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mlewisredford

~ may the Supreme and Precious Jewel Bodhichitta take birth where it has not yet done so …

mlewisredford

Tag Archives: radio

The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – Rain

20 Thursday Jun 2019

Posted by m lewis redford in announcements

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ash, beauty, bridge, clouds, consciousness, cottage, dawn, eyes, garden, gazing, gold, grass, grey, hedge, hill, land, leaves, light, memory, Michael J Redford, mist, morning, passing, petunia, quiet, radio, rain, reflection, river, roads, silence, silver, sky, skyline, smell, sound, speech, starlings, stillness, stone, summer, sun, sycamore, the Boats of Vallisneria, trees, valley, village, water, weather, willow, writing

Rain

“The morning will be overcast with frequent showers. They will be heavy at times in the south east but brighter weather will follow later from the west …”

Thus spake the oracle from the radio early one summer morning casting his own black cloud over the hearts of many.   I was a keen cyclist in my teens and at many a weekend my schoolmate and I would grease up our cycles and head for the open road.   Shoreham was our target this particular day but the voice of doom did not quell our enthusiasm.   The weather was kind to us on the way down with the sun occasionally breaking through the gloom above to splash a little watery light on the road ahead and we arrived on the outskirts of the village at around nine o’clock. Passing Samuel Palmer’s old cottage we came upon the bridge and dismounted.   After a strenuous exercise, it is a delight to lean upon a bridge and gaze upon the waters emerging from beneath one’s feet.   The flow catches the eye and lifts it slowly into the distance and the senses relax to the accompaniment of its music.   There weren’t many gnats and midges at that time of day, but those that were about were flying very low indeed.   Certainly there was rain about and it wasn’t very far off either for we could just detect the faint scent of it even above the mass of water at our feet.   Not wishing to miss any of its quiet charm, we walked our bicycles through the village, and as the sky grew heavy above us, my thoughts turned to my companion’s pet tortoise Horace who had been extremely active earlier that morning, this being a sure sign of approaching rain.   We turned down the hill past the Crown Hotel, on past the water mill which was then a tea house (I believe it is now a private dwelling) and out onto the banks of the Darenth.

A damp mist had filtered through the trees on the hill opposite and the grey light had transmuted the upturned leaves of ash and sycamore into flecks of silver that hung without movement in the stillness of the impending downpour.   An old weeping willow, pollarded of its crowning glory, leaned out from the bank across the water and as I peered into its dark reflection a crayfish, startled by the leviathan that reared above it, scuttled beneath the smooth stones. As I gazed, the picture was suddenly distorted.   A raindrop had followed immediately by another and yet another and soon I was no longer able to fathom the depths.   We donned our capes, drew up our knees and huddled against the tree like two diminutive bell tents.   Cozy in our little dry islands, the raindrops drummed upon our capes in anger and hissed at us from the river turning it into a boiling cauldron.   The mist that had settled among the trees on the hill opposite had drifted on making way for a great veil of rain that spanned the skyline in graceful folds – a grey but beautiful replica of the Aurora Borealis.

As the curtain drifted slowly by, the day grew appreciably lighter and the deluge eased to a steady drizzle.   Soon after, the clouds broke a little, and a shaft of pure gold struck the hills, becoming wider at its base as it raced swiftly down the valley.   Then the rain ceased as quickly as it had begun and silence, the ethereal beauty of which is always magnified when the rains are over, tumbled into the valley.   We sat in silence beside the bubbling waters and for several minutes we watched its breathless pursuit of the shaft of gold.

