Elaine Ewart

inspector vortex

I’m taking you off the case.

The Vice Chancellor’s on the phone

complaining about harassment

you’ve been standing outside his house 

with a photo of a Constable painting

asking passers by

if they recognise the view

you’re leaving the Super’s office

not slamming the door

you’re behind your desk

peering through blinds

at the greasy rain

I’ve covered for you all I can

      There must be no more

interviewing tipsy housewives

in swimming pools

you’re definitely not

visiting the city archives

with your grandmother’s love letter

not going to question

the mouse-haired busker

about the boy with the red suitcase

you will not break into the hospital

threaten a key witness

we can’t afford to

upset the University

            going door to door 

with questions about the moon

you need to accept

the world as it is

you can’t remember why

in your jacket pocket

a blurred photograph of

a ruined gun emplacement

we don’t have the budget

to dredge the lake

for your lost childhood

you will never recover from

memories of your father

you’re getting too involved

is that yesterday’s shirt?

            take some leave

You’ve maybe 24 hours

and a Network Railcard

leave a voicemail for your wife

you’re on your own now

                        sifting the evidence

  it’s staring you in the face

                                                there’s something you’re

                                                  missing

Elaine Ewart is a poet and writer of creative non-fiction, based in North Yorkshire. Her work has been previously published in various journals, including The Rialto, bath magg and The Interpreter’s House. Elaine has a PhD in Creative Writing from the University of Essex, and is currently working on a poetry pamphlet. She occasionally tweets @EwartElaine on what, in denial, she still calls Twitter and blogs infrequently at www.flightfeather.wordpress.com

Elaine wrote the following about her poem:

TV detective series are my guilty pleasure. Really their investigations are existential — bringing a malefactor to justice is merely an excuse. Poets are the same — we investigate because we must. I was also influenced by Caroline Bird’s poem, ‘The Final Episode’ in her marvellous 2020 collection, ‘The Air Year’. I saw my poem as a jigsaw that the investigator is vainly trying to put together. In order to find its final form, I cut up the poem into horizontal strips and moved the lines around until I found an order I liked.