Impression of Winter: Carriage on a Country Road, 1872

Tags

1872, 2018, 6*, black, chimney, contemplation, earth, Eternity, grey, hill, horizon, leaves, moon, path, Pissarro, red, sky, winter, woodland

                at the brow of even mild hills
                on the curve of the red-leaf path

                the copse at either side will be
                black and hack-hack skeletal and

                the tatterdemalion-grey sky
                will seem like the moon has

                come too close to Earth, only
                the ridge and chimney of the next

                dwelling sits down beyond the
                brow quietly contemplating eternity

 

Impression of Winter: Carriage on a Country Road, 1872 by Camille Pissarro – the only image I could find online, but it is not the colours I have seen

 

 

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

black wormhole: early // Minoan & Mycenaean Exhibitions in the British Museum – diptych
chimney wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J Redford – Working
grey & red wormhole: La Route, Effet d’Hiver, 1872
horizon & moon wormhole: Fishermen at Sea, 1796
leaves wormhole: Dulwich College, London, 1871
path wormhole: The Passage of the St. Gothard, 1804
sky wormhole: {reading right to left}
winter wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – Trees

 

Advertisements

La Route, Effet d’Hiver, 1872

Tags

1872, 2018, 6*, adulthood, afternoon, air, architecture, brown, childhood, chimney pots, cottage, flame, flight, future, grey, hill, horizon, life, lime, orange, Pontoise, red, rooks, silence, smoke, sunset, town, trees, walls

                over the roll of hill the town
                of Pontoise reared architecture

                of afternoon-future, grey and
                soupy air where I will try my

                life later, but here the sun
                has set, kindled treetops with

                lime air, blazed the tree
                across the road to brown and

                orange flame,
                until the rooks could take

                no more, split, singed and
                away in array before the

                silence of the cottage wall
                wide and orange with the

                lazy smoke, and modest
                from the blood-red pots

 

right there, from La Route, Effet d’Hiver, 1872 by Camille Pissarro (… actually, better if you could see the original)

 

 

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

afternoon & red wormhole: Dulwich College, London, 1871
air wormhole: stuck
architecture wormhole: pediment to behold
brown wormhole: {reading right to left}
childhood wormhole: LIGHT HEARTED WILLIAM by William Carlos Williams
grey & trees & walls wormhole: on facing the Have
horizon wormhole: London, 1809
life wormhole: SPRING AND ALL XXII by William Carlos Williams
lime wormhole: mauve
orange wormhole: La Route de Louveciennes, 1870
silence wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – pageant of the trees
sunset wormhole: sun setting over a lake, 1840

 

TREES by William Carlos Williams

Tags

1917, black, dark, grey, hill, identity, melody, music, night, north, poplars, scale, sky, stars, trees, vague, voices, weave, William Carlos Williams, wind, yellow

                                TREES

                Crooked, black tree
                on your little grey-black hillock,
                ridiculously raised one step toward
                the infinite summits of the night:
                even you the few grey stars
                draw upward into a vague melody
                of harsh threads.

                Bent as you are from straining
                against the bitter horizontals of
                a north wind,–there below you
                how easily the long yellow notes
                of poplars flow upward in a descending
                scale, each note secure in its own
                posture–singularly woven.

                All voices are blent willingly
                against the heaving contra-bass
                of the dark but you alone
                warp yourself passionately to one side
                in your eagerness.

 

from Al Que Quiere! 1917

a lot of these poems were some of the first poems I read with intent and an open, clean mind that had no precursor of what to see or find; and their reading imprinted deep, even when I didn’t read that well or attentively or learnedly; and, much later, when I attempted to re-ignite my writing, the language emerged like tramlines, there to follow, but fresh, utterly fresh; and utterly mine – which would never have been but for reading WCW

 

 

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

black wormhole: LOVE SONG by William Carlos Williams
grey & sky & voices & wind wormhole: I don’t need to go out / onto the balcony to see behind me / to know what’s going on
identity wormhole: moon- // washed
music wormhole: animus rises – powieview #37
night wormhole: ‘the Bat-Signal …’
stars wormhole: EL HOMBRE by William Carlos Williams
trees wormhole: presence
William Carlos Williams wormhole: SPRING STRAINS by William Carlos Williams
yellow wormhole: DANSE RUSSE by William Carlos Williams

