It definitely doesn’t feel like I have been here that long. Which is probably related to the two years ‘on pause’ of Covid. In a way that makes me grateful because the city still seems fresh to me. Considering in most other cities I moved on after roughly 4 years, this freshness gives me hope that I might have a few more Edinburgh years left in me. But it does leave me with lots of questions about what I’ll do with those years. Will I be happy with the status quo? After all, I have a secure job, I’ve bought a flat, I’m in a long term serious relationship, I have a solidly established circle of friends. As I move into my forties, these things all seem more and more precious. I still yearn for more though, and it worries me that this is some symptom of capitalist consumerism – the desire for ever more, more stuff, more productivity, more recognition. In 2022 my debut full collection of poetry was published and didn’t really make any waves in the poetry world. I’ve almost given up writing as a result. It feels worthless, if you can toil away for over 14 years and have no impact in the circles which you admire. While I’ve lied to myself that I always wrote for myself alone, my lie is now exposed and I’m a sadder person for it. And that sadness incorporates itself into my daily life. I know if I started writing again I’d feel better, more alive but I need some hope to do that. I planned another book if I could get funding to focus solely on writing that, however having been knocked back twice for funding opportunities my enthusiasm for that project is waning. I wonder if it’s related to reading less, or less attentively – so much of my time is spent doomscrolling whereas when I was younger I always had a book in hand. This is all related as well to my arrival in Edinburgh – I came to complete a Masters in Screenwriting, with the hope of making a career change. However I quickly realised I didn’t have it in me to graft from the bottom up in such a competitive industry. Since then, professionally, I have been treading water, to the detriment of any corporate career I could have resumed. I tell myself I am happy with a lowly admin job, without the pressures of corporate management, but as the cost of living crisis rumbles on, I resent my decisions and think longingly of my inflated Dubai salary. Still again and again, I tell myself to be happy with what I’ve got, to practice gratitude and think of those less fortunate. It’s working for now, but I don’t know for how long it will, now I’ve passed this four year landmark which has typically meant restlessness for me. So if you don’t mind, say a little prayer for me – not all is as rosy as Instagram paints it.
Author: mouthofeulalie
Waste
As we disposed of our disposable income
like tissues chucked in the bin after a wank
the amazon packages arrived one after another
large brown bubbles of guilty glee
like froth on a hot chocolate
and we dipped into our overdrafts
like a heron dipping its beak in a scummy pond
even the similes could not save us
we scraped tiny pennies off the floor for the next drink
and then we had to stop drinking completely, what a drag
there came a point where all I could think of was money
and how much I had, how little I had
how quickly it vanished in the first week of the month
and I wondered how they survive those who had
twenty pounds cut from their universal credit
and I defrosted last spring’s soup, and was grateful
that my antidepressants are free in Scotland
and I maxed my credit card with a tattoo deposit
because darling, we’ve only got one life.
On Domesticity
Watched by the skeletons of clothes airers,
I mountaineer up the sofa to water the devil’s ivy.
Bee-hum of the dehumifier, all our hopes pinned
to a spoorless wall, weekly bleached bone.
The mop forlorn by the bathroom door,
a gaunt wizard of cleanliness.
My hands soften in the washing up water
like petals in a puddle after a rainstorm.
So peach soft. Allow me then my forest
of bookcases, and among them the tumeric armchair
glowing like the sun of its own
peculiar solar system. We are caught up
in its orbit like a queen captive in a hive.
But closer to the workers, yes, their daily toil
and blunder. What else to watch – the kaleidescope
of laundry through a tiny porthole.
Feel your hand back to mine. Not trembling.
The solid warmth of a wood stove in October,
bearing all the seasons through.
The Abortion Dress
With all the focus on the possible striking down of Roe vs Wade, I thought I would perform my poem The Abortion Dress from my collection, The Mouth Of Eulalie. The poem is in the voice of my character Juliette but speaks pretty strongly to my first abortion. I’ve been lucky enough to live in countries where abortion is legal when I needed one (twice). I also lived in a country where it wasn’t legal, which was pretty scary.
My first experience wasn’t smooth sailing however as the NHS doctor I saw first treated me pretty badly (called me a stupid girl) so rather than having it on the NHS I paid Marie Stopes. They were as awesome as a provider could be in the circumstances.
You can order my collection at the following link: https://www.bluediode.co.uk/product-page/the-mouth-of-eulalie-by-annie-brechin-isbn-9781915108012
First poem in a long time
On borrowing my mother’s swimsuit – Suffolk, 2021
O warbler, calling from the soft
and sodden marsh, tell me it’s not true
that even newly blubbered I cannot fit
neat as a cherry pit in this
blue and yellow flowered suit
Once thin as the reeds of the beds I was
but the lockdown put paid to that
and now I snap lycra on stretchily
over swelling boobs and even more secretly
that strip of cloth that once covered her vulva
covers mine now
the slit of my becoming
and the slit of my being
fused by this nest of cloth
A Body without Organs?
