The author, James Joyce, was rather fond of the phrase "Dear dirty Dublin" - he uses it in a lot of his work. Ulysses can be read lots of different ways (it's over 900 pages long, there's a lot to work with), but I've always seen it as partly a love letter to a city.
This is my very own love letter to Brighton, written somewhere between the ages of 19 and 21. I lived in Brighton for three years while studying for an English undergraduate degree at the University of Sussex. I think that is the longest I've lived anywhere except Surrey, where I grew up.
The reason I chose the University of Sussex for my degree wasn't the English course. It wasn't the faculty. It wasn't the prestige of the university or the job prospects of graduates.
It was the location - four miles outside my favourite British city.
Dear Dirty Brighton
Your breath is a cold slap to the face,
as morning slips slow and bright down the houses
stacked like cards along curled crescents of suburbia.
When I walk, blind breathless alone along your unwound veins,
your love guts me like a fish, like a fist to the chest,
you are so hungry of hands, so hard of heart it hurts
sometimes, often. When we trip, together, down darkly
smirking, stinking streets, I swear, I sweat, I say
I'll never leave or love again, but you're so pretty
when you're unfaithful to me. And so perverse,
cradling regency terraces crushed against the filthy facades
of big business, mixing your pavilions and piers,
your students and stag dos, ethnic cafes and chip shops.
I am so irrational in your arms, so slavish and weakwilled,
needy as the sea washing round your feet. Every night
that fades to day sucks me hollow as the shells
lined up on my windowsill.
Edit: Oh, and I forgot to say - there's a line shamelessly stolen from a Pixies song. See if you can spot it.
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