It is within such a quietude that I sit now jotting down these notes.   This morning was a grey but clean smelling morning upon which the hedgerow leaves quivered.   It had been raining all night but had stopped just as dawn broke, leaving behind a miscellany of drips and drops, musical and echoing.   Each blade of grass had its tip bent by a raindrop and the clothes line was a string of pearls waiting to be spilled upon the lawn by the quick grasp of a starling’s feet.   By mid-morning the low cloud had dispersed and great mountains of summer cumulus were heaped about the sky.   It was my intention this morning to tackle one or two gardening chores that had been neglected but due to a tiny and insignificant happening, these have yet to be done.   As I passed the petunia bed, I bent to pick up an old seed packet that had appeared and my sleeve touched a petunia leaf.   Upon this leaf there were three rain drops, and as the leaf was set in motion, the three tiny drops rushed towards one another and merged into one large globule that trembled precariously in the centre of the leaf before rolling off the edge and disappearing into the soil.   This tiny happening caused my mind to leap back across the years to remember once more a particular drop of water out of all the millions that must have fallen that day at Shoreham; a single drop of water that has long since been returned to Poseidon from whence it came. We were walking back through the village when we paused awhile beside a cottage garden to discuss our plans.   The clouds were now few and the sun was strong in the cleansed sky drawing out the sweet scent of purity from the land.   Suddenly, a spark of light leapt from the ground and pierced my eye.   So bright was it that it might well have been of solid substance, for it so dazzled the eye that it quite took the breath from me.   I stooped to discover the origin of this manifestation and there, within the cupped hands of a lupin leaf was a tiny trembling rain drop.   It was a perfect globe clearer than crystal; a gem that would have done justice to the diadem of the most illustrious of monarchs.

So it is that my gardening chores for today have once more been neglected.   A rain drop fell from a leaf and in that single drop a flood of memories, memories I felt I had to record, for – they had been pushed so far below the plane of consciousness, that I was afraid they would never have come to the fore again.

 

read the collected work as it is published: here

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

beauty & dawn & rain & silence wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – Sky
bridge wormhole: Great Bridge, Rouen, 1896
clouds & passing wormhole: slight sneer
eyes wormhole: mandala offering
garden wormhole: A Corner of the Garden at the Hermitage, 1877
gold & grey & leaves & sun & trees wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – I took my camera into the fields
hedge wormhole: it’s / not what you do or what you say / if it ain’t got that swing
light & river wormhole: the Bodhisattva set out / for the Seat of Awakening
mist & morning & sound wormhole: 10/30 by William Carlos Williams
quiet wormhole: quietly in my quiet house
radio wormhole: within
reflection wormhole: in turgid reflection
roads & silver wormhole: Hastings: neither all or nothing
sky & speech & writing wormhole: 11/1 by William Carlos Williams
skyline wormhole: Boulevarde Montmartre, Evening Sun, 1879 // Boulevarde Montmartre at Night, 1879
smell wormhole: prose piece 2 from POEMS 1927 by William Carlos Williams
stillness wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – pigs
stone wormhole: “And anger it is that lays in ruins / every kind of mental goodness.”
water wormhole: Valentine’s Day 2019

 

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within

05 Wednesday Apr 2017

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

'scape, 2013, 4*, flying, garden, ivy, listening, music, pigeon, radio, song, trees, wind

                                              listening to the song
                                stepping the crescendos
                with the professionalism of hundreds
                                to recognition
                                O save me
                from the top one hundreds

                                not even the pigeon
                                nor the wind chimes
                                nor even the waving tops of trees
                can assuage this acrid spore on the breeze

                                but no
                                there
                                the ivy
                has climbed up one fence post
                                and shaped itself
                                square and fast
                                that I can see
                the pigeon dive and pull up adjust tail feathers
                                turn to land
                                on a branch
                                within the
                                tree precisely

 

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

garden wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – snow
listening & trees wormhole: the bench
music wormhole: No
radio wormhole: magnetic field
trees wormhole: what wounds have you got?

 

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magnetic field

31 Sunday Jul 2016

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

2013, 4*, attention, being, doing, field, Jon, poem, radio, sitting, talking to myself, time, traffic, windows, writing

 

 

 

                           magnetic field

                           dropped Jon off;
                           tried sitting a little –

                           too much traffic and radio
                           through the window

                           I’ve got about 20 minutes
                           to get a poem off –

                           look around but there is
                           nothing that draws my

                           filings up, only plenty
                           to pull my attention

                           left right and around
                           so I suppose t/here

                           is the starting point
                           as well as the full stop

 