Just for fun I decided to record this poem about Deleuze and Guattari, and hating office life. It’s about 4 minutes, I hope you enjoy it
The Bellringing Poet: What’s Keeping Me Busy In Lockdown
I’ve had a lot of trouble concentrating this last period of lockdown. Whereas I wrote almost a whole book in the first lockdown, and read a library of poetry and prose, I am struggling to do anything more than doomscroll in my spare time – and sleep, which without the exercise to tire me out leads more often than not to some crazy dreams.
But I have been somewhat productive in a couple of areas. Firstly, my aunt recently became President of a charity in France called Cancer Support France – Languedoc. They aim to help those anglophones suffering in the region by providing emotional and practical support. You can find out more about them here: https://csflanguedoc.com/
CSF-L are a growing organisation and as such have a lot of processes that require documenting. With my Ops background I volunteered to help them with this project, and have had a lovely time speaking with their volunteer staff to put together some hopefully useful documents. This has saved money they might otherwise have to spend on consultants, and also allowed me to keep my hand in with some customer journey analysis.
The second area is bellringing – for those who don’t know, I am indeed an enthusiastic campanologist. As well as running regular Monday night practices on the virtual platform Ringing Room, I’ve now agreed to come on board with a Scottish Association working group looking at recovery post-Covid. It’s a broad topic and we have some specific challenges here in Scotland, but I’m very excited to work on it. More information on the Scottish Association and on bellringing can be found here: https://www.sacr.org/
A Covid Poem
The year we watched the death tolls rise
I read some books, I stayed inside
I worked from home, I watched some films
I skyped my family from the realms
of my four walls – each week we said
Thank God none of us have had it yet
I wore a mask out to the shops
I panic-bought, but not a lot
On the news an old man couldn’t buy eggs
I cried the eyes out of my head
For him and all the others shielding
Later Bake Off and Noel Fielding
Soothed my anxious brain to numbness
But still the thought that I had done less
Than I could have to help others
Kept me restless between the covers
My drinking grew steadily out of hand
Some nights, well, I could barely stand
The mornings cracked on like a whip
As I tried to forget all of it
Poems no solace, nor was sex
Yet I couldn’t say I was depressed
The fugue was blanketing but hope
Remained there like an outflung rope
I called my friends, I hugged my partner
I tried to my hardest to remember
I was lucky – I survived
The year we watched the death tolls rise.
For Louis on his balcony, en ecoutant du jazz
This is one of several poems I wrote simultaneously in French and English. You can choose which version you prefer.
Monaco sun
over impossible blue bay
Soleil monégasque
sur une baie de bleu impossible
if those moored yachts
were my vertebrae
si ces yachts amarrées
étaient mes vertèbres
you could run your fingertip down them
tu pourrais glisser ton doigt là-dessous
No two seas own
the same colour
Aucunes mers possèdent
la même couleur
the mediterranean’s got
a golden glint
la méditerranée porte
un lueur d’or
like a pirate’s tooth
Flash me that smile
comme une dent de pirate
Jette-moi cette sourire
Even my bone’s marrow tenses
against your absence
Même ma moelle osseuse se tend
contre ton absence
restless tides pulled
to a distant moon
marées inquiètes attirées
par une lune distante
invisible in brilliant daylight
invisible dans un soleil brillant
What’s New, Pussycat?
So I thought I’d try and update this old site and make something shiny and sparkly new as I am trying to find a publisher for my next pamphlet. First order of business is the excellent news that I have four poems in the new Spring 2020 issues of Poetry Wales. Thanks a million to Jonathan Edwards for choosing them. You can pre-order your copy here: https://poetrywales.co.uk/product-category/current-issue/
What else is new? Well since, 2015 which is when I think my last post was, quite a lot!! I’ve moved to Edinburgh, done a Masters in Screenwriting and started a job at University of Edinburgh. It was sad to leave Dubai but it was the right time. I’ll never forget the great times I had in the sandpit.
In memory of Dubai, here is my poem We Live In Water, which was published in the now-defunct Hinterland magazine:
We Live In Water
Dubai is merpeople
in neon fringed bikinis
no tails required
slick-skinned revellers
flitting between pool and plage
to finish in chromy towers
where we swallow as much
as we swim in…
Don’t tell me you don’t want
our poolside passionfruit vodka
don’t tell me you don’t want
our beaches that turn to nightclubs
our limitless champagne brunch
I won’t believe you
I never believed you
that’s why I came
Annie Brechin 