on facing the Have

Tags

2018, 7*, being, block, blue, bone, cause and effect, change, choice, clothes, clouds, Darwin, death, depth, discipline, doing, dream, drifting, economics, emerald, extermination, faces, government, green, grey, hats, Have, head, hills, hinge, humanity, identity, iron, kiss, life, loss, making, mud, music, neck, peacock, photography, power, quotidian, river, roof, settlement, shadow, Shrewsbury, slow, society, statue, stone, streets, tectonic plates, time, trees, violence, walls, war, watching, water, woman, World War, writing

bone to stone drifting
catastrophic slow

lee to face-ward drifting
shadow to quotidian

suggesting life
only when settled

under branch of roof;
noticeable change

comes at the price
of sheild and pike:

death-mask disciplined
to the painted face

open to the very depth
of loss, later settled

to economies of
plea, barter and

proliferation of fact
artisaned superfluous

to being – faces fixed
in leer the rest of

born days, where
animals are skinned

under abnegated face,
where stone walls

turn green, staining
clothing and where the

emerald poise of head
and neck watches

the peck of open flay, all
“exterminated by

slow acting and still
existing causes …”

… time begins
to tick – well it had to

start somewhere – and
with time cometh writing

and with writing the
topography fades from

hill-wide face to
pock-mark street and settlement

all fitted ingeniously
with raised wall over arch,

high to unresolved descant
always left in minor;

the woman bends
to the laundry before

the rush of water
released from the mill:

power is only explicit
when blocked and

channelled, tree to
gable with date

and signature, silk
to valence with

drape of repose and spreading peacock dream;
so, is there choice

of governance: cut
through from neck to child;

you stay unnatural-still
your image will be caught,

you turn, and your
head will disappear,

you climb the wall
and stand still, you

stay in the mud yard
and stand still, … only

hats stay constant, cast-
iron flanges reach

from cast-circular
hinges, woven to corset,

slave to youth; the
memorial stone,

painfully-carved,
reflects the blue

of grey cloud, under
posts of wire

the death-etched
face stoops to kiss

the face of
wholly mud

291218 – spent the afternoon at the Shrewsbury Museum and Art Gallery to tread time from immemorial to the First World War; the quote is from “Thinking Path” by Shirley Chubb (2004), an exhibition that explores the life and legacy of Charles Darwin, an artwork and series of installations inspired by Darwin’s daily ritual of walking the same path at Down House; “Shadow Stories”, an animated short film by Samantha Moore is not directly referenced but weaves about the whole perambulation; references include the Roman conquest, medieval, Civil War, and industrial exhibits, up to the Open Art Exhibition commemorating the 100th anniversary of the First World War

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

being & clouds & doing & identity & power wormhole: The Passage of the St. Gothard, 1804
blue & woman wormhole: SPRING AND ALL XI by William Carlos Williams
change & streets wormhole: to let be
death wormhole: What You Are by Roger McGough
dream wormhole: THURSDAY by William Carlos Williams
economics & society & walls & war wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – Trees
faces wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – With Cows
green & shadow & trees & writing wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – pageant of the trees
grey & time wormhole: La Route de Louveciennes, 1870
Have wormhole: SPRING AND ALL VI by William Carlos Williams
life wormhole: ‘… and yet I think I am so modest: …’
music wormhole: JANUARY by William Carlos Williams
river wormhole: quiet river
roof wormhole: breakfast
stone wormhole: early // Minoan & Mycenaean Exhibitions in the British Museum – diptych
water wormhole: SPRING AND ALL I by William Carlos Williams