The words are from poem wranglers Tim, Erin and Emma.
I look down at the wrinkles on my hands.
And wonder when I got so old and bitter
At which point did my young, inviting flesh
Become less supple than it was before?
Was it so long ago my movie ran?
Where is the face that should be in the mirror?
I stared bewilderedly into a mirror
Gripped in my manicured and trembling hands
It seems so long ago now, that I ran
My fingers through his hair. Not that I’m bitter
I’d known his reputation well before
I topped up that audition with some flesh
On show. “I find the pleasures of the flesh
He’d lectured, as he fucked me, “always mirror
The acting talent that I’m looking for”
He brought me such success, his roaming hands
Seemed fair enough. His wife was never bitter
She knew that all his brief encounters ran
Their course, until the latest movie ran
And then he’d seek new, undiscovered flesh
I know that now. I tried to quell the bitter
Ness by staring down into in a mirror
A rolled up dollar bill clutched in my hands.
I could have just moved on but then, what for?
I always knew what I had come here for
The fame of that one film that ran and ran
The autograph collectors’ outstretched hands
The delicately flavoured lobster flesh
The nation’s sweetheart smiling from the mirror
And when I lost that, well, the taste was bitter
And now I wince and swallow down my bitter
Coffee, think of nineteen sixty four
Back when I recognised her in the mirror
Before my fans and my mascara ran
When everyone desired my supple flesh
Before I grew these strange, old-lady hands
She’s staring from the mirror, old and bitter
In knotted hands I cup the time before
An also-ran. Just barely in the flesh
Tom Juniper Poetry 