Drama

by Anna Kahn

On my year 10 report, under the by-rote bumpf
she wrote out for everyone in round Canadian print
she added: Anna’s sense of humour always keeps
me on my toes. We were her first UK job.

She sat us in a circle on the floor, told us
there are two kinds of feedback: warm fuzzies
and cold pricklies. I don’t think she’d planned
for a class so reluctant to fuzz for each other

but she kept at it. Ten years later it’s the joke
we make most often, dredging her squeak
of a voice from the marshlands: Cold pricklies!
Warm fuzzies! Warm pricklies! Cold fuzzies!

She’d stretch her hips out as she took the register,
plump hand pressing plump foot into top of thigh.
I thought the point was for us to find her if not
sexy then kooky, be impressed by the flexibility.

Now, collating the agenda for another Internal Comms weekly,
I wonder if she was convincing herself that a reluctant
circle of deadpan girls was better than an office,
itchy nude tights and having to wear shoes.

Anna Kahn | @AnnaCarlaKahn

Anna Kahn is a corporate copyeditor and one of the 2015–16 Barbican Young Poets. She lives with three cats and one human. She’s performed all over England and her poetry has been published in print and online, most recently on Blue of Noon and in the forthcoming Lunar Poetry.