 

behind / glass walls and wan and hooded eye

Tags

2017, 6*, abdomen, avenue, being, boundary, doing, eye, frame, glass, gold, heart, hill, house, Knole Park, nude, oak, sky, sound, stone, thought, vista, walls

                there was the house on the higher land
                with vista up to avenues of higher sky
                and generations of oak rolling downhill

                the rough stone frame between thought
                and act, the lattice glass through which
                to understand where we are

                then the oak crack plank and creak
                that bridge the languid nude that
                curves all known boundary

                and the chiselled abdomen and arm
                that built between what is always there
                and at the heart the restored crushed

                gold tumbling about event that never
                happens and continues not to behind
                glass walls and wan and hooded eye

 

Knole House

 

 

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

abdomen wormhole: AT-tennnnnnnn – waitfrit waitfrit – SHUN!
being wormhole: so where have I got:
doing wormhole: polystyrene / boulderscape
glass wormhole: green and / luminant / to behold
gold wormhole: the too big moon
house wormhole: looking ahead
oak wormhole: walk from Castleton to Hope
sky & sound wormhole: chuckling
stone wormhole: is this it // all the time
thought wormhole: stuck in lower realm
walls wormhole: ‘when travelling astrally …’

 

snapshots about Totnes

Tags

2015, 4*, bench, child, doors, flower, girl, hill, legs, lintel, looking, mauve, portrait, streets, Totnes, walls

                snapshots about Totnes

                girl with legs and shorts
                looks at me with lintels

                roadside wall holds mauve
                flower and steppe of land

                door-line out of street with
                hill by access ramp and rail

                kid hangs from the playship
                prow almost fell mum’s

                friend on the bench points
                her foot but doesn’t smile

 

 

 

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

bench wormhole: Day Out
child wormhole: Plumstead – Woolwich – Plumstead 220211
doors wormhole: red / lacquer / door
girl wormhole: reating & wriding
looking wormhole: Pilot 125 … // … being excursion in the interludes
mauve wormhole: immeasurable love
streets wormhole: city streets
walls wormhole: slightly / uphill

 

Plumstead – Woolwich – Plumstead 220211

Tags

2011, 2014, 2017, 6*, architecture, birds, birdsong, blackbird, blue, branches, breathing, brick, bus, cars, change, child, childhood, church, coat, coffee, coffee shop, crane, crows, death, echo, Eglinton Hill, evening, football, friends, green, handshake, Have, hill, houses, lifetimes, light, looking, mother, Mum, newsagent, no effort, notice, passing, pigeons, Plumstead, Plumstead common, quiet, roads, smiling, sound, step, streets, Thames, thought, time, trees, voices, walking, white, windows, Woolwich

        Plumstead – Woolwich – Plumstead 220211

        the crane holds effortlessly over from behind
        the houses and trees cables thrumming always
        cold and eventually it will all be dismantled;

        the diesel car purred slowly downhill, a pigeon
        dropped down behind it walked around a bit;
        through the leaf-clean branches of the young

        tree the Edwardian cornices and tops along
        Plumstead Common Road, don’t collect thoughts,
        t a s t e them without notice, deep and wet

        with no tice – much less effort – while walking,
        every once in a while the wall steps up a brick
        I search for being clear again … step, while

        walking stop, and breathe the beauty, stop
        and smile a little thought for you; in St. Mary
        Magdalene’s ground the mother has turned

        points to the trees, birds fly off and land, the
        toddler steps and stands among the pigeons
        while the mother brings the abandoned scooter

        but then in New Road holding the handshake
        shaking between exchange the firm friends
        look at each other only occasionally; while he

        he Had a coffee heated sandwich iced bun
        crisps water £8.89, busses passing bulbous
        over the dark green and hanging shade; up

        the hill on the coldstreet stepping downhill
        out the newsagent the bright blue padded
        jacket and the single bounce of a well-inflated

        basketball with simultaneous echo inside; the
        while on a wall opposite his Mum’s flat dead
        almost 12 years now watching a boy with a limp

        and the 53 bus working between parked cars
        and the crossing island with air suspension
        and when it was quiet the dark coat and white

        trainers crossed the road paused and into the
        newsagents but then I didn’t see where she
        went; the constant echo of boys’ voices playing

        football on Plumstead Common off Acacia
        Terrace 1890; and I can’t see 46 Eglinton Hill
        where I’m sat, conifers grow so quick, but