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

attention & radio wormhole: nothing to say
being wormhole: Elektra
doing wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – On Doing Nothing
field wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] by Mark L. Redford – from arm to nature, doing nothing
Jon wormhole: Jon
sitting wormhole: my seat // now
talking to myself wormhole: ashramas
time wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] by Mark L. Redford – mmpph’
windows wormhole: weight of high sash windows – poewieview #33
writing wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – Olly

 

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nothing to say

07 Saturday May 2016

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

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2016, Arlington Reservoir, attention, birdsong, blue, bluebells, clouds, driving, flowers, grey, morning, notice, passing, pink, radio, walking, warblers, woodland

 

 

 

                           nothing to say

                           passing bluebells
                           at the speed of
                           recall, maybe

                           cresting a hillock
                           behind the last
                           bend of road

                           under deep vault
                           of hanging cloud
                           grey to the blue

                           and pink flowers
                           between reclining
                           concrete slabs

                           humbly accompanying
                           the Arlington Reservoir
                           with the white-

                           throated warblers I’d
                           heard on the radio
                           this morning

 

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

attention wormhole: quick inventory after coffee
blue wormhole: impressionism
clouds wormhole: words tumble like / boulders – poewieview #25
grey wormhole: 1963
morning & walking wormhole: Le Pont Royal, 1909
passing wormhole: fine
pink wormhole: stacked
radio wormhole: 1965

 

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1965

24 Sunday Apr 2016

Posted by m lewis redford in poems, poeviews

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

1965, 2014, bridge, cars, crane, morning, music, passing, radio, silence, sound, sunlight, traffic, truck, voices, years

 

 

 

                           1965

                           the traffic
                     the cars and the blocks of trucks with their air-breaks and axels pass
                           and recede

                           silent
                     over the bridge on the way past the docks and cranes save for
                           the line

                           on the radio
                     which ends ‘instead …’ and doesn’t resolve until ‘… of me’ to
                           change down gear

 


Are You There (With Another Girl): Dionne Warwick, Burt Bacharach, Hal David

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

bridge wormhole: Compartment C, Car 193, 1938
cars wormhole: always
crane & traffic wormhole: finding my own true nature – Plumstead, Woolwich, 190915
morning wormhole: 1964
music & voices wormhole: well,
passing & sunlight & years wormhole: 1968
radio wormhole: any answers
silence wormhole: and that’s where I are
sound wormhole: impressionism

 

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any answers

12 Friday Jun 2015

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

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Tags

2014, agenda, discussion, politics, radio, society

 

 

 

                           any answers
                           in allusion, please
                           repeatedly if necessary

                           in sound-phrase only
                           to obviate agenda
                           over discussion

 

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

radio wormhole: dawn
society wormhole: my life / of others

 

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dawn

24 Wednesday Dec 2014

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

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Tags

1980, 5*, abandonment, breakfast, cars, dawn, eggs, emergence, fir, motorway, night, passing, radio, sound, streetlight, tea, travelling

 

 

 

                                dawn

                                the cabin-loggy

                                ===============
                               !! bacon-burger bar !!
                                ===============

                                blumbered from the crackly radio

                flat fried eggs blupped onto the bonnet from the tree-lamps
                                down the middle of the motorway

                and as the spikey-fine fir trees flinked some white silliness
                                into my piping-hot tea –

                “Whappo” said the tatty tyres slapping the tarmac
                                over the hills and far away

 

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

abandonment wormhole: ‘“Never,” said the Sandman; / he blinked …’
cars & passing wormhole: Plumstead – Woolwich – Plumstead 290508 – / the breath of London
dawn & night & sound & streetlight wormhole: the silent night of the Batman
emergence wormhole: glass
fir wormhole: sounds // suddenly / stop
motorway wormhole: we // walk
radio wormhole: King of the World
tea wormhole: smiling
travelling wormhole: sometimes

 

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King of the World

01 Tuesday Oct 2013

Posted by m lewis redford in poems, poeviews

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Tags

2*, 2012, hills, night, orange, radio, Steely Dan, valley, yellow

 

 

 

                                King of the World

                                in the cabin out
                                in the hills

                      the machine fires
                      and hums with wavy needles

                                safe
                      with the oranges and yellows
                      and the valley of dark before me

                                I talk to the world

 

