×
This is the last article you can read this month
You can read more article this month
You can read more articles this month
Sorry your limit is up for this month
Reset on:
Please help support the Morning Star by subscribing here
Celebrities
Lisa Kelly
Lisa Kelly
Workers’ photos are erected on posts around the local pond in Asserac, France
Valérie Touya, Coiffeuse
A big silver hoop dangles from one ear,
her T-shirt says, come from the moon.
To the man in the chair,
steel blades grazing his neck hair,
she is a luminary: a goddess in her sphere.
Claude Lelecque, Paludier
He is fierce in the face of the lens – caught
with a stash of the finest white substance
in a basket by his bare feet: harvested salt.
Behind him, his wooden hut is a treasure vault
for shovel; bucket; wooden rake, the long-handled sort.
Chantal Caba, Boulangère
From the interior of her stretch white
van, she smiles at her queuing fans.
‘Let them eat bread, baked on-site
and delivered first thing for their delight.’
Every inch a diva, after being up half the night.
Olivier Bertho, Charpentier
Not a cigar rolled for a star clamped in his teeth –
but a pencil. He will use it to mark his place,
of which he is sure, but now his focus is on the lathe
and the wood. His work will bequeath
craftsmanship for generations: a kind of belief.
Jean-Marc Lecam, Plombier
His rolled up sleeves, deadpan
stare straight to camera as if he means business.
He does. A hero, a leading man
who prevents floods, makes a plan.
A man of few words, whose catchphrase is I can.
Patrick Lecarff, Pompier
His uniform is not a costume. It is no act,
entering a burning building as the camera rolls.
Saving lives is not a drama; but matter-of-fact –
what he does for his community, backed
by a crew of solidarity: a fireproof pact.
Maxime Pierlo, Monteur de Kitesurf
This is his beach, his turf.
He is half man, half Poseidon,
half in his wetsuit, half out. King of the surf,
he harnesses the wind, cuts up the sky, can morph
from man to immortal. The title of his biopic: Sail Forth.
Lisa Kelly’s pamphlet, Bloodhound, was published by Hearing Eye in 2012. She is a regular host of poetry evenings at the Torriano Meeting House, London.
