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Rake
Throughout Rake, Matthew Caley’s fifth collection, it can appear as if we are leafing through the oblique diary of an immortal time-travelling rake, one who is seeking his ‘one true beloved’ through an heroic tally of amorous encounters, desperately trying to get beyond appetite; or possibly a number of parallel immortal time-travelling rakes; or maybe even someone, having drunk too many espressos, imagining themselves to be such a rake. The forms used are equally tanka, sonnets, refrains, poems sifted from or alluding to Les Liaisons dangereuses or Barthes’ A Lover’s Discourse, versions of Baudelaire, Bonnefoy and Corbière, an ‘echo sonnet’, sonnet-strings, mono-rhymers, a ‘tonnet’ – hybrid of sonnet and tanka – and, most frequently, tanka used as a run-on stanza unit. Traversing the boudoirs of La Belle Époque, 80s Cold War Russia, ancient Egypt and the Wild West, to London 1910 or LA in the 1990s, but more often than not from these locations to the 24 hour neon of the contemporary city and back again in a micro-second, desire feeds lack (and vice versa) yet yearns for escape. What results is a series of beautiful, back-handed love poems.
76 pages, Paperback
Published February 25, 2016
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
February 4, 2017
Poets are poor but readers of poetry are rich.
Rake is a slim book of poems by the rakish Matthew Caley, published by Bloodaxe Books. Some of the poems are tiny, four or five short lines. Some take up more than a page. But even with the long ones, if you like making notes there is plenty of space to do it. Or you can write your own poems underneath or beside Matthew's if you are feeling frisky.
It is £9.99 well spent.
I chose to snuggle under the covers this cold Saturday morning and warm myself to its pulsing rhythms and insinuating cadences. Fancy an Acute Hot Knee?
If I behold your/rucked up dress, revealing as/it does one acute/hot knee in all its bare-assed/actuality, nothing//is composed.
Mmm, I don't think he's joking.
There is more. (This is not one of his short ones.)
I can't do justice to his word placement. He is very cheeky with it.
There's a poem here about a Giantess that caught my attention, after Baudelaire. Matthew's take on it is quite erotic.
It's not his only nod to the decadent Frenchman.
Baudelaire is clearly quite an influence, even when not named. He leads the London hipster to Hither Green (a very sexy poem), and then there is Bling, an acknowledged re-working of Les Bijoux.
My love is naked/almost, for knowing my kink/she keeps on her bling...
Tantalising, isn't it? Or do you prefer the original?
La très chère était nue, et, connaissant mon coeur,
Elle n'avait gardé que ses bijoux sonores,
Dont le riche attirail lui donnait l'air vainqueur
Qu'ont dans leurs jours heureux les esclaves des Mores.
I feel richer for having Matthew Caley's version. He leaves out the Moorish slave women in their happier moments, substituting a jangly American rock group called Audioslave. Witty?
You decide.
But, outrageously, Matthew's rake claims to have had Jeanne Duval before Baudelaire did. In Brixton!!
This is some poetic licence!
It's quite tricky to do humour in a poem. Even harder to do it in an erotic poem. But this collection aims high. The poems succeed in being erotic and funny at the same time.
How can you afford to be without this essential modern masterpiece?
Rake is a slim book of poems by the rakish Matthew Caley, published by Bloodaxe Books. Some of the poems are tiny, four or five short lines. Some take up more than a page. But even with the long ones, if you like making notes there is plenty of space to do it. Or you can write your own poems underneath or beside Matthew's if you are feeling frisky.
It is £9.99 well spent.
I chose to snuggle under the covers this cold Saturday morning and warm myself to its pulsing rhythms and insinuating cadences. Fancy an Acute Hot Knee?
If I behold your/rucked up dress, revealing as/it does one acute/hot knee in all its bare-assed/actuality, nothing//is composed.
Mmm, I don't think he's joking.
There is more. (This is not one of his short ones.)
I can't do justice to his word placement. He is very cheeky with it.
There's a poem here about a Giantess that caught my attention, after Baudelaire. Matthew's take on it is quite erotic.
It's not his only nod to the decadent Frenchman.
Baudelaire is clearly quite an influence, even when not named. He leads the London hipster to Hither Green (a very sexy poem), and then there is Bling, an acknowledged re-working of Les Bijoux.
My love is naked/almost, for knowing my kink/she keeps on her bling...
Tantalising, isn't it? Or do you prefer the original?
La très chère était nue, et, connaissant mon coeur,
Elle n'avait gardé que ses bijoux sonores,
Dont le riche attirail lui donnait l'air vainqueur
Qu'ont dans leurs jours heureux les esclaves des Mores.
I feel richer for having Matthew Caley's version. He leaves out the Moorish slave women in their happier moments, substituting a jangly American rock group called Audioslave. Witty?
You decide.
But, outrageously, Matthew's rake claims to have had Jeanne Duval before Baudelaire did. In Brixton!!
This is some poetic licence!
It's quite tricky to do humour in a poem. Even harder to do it in an erotic poem. But this collection aims high. The poems succeed in being erotic and funny at the same time.
How can you afford to be without this essential modern masterpiece?
February 10, 2021
I literally could not tell you anything about these poems. There was so many references I could not even begin to comprehend, perhaps better for an older reader?? I couldn’t finish it quite honestly and I really really tried my best but had to leave it five pages til the end
Some I felt like I was on the cusp of understanding and seeing the cheeky sexual side of the poet but ??? Then it just fell. I was running my eyes over the words and whatever I tried nothing would go in and make any sense to me.
I found this for £1 in Waterstones reduced section so it was a bit of a wildcard but....
Maybe I will come back to it when I’m a better reader? Maybe then it’ll make more sense?
Some I felt like I was on the cusp of understanding and seeing the cheeky sexual side of the poet but ??? Then it just fell. I was running my eyes over the words and whatever I tried nothing would go in and make any sense to me.
I found this for £1 in Waterstones reduced section so it was a bit of a wildcard but....
Maybe I will come back to it when I’m a better reader? Maybe then it’ll make more sense?
June 6, 2016
A collection rich in language and musicality. Both intellectual and playful.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews