Carol Ann Duffy

thumb|Somewhere on the other side of this wide nightand the distance between us, I am thinking of you.The room is turning slowly away from the moon. Carol Ann Duffy, CBE (born 23 December 1955) is a Scottish poet, playwright, freelance writer and current Poet Laureate, the first woman to hold that title. Quotes Somewhere on the other side of this wide nightand the distance between us, I am thinking of you.The room is turning slowly away from the moon. Words, Wide Night, from The Other Country (1990). Not a red rose or a satin heart.I give you an onion.It is a moon wrapped in brown paper.It promises lightlike the careful undressing of love...I am trying to be truthful. Valentine, from Mean Time (1993). Here.It will blind you with tearslike a lover.It will make your reflectiona wobbling photo of grief. Valentine, from Mean Time (1993). Light gatherer. You fell from a starinto my lap, the soft lamp at the bedsidemirrored in you,and now you shine like a snowgirl,a buttercup under a chin, the wide blue yonderyou squeal at and fly in. The Light Gatherer, from Feminine Gospels (2002). I cannot say where you are. Unreachableby prayer, even if poems are prayers. Unseeablein the air, even if souls are stars. Death and the Moon, from Feminine Gospels (2002). As anyone who has the slightest knowledge of my work knows, I have little in common with Larkin, who was tall, taciturn and thin-on-top, and unlike him I laugh, nay, sneer, in the face of death. I will concede one point: we are both lesbian poets. Interviewed in The Guardian, August 31, 2002. What do I haveto help me, without spell or prayer,endure this hour, endless, heartless, anonymous,the death of love? Over, from Rapture (2005). When you have a child, your previous life seems like someone else's. It's like living in a house and suddenly finding a room you didn't know was there, full of treasure and light. Interviewed in The Guardian, December 4, 2005. There'll be what you might call a moment of inspiration – a way of seeing or feeling or remembering, an instance or a person that's made a large impression. Like the sand and the oyster, it's a creative irritant. In each poem, I'm trying to reveal a truth, so it can't have a fictional beginning Interviewed in The Guardian, December 4, 2005. Standing Female Nude (1985) Six hours like this for a few francs.Belly nipple arse in the window light,he drains the colour from me. Further to the right,Madame. And do try to be still.I shall be represented analytically and hungin great museums. The bourgeoisie will cooat such an image of a river-whore. They call it Art. Standing Female Nude. This is the word tightrope. Now imaginea man, inching across it in the spacebetween our thoughts. He holds our breath.There is no word net.You want him to fall, don't you?I guessed as much; he teeters but succeeds.The word applause is written all over him. Talent. One saw I was alive. Loosenedhis belt. My bowels opened in a ragged gape of fear.Between the gap of corpses I could see a child.The soldiers laughed. Only a matter of days separatethis from acts of torture now. They shot her in the eye. Shooting Stars. External links Category:Women academics from Scotland Category:Poets from Scotland Category:Playwrights from Scotland Category:Poets laureate Category:Women authors from Scotland Category:People from Glasgow Category:LGBT people Category:1955 births Category:Living people Category:20th-century British poets Category:Commanders of the Order of the British Empire