        `doesn’t matter, I can’t see the blackbird singing
        a different collect each time either; crows on the
        chimneys of 40/38; for a minute the blackbird

        stopped no vehicles uphill downhill, lights
        went on across the river and each house had
        the face of lifetimes in their windows;

 

Every year and a while I travel 40 miles up to Woolwich, where I grew up, to check that the journey I make started off in the write direction (HA!); while wandering I write, leaning on peoples’ front walls and making a coffee last in a cafe (and every once in a while I treat myself to an afternoon bench); walking downhill from Plumstead to Woolwich and around and back, in time; those who know Woolwich and Plumstead (all none of you across the world wide, as far as I can tell, although you have got Google maps, if you’re really interested) will [be able to] recognise as they appear: South Circular coming up to Well Hall roundabout, Eglinton Hill [childhood home], Plumstead Common Road, St Mary Magdelene’s Church, Woolwich New Road, [along A206], Waverley Crescent (top of Griffin Road), Plumstead Common (proper), back up Eglinton Hill …

 

 

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

architecture wormhole: pen and ruler
birds wormhole: open window
blackbird & change wormhole: relief
blue wormhole: low afternoon
branches wormhole: between
breathing & coffee shop & evening & sound & time & windows wormhole: amid
bus wormhole: Mark & Jon at the coffee shop III
cars & green & trees wormhole: Cocktails in 1951
child & streets wormhole: red / lacquer / door
childhood wormhole: all the sandstone / reflections in the / marble-blue troughs
church wormhole: ‘someone …’
coffee wormhole: Mark & Jon at the coffee shop I
crane wormhole: Luton // couldn’t make a poem out of it
crows wormhole: the ancient tree
death & light & Mum wormhole: good going into / that gentle night
echo wormhole: circuitry
Eglinton Hill & Plumstead wormhole: lost and city ground
Have & looking wormhole: found
lifetimes wormhole: cape and cowl
mother wormhole: mother and daughter
passing & roads & leaves wormhole: leaves
pigeons wormhole: municipal garden
quiet wormhole: the quiet whale
Thames wormhole: to rescue something
thought wormhole: ‘God, who am I …?’
voices wormhole: I keep / waiting to be discovered and get lost in anticipation
walking wormhole: cinnamon / milkshake
Woolwich wormhole: that comicbookshop … // … in dreams

 

dream I // dream II

Tags

2014, 3*, arrival, blue, experience, explanation, giving, hill, identity, looking, people, poem, reflection, retirement, school, tarmac, teaching, time, town, waking, windows

          dream I

    I had to get to school
    from the college halls
    in a town I didn’t know
    or what I was doing there

    I was already late
    but making my way
    past blue window reflections
    on honeycomb tarmac

    I realised I was going the
    wrong way up a hill people looking
    at me in my teacher’s clothes they
    knew the school is not here

    I am in an area I do not know
    so I go back down the hill
    trying to show that I know
    what I am doing I can see

    the whole town spread out
    like a city the different areas
    the school is there somewhere
    and I need to get myself there

and yet woken up now I’m not so sure I do

          dream II

    my chance to teach
    I explain everything

with little clever phrases like poems
    but each time

    I have to explain yet further
    taking hours, not

    holding them I gave of my
    of my own experience but it wasn’t

    theirs, they started leaving
    before I could conclude

retired now I’m not sure I ever arrived

 

 

 