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

hills wormhole: the sun / in a clean / industrial / sky
night wormhole: half an hour
orange wormhole: 1972
radio wormhole: rear attic / bedroom
valley wormhole: clouds
yellow wormhole: blue and green / a l l s  o  r  t  s

 

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rear attic / bedroom

25 Thursday Oct 2012

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

'scape, 2012, 5*, bedroom, beige, childhood, curtains, Eglinton Hill, Manhattan, pink, radio, sun, walnut, white, windows

 

 

 

                                                      rear attic
                                                      bedroom

                                          in
                           through the
            smallpalepinkflowersonwhiteandbeige curtains
                           shaft of aslant sunlight
                           fanthening strip by strip along
                           the slighty embossed wallpaper
                           of the attic window alcove
                           until the edge of the inward-sloping
                           ceiling

                                          then
                           I whine to be picked out of the cot
                           I worry the railings the catch that holds
                           but don’t understand
                           but no one comes
                           so I notice the walnut record player and radio
                           stored away and standing like a
                           Manhattan apartment building

 

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

a room in the House on Eglinton Hill
bedroom wormhole: the open window
beige wormhole: ‘dirty beige …’
childhood & Eglinton Hill & pink wormhole: there
curtains wormhole: snow and incense
Manhattan wormhole: travel writing
radio wormhole: radio
sun & white wormhole: sun low / from behind
windows wormhole: evening

 

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radio

10 Monday Sep 2012

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

'scape, 2012, 5*, black, doors, green, portrait, radio, Ramsden Heath, white, wood

 

 

 

                                                                   radio

                                   in one of the outhouses
                                   the green paint wooden door
                                   opened easily when the metal latch
                                   was raised – clack –

                                   petrol-crystal smell
                                   coal bunker dark

                                              adjust
                                              stay

                                   tools hung white-washed wall
                                   rake Wellington boots tea-box

                                   and that was Grandad’s radio
                                   handsome box walnut knots
                                   polished mesh cloth speaker
                                   onoff volume tuner tick-marks
                                   along different levels of realities

                                              unplugged
                                              no electricity
                                              in the outhouses

 

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

black wormhole: your gold teeth
doors wormhole: winter / weeks
green wormhole: ‘across the flat meadow …’
radio & Ramsden Heath wormhole: Grandad / Redford
white wormhole: the Joker’s face
wood wormhole: one mirror

 

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… Mark; remember …

"... the impulse to keep to yourself what you have learned is not only shameful; it is destructive. Anything you do not give freely and abundantly becomes lost to you. You open your safe to find ashes." ~ Annie Dillard

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  • Bodhisattvacharyavatara
    • Chapter 1
    • Chapter 10
    • Chapter 2
    • Chapter 3
    • Chapter 4
    • Chapter 5
    • Chapter 6
    • Chapter 7
    • Chapter 8
    • Chapter 9
    • Introduction
  • collected works
    • 25th August 1981 – count Up
    • askance From Hell
    • Batman
    • Bob 1995-2012
    • David Bowie Movements in Suite Major
    • Edward Hopper: Poems at an Exhibition
    • Eglinton Hill
    • FLOORBOARDS
    • Granada
    • in and out / the Avebury stones / can’t seem to get / a signal …
    • Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters]
    • Miller’s Batman
    • mum
    • nan
    • Portsmouth – Southsea
    • Spring Warwick breezes / over Bacharach fieldwork and boroughs with / the occasional shift and chirp of David / in the pastel-long morning of the sixties
    • The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford
    • through the crash
  • index
    • #A-E see!
    • F–K, wha’ th’
    • L-P 33 1/3 rpm
    • Q-T pie
    • U-Z together forever
  • me
  • others
  • poemics
  • poeviews
  • teaching matters
  • William Carlos Williams
  • wormholes

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  • Bodhisattvacharyavatara: Chapter VII, Joyous Effort – verse 8; reflectionary
  • Bodhisattvacharyavatara: Chapter VII, Joyous Effort – verse 7; reflectionary
  • Bodhisattvacharyavatara: Chapter VII, Joyous Effort – verse 6; reflectionary & verses 3-6 embroidery

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