The Friday Poem: Ode to Mons Pubis, by Claudia Jardine
Photo: Getty Images
A new poem from Ōtautahi-based poet Claudia Jardine.
Ode to Mons Pubis
fatty tissue, edifice of overtures
joints, ligaments, bones, cartilage
dark turns to stars when I think about
the buttress of pubic symphysis
yes! paths of faery lights, yes! brambly wads
yes! tracks of calligraphic gastropods
yes! tender grasses, yes! boxed beds
clippings from a crooner’s greenhouse
topiary of the descent
one sight of the treeline and brain tells blood to bouse
erogenous zone! bumper bar!
tendons, abdominals, I know what you are!
hair-covered fat pad, fine hill for roly-polies
the best views, as we know, should be taken in slowly
but not too slowly! Byron did say that
“high mountains are a feeling”
and this mountain, though not high, feels like
a chalet, a chassis and a beacon
oh shady stoa! sloping lawn!
diving board of channel crossings!
the panache and talent of your form
absorbs all of my worries
your body, my body, round and around
the belt of Adonis ♥ the Venusian mound
and all my moth-heart das̶h̴b̷̩͎̘̄̈́ŏ̸̜͙̇͜͜͝a̴̱̐͆̒r̵̜͂̌͑̔d̵͕͇͈̣͙̎̿ ą̵͑b̸̯̌̃͌ļ̵̻̞̎ą̵̣̃̊ż̴͖̿̌ͅē̵̥
interrupt my Byron – ready the belays
The Friday Poem is edited by Chris Tse. Submissions are welcome and will be open until the end of April. Please send your poems to chris@christse.co.nz.
Claudia Jardine
Claudia Jardine (she/her) is a poet and musician based in Ōtautahi/Christchurch. In 2020 she published her first chapbook, The Temple of Your Girl, with Auckland University Press in AUP New Poets 7 alongside Rhys Feeney and Ria Masae. Her work has also been published in Starling, Sport, Landfall and Stasis. For the winter of 2021, Jardine will be one of the Arts Four Creative Residents in The Arts Centre Te Matatiki Toi Ora, where she will be working on a collection of poems. Photo by Gerry Keating.
