Chainsaw versus Pampas Grass Imagery
by Nikki Reihill
1. Personification
1.1. Offered the can it knocked back quarter pint
1.2. The chainsaw with its perfect disregard, its mood
1.3. The chainsaw with its bloody desire
1.4. drumming in its heart
1.5. gargle in its throat.
1.6. sunning itself, stealing the show
1.7. stalk that swooned
1.8. blade became choked
1.9. the chainsaw seethed
1.10. I left it a year to work through its manmade dreams
2. Plants
2.1. length of the lawn and garden path
2.2. from cuttings and bulbs
2.3. dabbed at stalks
2.4. new shoots like asparagus tips
3. Boudoir (swingers)
3.1. "ludicrous feathers and plumes"
3.1.1. "
3.2. footstools, cushions and tufts
3.2.1. A stalk that swooned
4. Nature
4.1. 'last years heat'
4.2. new shoots like asparagus tips
4.3. wasps and flies, moth-balled in spider's wool
5. Gardens
5.1. the length of the lawn and the garden path
5.2. from the summerhouse
5.3. under the outhouse wall
6. Pampas Grass the Victorious
6.1. it was riding high in its saddle
6.2. wearing a new crown
6.3. Corn in Egypt
6.3.1. Joseph's dream?
7. Armitage defeated
7.1. I looked on from the upstairs window like the midday moon
8. Zoomorphism/Animal
8.1. grinding its teeth
8.2. swung nose-down
8.3. lashing out at air
8.4. bloody desire
8.5. the chainsaw seethed
9. Machine
9.1. coupled the saw to the flex
9.2. I trailed the day-glo orange power line
9.3. maker's name
9.4. joints and threads
9.5. dry links
9.6. gunned the trigger
10. Safety Manual
10.1. In a plastic sleeve
10.1.1. safety catch
10.2. To clear a space to work
10.3. its mood to tangle with cloth, or jewellery, or hair
10.4. to rear up into the brain
10.5. dropped the safety catch
11. Texas Chainsaw Massacre
11.1. Overkill.
11.2. Darkroom under the hatch floor
11.3. I ripped into pockets of dark, secret warmth
11.4. Felt the drive-wheel gargle in its throat
11.5. The Chainsaw with its bloody desire, its sweet tooth for the flesh of the face and the bones underneath
11.6. whatever was severed, or felled or torn
11.7. walked towards the dead zone
11.8. the stalk that swooned
11.9. on its hook (x2)
11.10. carved at the trunk
11.11. plant-juice spat from the pipes and tubes
11.11.1. like blood