Steve Tasane is critically acclaimed for his writing and performing. He successfully adapted his first novel Bird of Prey (Clubman Books) into a play, and has also published a collection of poetry, Bleeding Heart (Gecko). As a performance poet, he has worked with Apples & Snakes and was a founder member of the performance poetry group, Atomic Lip. In 1997 he premiered his post-modern performance novel (SIC) at the Edinburgh Festival and has since toured nationally. He has also appeared on BBC Radio 4's Poetry Please.
Set up in 1860 Battersea Dogs Home has become a national institution, housing around 700 dogs and cats. Helen Tennant from the Public Affairs Office at Battersea Dogs Home explained that many of the Home's users have anecdotes and observations which through Steve's residency they could translate into poems. Since Steve has been visiting the home a number of staff and visitors have already come forward with their own work. His placement at Battersea Dogs Home, which started in October, will explore the unique relationship between human and canine natures. During his residency Steve will run workshops, hold a benefit performance of poems by the public and established performers, exhibit poems around Battersea Dogs Home and feature poems on their website: www.dogshome.org
"How," said the smart alecs when I told them about my poetry placement at Battersea Dogs' Home, "are dogs going to write poetry? They'll keep dropping their pen." Of course, the world is divided between those that adore dogs and those that despise them. The former understand the inherent poetry within a human/canine relationship and the latter, well, if they fail to see the soul of a dog when they look into its eyes what chance have they of finding the soul of a poem? Fortunately, the Poetry Places team at the Poetry Society appreciate both poetry and dogs.
And so it was that I walked through the doors of Battersea Dogs' Home in late 1999 armed with my pen and pad to have my ears bombarded with the howling yapping voices of its 700 inhabitants. Part of my job was to translate this canine cacophany into the sweet music of verse. Part of my job was to spread the word on the dynamic service provided by the Home (it did actually rehome 6000 dogs and 3100 cats in 1999). My ultimate aim was to produce a 140th anniversary poem for the Home with a line for every year, putting together poetic images given to me by an obligingly creative public. They came in searching for a new dog, and left having produced their first line of poetry since school days.
Prior to this, Shelley was just the name of next-door's poodle. But somehow, with the aid of workshops, tape machines, unbelievable enthusiasm and energy from the Battersea staff and that potent brew of emotion and communication within us all, the dogs did speak. Their poetry did come to life. Never more so than in the case of Daisy, a cross whippet/Pokemon thingy with a Dot Cotton personality whose soap opera life story was exhaustively put into words by Caroline Green, Daisy's adoptive human Auntie and administrative worker at Battersea Dogs' Home.
The whole Poetry Placement was directed with aplomb by Sophie Allen and Eleanore Casey from the Home's public relations team, who were so accommodating to the BBC filming segments of the poetry for the third series of their popular Battersea Dogs' Home documentary. We reached an almighty peak with the Lead Vocals dog poetry performance at Battersea Arts Centre for which a host of contemporary poets wrote special dog poems especially for the night. It was, needless to say, a howling success.
Steve Tasane, August 2000
Steve Tasane
Flossie
You're the perfect terror, you're a cuddle-trap
You're the cat's whiskers, you're a whispered yap
You're a whirlwind whisking me away to Oz
You're a dancer like Muhammad Ali was
You're the Queen of Sheba, Her Mighty Highness
You're a puddle of fun in a desert of dryness
You're Chaplin's waddle, Marty Feldman's eyes
You're Cagney's mouth and you're Cagney's size
You're the last gold leaf on the Autumn trees
You're hot gossip in a swirling breeze
You're a rumble of dissent that sparks rebellion
You're the splash of colour when we switch the telly on
You're a burglar alarm that can't stop beeping
You're a zooming broom that won't stop sweeping
You're a raging rag, a hairy tornado
You're carpet crumbs on a lump of Playdo
You're a famished midgit at a three course feast
You're the Top Dog, at the very least
You're a goggle-eyed gargoyle with a baked bean heart
You're Minnie the Minx, you're Butthead, you're Bart
You're scandal in a ribcage, a riot on paws
You're a wiggling tiddler but you think you're Jaws
You're a brittle jewel on a bit of string
You're the atom at the heart of everything
You're the Mini nipping through a juggernaut jam
You're the God of Dogs, the Little I Am
You're sliced bread, plus the bits between
You're a Miniature Yorkie, the canine Queen
Steve Tasane
How Roxy Came To Battersea
Roxy ran in front of a Rover
Backflipped onto the windscreen
Like a zombie in a Cronenberg movie
Some say it was a suicide job
For she was no more than a weeping sore
On legs, when they took her in
But a bloody-minded, half-hearted
Wag flickered through her stripped, Autumnal
Tail when the rehomers called her name
She grinned her fang-filled grin and dreamt
Of chasing rabbits, or cats, or cars
And she always wolfed her food
Like it was her last supper
Where she sprang from, no one knew
Roxy sprawled before the fire
Licking biscuit crumbs from Jim's palm
Like a toddler giddy on handfed sweeties
Luscious whimpers oozed from her drooling jaw
For she was nothing less than a pound of puppy fat
On paws, and fresh-from-the-litter dim
But a wary, feral, ill-boding
Spark flashed in her blue oasis
Eyes when the master snapped her name
Jim wept hot, curdled tears at night
He reeked of booze and puke and fear
And she began to sniff her food
Like it was a slow poison
What possessed him, no one knew
Jim staggered out of The Flowers
Slipping beneath an N29
Like an old codger into a Jacuzzi
Or a puppy in a sack from a shore
For he looked more-or-less like a suckling child
In old man's clothes, and old man's skin
But his lily-livered, bitter-fingered
Hold on Roxy's leash broke in his brittle
Hands. He spat blood with her name
Roxy howled and was lost to the dark
She lived off rats and scraps and chocolate bars
And she remembered human love
Like it was enforced hunger
How she got here, no one knew
Steve Tasane
excerpts from
The Dogs Of Battersea Dogs' Home
Here's an England player about to score
Here's Oliver Twist asking for more
Here's Oliver Reed after a night on the booze
and Screaming Jay Hawkins howling the blues
...
Here's Tyson the Dobie who wants to have fun
and Grobble the Greyhound who refuses to run
Here's Caesar the Lurcher who's looking for love
and Herman the Yorkie who thinks he's the Guv
Here's Terry the Terrier trembling in terror
Toying with a Toyota was a terrible error
Who's laughing? Leonardo the Labrador, that's who
Cos Sidney the Shih-tzu is teaching Shiatzu