Poetry Magazines - The best collection of poetry magazines online - Simon Armitage

On emptying the BBC Spot Effects Store, Broadcasting House, 2003. ‘Spot effects’ (FX) is the name given to the actual physical objects used when recording radio dramas, rather than electronic sound effects.


The flipflop is FX 29, the dark brown teapot FX 324,
those inevitable coconut shells FX 561 –
though the ink here goes faint, is lost in brown wiry hair.

And beyond stand shelves of labelled cups and saucers,
handbags and suitcases, a stack of doors with noisily turning handles,
with knockers, letter boxes and one electric bell.

All wait on a summons – fill in a form, quote a number,
haul them out from soundless dust by the precision of your ear:
a tricycle in a corner is only waiting for asphalt,

bundles of umbrellas would flap out rain,
the coils of recording tape squashed in a bin liner
could soon skitter autumn leaves, just for the asking.

FX, FX, FX – held in the space of this long-eaved room,
labelled, sectioned, meaningless because mute,
waiting for the narrative to name their number.

These are not the story, never the story –
They’re the world without words, at most a background hint.
But if the unthinkable should happen

and the story not appear, if the gaps in the words
should fill all the space,
then is the rest only silence, or unknowable noise?

FX 561 meets FX 324 meets…
Doors would open on a long foggy corridor
where that bell might ring and never ever stop,

where a flipflop and a sandal
might go walking for days, and those skittering
autumn leaves be always returning