fifty-eight // and silent prayers

Tags

1979, 2017, 6*, age, birthday, blue, Castleton, clouds, cross-section, direction, gold, green, hair, heartbeat, hills, identity, knees, landscape, lifetimes, metal, neck, prayer, ripple, road, shirt, silence, silver, step, sun, time, travelling, walking, wandering

                                fifty-eight times now

                wandering dopey through another landscape

                                (walking) up into the hills
                                to find the golden sun –
                                sheet-metal through
                                flanks of cloud

                                the snaking A-road
                                sunk and cascaded
                                in 1979, petrified cross-
                                sections there to study

                                never travelling far
                                but up in giant gulp-steps
                                heart beats in the back
                                of the neck and down

                                through the knees
                                with the rising pass

                I stand now at fifty eight with clipped and

                                silvering hair with
                                check and green-blue
                                shirt and silent prayers
                                rippling to all directions

 

 

 

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

birthday wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – … as the new town marches in
blue wormhole: I
Cadtleton wormhole: walk from Castleton to Hope
clouds & hills wormhole: mauve
gold wormhole: so / do I keep on writing now I’ve retired, or … / Rumplestiltskin
green & walking wormhole: abandoned sound mirrors
hair & sun wormhole: ash leaves
identity wormhole: both modern and en-slaved / to life
lifetimes wormhole: oh, alright then
silence wormhole: where did the silence go
silver wormhole: Coleton Fishacre
time wormhole: sreet
travelling wormhole: breakfast

 

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oh, alright then

Tags

2017, 6*, beech, church, lifetimes, Nottingham, offices, passing, poetry, quiet, sandstone, sitting, talking to myself, time, traffic, trunk, windows, writing

                oh, alright then

                                sitting in a church ground
                                before a beech tree sometime coppiced

                                pushing up the ancient sandstone
                                so much quieter before

                                the ill-fitting windows
                                of terraced offices where nothing

                                happens
                                save the mark of passed lives

                                the twisted trunk
                                and the exhaust of cobbled engines

                                over speed-humps, to claim
                                that I don’t seem to be writing many poems these days

 

 

 

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

church wormhole: {Ellen Terry’s house}
lifetimes wormhole: the balance necessary between
passing wormhole: amniotic avenue
poetry wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J Redford – Working
quiet wormhole: quiet river
sitting wormhole: skeins of candy pink and lilac
talking to myself wormhole: so where have I got:
time & windows wormhole: all the low clouds keeping pace / through the train window, / always arriving, whether fast or / slow, but never actually moving
writing wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – reaping

 

the balance necessary between

Tags

2017, 7*, appearance, balance, being, cause and effect, checking, coagulation, denial, doing, empty, fortune, healing, holding onto, karma, legacy, life, lifetimes, lunge, morning, path, Refuge, relationship, room, self-grasping, shutters, statue, trauma, true nature, urge

in my corner of the room
                I have only just noticed the shutters ajar –
                                wondering if I dare push them further apart –

the dynamics of past lifetimes
                rebirths of exact measure to the traumas
                                round which they coagulate; but then, also, the

healing of relationships
                which tip towards fortune however
                                you make them, the balance necessary between doing

all that holding and checking
                of all those causes and effects which
                                comb-through the tangles of legacy but which

can so-easily become the
                local point of selfish, and being
                                insight through the skein of appearences into

their respective empty
                nature enabling them all to
                                appear in the first place which can so-easily

become a stoney denial
                of causality into one’s own statue
                                stuck in pose; the path through which neither

aggravates nor heals;
                the practice of Refuge in the
                                morning and at the urge to lunge of all

my doings, alongside
                all the other 6-fingered and 4-
                                thumbed sisters of this world

 

this teetered out of a comment made in response to one of Jana H. White’s posts, but I’ve been all the way through her site and can’t find it – she must have taken it down: it would make sense of the ‘corner of the room’ and the ‘6-fingered and 4-thumbed’ references, but, maybe, if you tune out a little, it works nonetheless…

 

 

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

balance wormhole: green and / luminant / to behold
being & doing wormhole: behind / glass walls and wan and hooded eye
life & lifetimes wormhole: amniotic avenue
morning wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J Redford – Working
path wormhole: in the / Citadel / Park / a leaf / new / ly fell

 

amniotic avenue

Tags

2017, 5*, ageing, avenue, bay window, Bodhisattva Vow, change, conditioned existence, Eastbourne, Have, life, lifetimes, mother sentient beings, passing, people, perspective, promenade, shadow, shops, society, step, time, walking

                                                                amniotic avenue

                ah, here they come
                out from under the receding bay windows above

                people emerge
                by the flanking promenade of shopfronts that come and go over decades                

                ageing with each step
                and pass

by

 

 

 

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

change & life wormhole: polystyrene / boulderscape
Eastbourne & walking wormhole: perspective
Have wormhole: it’s all about…;
lifetimes wormhole: stuck in lower realm
passing wormhole: skeins of candy pink and lilac
people wormhole: I am not yet ready
promenade wormhole: and ‘naerrgh’ a mention of a seagull’s call
shadow wormhole: with all love released
shops wormhole: the silent night of the Batman
society wormhole: growth
time wormhole: {Ellen Terry’s house}

