ruin | mlewisredford

Tags

2019, 6*, ampitheatre, arch, Chester, compromise, driving, gothic, history, identity, living, mosaic, role, Roman, roundabout, ruin, schoolchildren, settlement, sleep, society, storey, time, traffic lights

                there
                                may
                                                have
                                                                been

                bygone gothic arches
                pointing two three storeys up
                on the traffic-lighted roundabout

                and milling schoolchildren with
                Roman shields marching patchwork
                from the rebuilt amphitheatre, I know

                but that single vice in perpetuity
                above and beyond the call of living
                from which to sleep heavy,

                snug and secure under
                single tattered rank, and ever
                metres deep in tread across

                meticulous tesserae – mosaic
                to the measure of all settlement –
                was far too much to emerge from with any certainty,

looking for the right exit

back from a visit to the midlands; visited Chester for the first time – it’s an old town, back to when it all begannn annnd connnntinnnues…

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

compromise wormhole: my uncomfortable life
history wormhole: pursued
identity wormhole: writening
living wormhole: it’s / not what you do or what you say / if it ain’t got that swing
sleep wormhole: beguiled / desire
socoeity wormhole: boiled spangle with soft centre
time wormhole: then
traffic lights wormhole: travelling / back

Tags

2019, 6*, anger, animals, architecture, Bodhisattvacharyavatara, collapse, corner, dream, fireplace, lintel, moss, pediment, pillars, ruin, settlement, sound, stone, thought, trees, walls, weight, windows

“And anger it is that lays in ruins
every kind of mental goodness.”

crunch what have I stepped on
cracked, hollow, all about, what

is this square stone pediment
skewed and in the way, no, not

square, this moss has rounded
the corner, and here is a

pillar (where’s the arch, where’s
the other pillar) all concussed

and made of cone it seems,
it must have just collapsed

one day, couldn’t hold the weight,
maybe someone took the

other pillar, maybe the lintel
just shattered and got walked over;

but no walls here, just that
mound over there, I could

climb the side, there are steps, oh,
it was the fireplace, all that rubble

has filled the hearth and …
this was the back wall, here

is a corner of a window space,
but there are just trees to see

now, was it cleared here once,
did they keep animals milling

about, were they comfortable,
did they have dreams …?

a wistful from Bodhisattvacharyavatara VI, verse 7: “Encountering that which I fear or do not want, and obstructed or frustrated in obtaining what I want, these provide the fuels of discontent, of unhappiness, of irritation. They smoulder and then flare-up, spreading within me. I become built-up and headstrong with anger which eats away inside and will eventually consume me and the toxic world I have created for myself.” The title-quote is from “The Nectar of Mañjuśrī’s Speech”, a commentary to the Bodhisattvacharyavatara by Kunzang Palden.

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

architecture wormhole: La Route, Effet d’Hiver, 1872
dream wormhole: on facing the Have
sound wormhole: in turgid reflection
stone & trees wormhole: Cours La Reine, Rouen, 1890
thought wormhole: in deed
walls wormhole: Female Peasant Carding, 1875
windows wormhole: threshold to behold