Issue 9: Carrie Etter

Even Supposing

an erasure of the chapters from Charles Dickens's Bleak House narrated by Esther Summerson: from chapter 3, 'A Progress'

a.


My portion          I always knew


                                   indeed                  alone


         such a shy


                  rather a noticing way                  seems to brighten


         trifling I         I ought to         better


cast me upon                                   ease


        

         took the light away                 


                  birthday         melancholy


 


         quickened when my affection is


vehemence    trembling


disgrace         you will understand


pray daily         forget          forget

b.


set apart         crept


properly         I felt the distance         fervently                                   


         come home     long shadow

c.


almost fourteen         I was reading                  as I always did


stopped by my godmother’s                  


                           is dead


Don’t weep! Don’t tremble!


                          

                  wondering


every contingency, every masterly


                                                      nothing


         only to know


         upon the whole

d.


beat time to his own music or rounded a sentence


         desolate—position         


                                    offers             education                  comfort


                                             eminently


                                                      faithfully


less able to speak              say?


 


                  parting kiss    a thaw-drop from the stone porch


                                             and thus I left                                            

e.


The coach


                  frosty trees         pieces of spar


                  sun, so red yet yielding so little


a gentleman          took no notice


                 

                  crying         I faltered


                                                      want to go there?


         very glad to


                                    pleasant              muttering


 


                                             We left him at a milestone.

f.


As if this narrative were the narrative of MY life!


         little body                  soon fall


                                                               rapture


                  proofs of love


        

                                             could I


                                                                        take tears


         conveyance                  conveyance


                                                             a London particular

g.


A fog


                  Oh, indeed!


slowly         the dirtiest         ever


                           distracting


         until           sudden quietude         a silent square


                                                                                 an odd nook


after the journey                  stirred the fire


         strange         stranger         night in the day-time


                                                      candles burning with a white flame


                                                      raw and cold


I read the words in the newspaper without knowing what they meant


         thinking, thinking, thinking


         the fire         burning, burning, burning


                  the candles    flickering and guttering        — for two hours


round a corner, under a colonnade       into a comfortable sort


         a young lady and a young gentleman

h.


saw in the young                  shining                 


                           Ada        


         welcome and her hand


         in a few minutes             the window-seat                 


                  the light of the fire upon us         free


Richard         an ingenuous face


         a bustle and a tread        


                  his lordship                  trimmed with beautiful gold lace


                           turned over the leaves                  Miss Ada Clare?


         a suitable companion         Miss Summerson


                           gave me an indulgent look


                                             the candour of a boy


dismissed        

                  in the fog

Carrie Etter has published two collections of poetry, The Tethers (Seren, 2009) and Divining for Starters (Shearsman, 2011), and edited Infinite Difference: Other Poetries by UK Women Poets. She teaches as a Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing at Bath Spa University.