 

stuck in lower realm

Tags

2017, 6*, anatta, Bodhisattva Vow, Bodhisattvacharyavatara, buffalo, choice, identity, karma, lifetimes, morality, perfect human rebirth, perspective, rebirth, self, self-containment, snake, spontaneity, thought

                stuck in lower realm

                … OK

                when in woeful state
                I grunt like a buffalo
                and sting like a snake

                but when human
                I have the choice
                to exercise: I – won’t –

                do – that; except the
                swarm ‘oh, it doesn’t
                matter’ or the won’t-

                think-but-lunge-in-
                thrill-of-spontaneity;
                every time I acquiesce

                I create propensity to
                tip to wrong perspective,
                which predisposition

                magnifies as a whole
                realm of being after
                this human is done;

                but for a silent vow
                I made despite my-
                selves and which I

                keep despite myself
                to hold myself to check,
                is my only identity

 

Bodhisattvacharyavatara VII, 19

 

 

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

identity wormhole: growth
lifetimes wormhole: looking ahead
thought wormhole: turned backs of saddened victory

 

looking ahead

Tags

2015, 20th century, 8*, age, attention, cypress, dark, daughter, dress, duty, eyes, facade, father, field, fields, green, hair, horizon, house, jaw, land, left, lifetimes, medals, mouth, portrait, Remembrance, sienna, sky, smile, standing, war, white, youth

                                                looking ahead

                at 18 he peered frightened and gentle –
                the high forehead and round jaw of all
                his youth, but that his mouth held duty

                faintly pursed on the left, in reserve and
                to attention, although the epaulettes were
                (the wings of a choirboy) – at the strips

                and strips of field and fields of umber
                and sienna and the deepest darkest green,
                as high as the land was wide, and it was

                wide, to the white-washed house perched
                on the higher horizon flanked by European
                cypresses, at home in the fields; at three

                she looked above the horizon, hair in all
                direction to the sky, the purse to the left,
                in attention and wan smile from above

                the ruffled dress (soon to be outgrown with
                every crumple-ene); the medals were worn
                on the left side, the eyes up to the right;

                they stood together to attention, in profile
                before the wet facades of eleventh hour,
                eyes forward, eyes down, pursed and still

 

three photographs in the house of an old friend: her father when newly enrolled in the army shortly before World War II – he served in Africa; herself in her then-best dress in the very early 1960s; father and daughter standing on a wet street collecting for Remembrance Day …

 

 

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

20th century wormhole: ‘God, who am I …?’
attention & smile wormhole: dear Lucy
daughter wormhole: mother and daughter
eyes wormhole: addictive
father & lifetimes wormhole: granny
field wormhole: walk from Castleton to Hope
green & white wormhole: Plumstead – Woolwich – Plumstead 220211
hair wormhole: immeasurable love
horizon wormhole: Bexhill 140215
house wormhole: slightly / uphill
mouth wormhole: over-pink cagoule
sky wormhole: low afternoon
war wormhole: memorial

 

granny

Tags

2015, 4*, disability, father, garden centre, generations, grandmother, grin, lifetimes, mother, portrait, tangerine

                granny
                tried tangerine jelly with her

                but she weren’t having none of that with a
                cheeky grin

                mum and dad
                finshed theirs quite quick with a few exchanges

                packed up the chair and whirred off
                granny looked back

                and returned to stack the plates and cups on the tray
                with a lifetime’s

                push up of bottom lip with each place-
                ment

 

 

 

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

father wormhole: out
lifetimes & mother wormhole: Plumstead – Woolwich – Plumstead 220211

 

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

 

cape and cowl

Tags

2014, 7*, Batman, breathing, cape, cowl, edge, identity, life, lifetimes, rest, stillness, true nature

                cape and cowl

                only in the midst
                of billow and flurry

                from lifetimes passed and
                current wafts breathing

                hardly sometimes at the edges
                between lifetimes to happen

                can you rest
                your battered identity enough

                to think with true nature enough
                to be still

 

 

 

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

Batman wormhole: between
breathing wormhole: reating & wriding
identity wormhole: ‘God, who am I …?’
life wormhole: good going into / that gentle night
lifetimes wormhole: make your rickety / constructs strong with / unbending grids / of attention and wide- / open grates of let
stillness wormhole: wakeoutofadream

 

make your rickety / constructs strong with / unbending grids / of attention and wide- / open grates of let

Tags

2013, 7*, afternoon, attention, boundary, class, construction, defeat, defensive, dream, labour, letting go, lifetimes, living, morning, satisfaction, shift, silence, skill, speech, teaching, waking, water

                I woke saying “sit down”
                to a class who had
                been testing me like water

                moving silent against
                my every prescription
                demanded or presumed

                despite all the charm or
                cleverness I might use
                to a morning

                and then an afternoon
                of defeat and defence
                unable to use the skill

                and manoeuvre I have
                taught myself for
                lifetimes now

                all the shift and forming
                around the boundaries
                finding every fissure

                and fault just ahead
                of my every attempt
                to dam it all; what labour

                what want of satisfaction;
                let the water go
                where it will – it will

                all go there anyway – and
                make your rickety
                constructs strong with

                unbending grids
                of attention and wide-
                open grates of let

 

 

 

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

afternoon wormhole: be
attention wormhole: divergent // direction
dream wormhole: wakeoutofadream
letting go wormhole: redundant
lifetimes wormhole: Salisbury Cathedral // suspended in everything
living wormhole: free
morning wormhole: windows // and balconies
silence & speech & water wormhole: the quiet whale
teaching wormhole: a nice grey woollen picnic blanket