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

blue wormhole: pass and / fro
giving wormhole: six paramitas
identity wormhole: I keep / waiting to be discovered and get lost in anticipation
looking wormhole: over-pink cagoule
people wormhole: memorial
retirement wormhole: Virginia
school wormhole: step
teaching wormhole: make your rickety / constructs strong with / unbending grids / of attention and wide- / open grates of let
time wormhole: tragic and archival
windows wormhole: windows // and balconies

 

and I lose sight of her into memory

Tags

2013, 5*, air, girl, hair, hazel, hill, journey, memory, muse, passing, phone, sight, step, talking, walking

                                the girl
                walks ahead down the hill
                each step gaited and strapped
                                left then right
                hazelnut hair lapping and sweeping –
                                she journeys
                far further than each advance against
                                              the air

                                as I pass
                she is talking into a phone
                                and I lose sight of her into memory

 

 

 

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

air wormhole: the quiet whale
girl wormhole: stone
hair wormhole: garden
muse wormhole: neither nude nor / descending a staircase
passing wormhole: free
talking wormhole: mother and daughter
walking wormhole: every step I take

 

St. Mark’s flies flagpole upwards / with the forelegs hanging down obscene / reaching some height blindly to connect / out from the long-stalk tri-separating up- / to-seeded rounds of pod like acacia what / is it called “‘hogweed’ I-don’t-know- / what-it’s-called-but-goats-love-it-and- / it-makes-them-burp-a-lot”

Tags

'scape, 2013, 8*, age, being, blindness, blue, books, breeze, Carol, contrapuntal, Derbyshire, flies, flying, grass, hill, mating, plants, seeds, shelf, speech, stone

                St. Mark’s flies flagpole upwards
                with the forelegs hanging down obscene
                reaching some height blindly to connect
                out from the long-stalk tri-separating up-
                to-seeded rounds of pod like acacia what
                is it called “‘hogweed’ I-don’t-know-
                what-it’s-called-but-goats-love-it-and-
                it-makes-them-burp-a-lot”

                stones like grouped books on a shelf
                some fat enough to stand upright by themselves
                some leaning
                some fat ones leaning anyway
                with twisted spine

                various stalks of dried grasses
                reach slightly arthritic and
                inflexible in the breeze
                their seeds spent but ragged contrapuntal

                to the distant hill risen
                too old to read
                too stone-blue to talk with
                there and always there
                and only there by its lone and ever self

 

 

 

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

being & breeze wormhole: lesson from watching two crane flies work the evening / skating across the panes flying and pushing legs grappling / the glass crossing repulsive over themselves and clinging akimbo / for a rest until lifeless just to get their stickly bodies through to the light
blue wormhole: St. Edmund’s / Parish Church / Castleton
books wormhole: through the pane – poewieview #34
Carol wormhole: ‘quick – she’s gone to pay …’
grass wormhole: prospect
speech wormhole: municipal garden
stone wormhole: prelude: // travel

 

walk from Castleton to Hope

Tags

'scape, 2013, 5*, beech, Castleton, field, hill, holiday, leaning, leaves, mauve, oak, passing, red, river, shadow, shape, time, walking

                walk from Castleton to Hope

                                magnificent
                oak grown into its own shape
                mid-field and backdropped
                completely over and rising
                                in hill

                                then later
                walking lightly beside the
                top leaves of the beech leaning
                effortlessly over the river from the
                                other bank

                                eventually
                up ahead out from under the shadow
                a perfect red and mauve –
                … no, a couple in their holiday
                                t-shirts

 

 

 

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

Castleton wormhole: St. Edmund’s / Parish Church / Castleton
field & passing wormhole: prelude: // travel
holiday & leaves wormhole: lesson from watching two crane flies work the evening / skating across the panes flying and pushing legs grappling / the glass crossing repulsive over themselves and clinging akimbo / for a rest until lifeless just to get their stickly bodies through to the light
mauve wormhole: 1968
oak wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J Redford – A Sign of the Times
red wormhole: greedy
river wormhole: south horizon
shadow wormhole: that comicbookshop … // … in dreams
time wormhole: wakeoutofadream
walking wormhole: garden