written relief to / creeping anaesthesia / through palimpsest / and crankled page

Tags

2013, 6*, being, buying, centre, consumerism, driving, Have, identity, living, page, passing, progress, self, texture, travelling, writing

                written relief to
                creeping anaesthesia
                through palimpsest
                and crankled page

                driving soaks you into
                the process of passing
                inexorable to progress
                oblivious to a      centre

                here comes a service station
                let me choose a centre to buy
                inevitable to consume and then
                obliged to define myself     through

 

 

 

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

being wormhole: 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”
Have wormhole: 20th century
identity wormhole: wakeoutofadream
living 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
passing wormhole: municipal garden
travelling wormhole: too much in arrival
writing wormhole: landscape of cloud over London / with differing depths of grey

 

landscape of cloud over London / with differing depths of grey

Tags

2013, birth, black, breathing, clouds, England, green, grey, hope, iron, landscape, life, London, mauve, mist, park, pipes, pregnancy, publishing, shadow, streets, Sylvia Plath, Victorian houses, walking, writing

                soon after I was born
                to the rendered sides of
                talling Victorian terrace-ends
                with networks of iron black pipe
                and random small frosted window
                                Sylvia Plath

                arrived back in England
                pregnant with newhope and
                immanent with firstbook
                to breathe the alternating
                talling shadows of street
                and the misty greenmauve landscape
                                of park

                landscape of cloud over London
                with differing depths of grey

 

 

 

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

black wormhole: St. Edmund’s / Parish Church / Castleton
breathing & writing wormhole: the goldilocks stance
clouds & green & grey wormhole: municipal garden
life wormhole: garden
London wormhole: handsome
mauve & shadow & walking wormhole: walk from Castleton to Hope
mist wormhole: prelude: // travel
park wormhole: in the / Citadel / Park / a leaf / new / ly fell
publishing wormhole: Granada holiday …
streets wormhole: Luton // couldn’t make a poem out of it
Sylvia Plath wormhole: Sylvia
Victorian houses wormhole: through the pane – poewieview #34

 

St. Edmund’s / Parish Church / Castleton

Tags

2013, 7*, black, blue, brass, Castleton, ceiling, church, metal, patience, silence, smell, sound, waiting, wood, writing

                                smell

                of centuried wood and polish
                misaligned and creaky and
                still held by metal twist brace
                with brass lamp-holders polished
                and blackening and spore
                of pew-bolster-cushions patient
                and attentive waiting

                                silently

                but for the crease and crankle
                of the notepad as I write these
                lines high among the rafters
                of the powder-blue ceiling

                                St. Edmund’s
                                Parish Church
                                Castleton

 

 

 

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

black wormhole: that comicbookshop … // … in dreams
blue & Castleton 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
church wormhole: and that’s where I are
silence wormhole: 1968 – orange sand and mauve mist
smell wormhole: too much in arrival
waiting wormhole: greedy
wood wormhole: prelude: // travel
writing wormhole: the goldilocks stance

 

the goldilocks stance

Tags

2013, breathing, eyes, frog, openness, seeing, shoulders, sitting, writing

                                the goldilocks stance

                you sit straight with back and shoulders
                but not too straight like a mission rather
                just enough like a                          frog

                and you plant your eyes softly in front
                but not too soft that they close rather
                open enough to breathe              evenly

                then you hold your pen over lined paper
                but not too thoughtful like a prerequisite
                rather naïve enough to see          unto

 

 

 

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

breathing wormhole: breathing
eyes wormhole: brown corduroy shirt / and dark redwine tie
openness wormhole: strain
seeing & sitting & writing wormhole: in the / Citadel / Park / a leaf / new / ly fell

 

in the / Citadel / Park / a leaf / new / ly fell

Tags

'scape, 2013, 8*, attention, Belgium, block, breeze, circular poem, clouds, Ghent, leaf, living, looking, lost, notice, park, path, preoccupied, reaching, searching, seeing, settling, shops, sitting, trees, undergrowth, writing

 

 

 

                                              stuck
                         lost and                         for  something
            preoccupied                                  to write
             and shops                                         I am
            past trees                                             usually plagued
             as I drift                                               by clustered
  I am looking at                                 in the belly-heavy
to see everything                                         Citadel
            stopping me                                  rainclouds Park
        my subconscious                         idling                     a leaf
                                            through                                           new
                                                                              ly fell to                         for the
                                                                        the path                                    constant search
                                                                 the breeze                                           reach for the
                                                     worries the top                                                 more to
                                                          of the trees                                                     deal with
                                                          constantly                                                       more to
                                                          but lets the                                                     they have
                                                        undergrowth                                                  it seems
                                                              settle itself                                             when they reach                                
                                                               comfortably                                      it’s only
                                                                         into its seat                         unnoticed
                                                                                                 alert and

 

 

 

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

attention & looking wormhole: Day Out
breeze & clouds & seeing wormhole: weight
circular poem & sitting wormhole: wakeoutofadream
living wormhole: nothing significant
park & path wormhole: the bench
searching wormhole: that comicbookshop … // … in dreams
settling wormhole: six paramitas
shops wormhole: time travel
trees wormhole: within
writing wormhole: Virginia

 

Virginia

Tags

2017, 20th century, 5*, chess, inside, retirement, society, teaching, thought, Virginia Woolf, writing

                                              Virginia wanted
                                to dispense with tale-tell-all
                rough-carved and ugly in ungainly moves
                                across the cornered chessboard

                                              but what
                                of the train of thought she thought
                as more essential than denouement
                                and in and in she went

 

retirement #9: I understand this much: that Virginia Woolf was nurtured in, but wanted to bridge out from, the more of [patriarchal] social imperialism; it has waited this long for me to appreciate her need and courage whilst emerging from the more of unattributable results/problem-solving-backwards managerialism in what should be public (not political, not (someone’s) personal (career)) service (not done-deal) into retirement, in an era when it all seems to be lurching horribly right again; read the whole sequence as it extricates itself from customs: in and out / the Avebury stones / can’t seem to get / a signal …

 

 

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

20th century wormhole: to rescue something
retirement wormhole: strain
society wormhole: darkness
writing wormhole: brown corduroy shirt / and dark redwine tie

 

brown corduroy shirt / and dark redwine tie

Tags

2017, 6*, breath, brown, eyes, hair, identity, life, neck, nose, portrait, red, retirement, shirt, tie, Virginia Woolf, writing

                                brown corduroy shirt
and dark redwine tie

                finding Virginia
                                              young before gathered and drapèd hair
                                              over enquiring philtrum
                old where sternomastoids meet
                below the whole larynx readying to write properly
                                              and hooded eyes half closed to stolidity
                                                              half open to breath

 

 

read the whole sequence: in and out / the Avebury stones / can’t seem to get / a signal …; I bought myself some new shirts with the no-blame severance pay I accepted to make it all stop – one of the shirts is a mid-brown corduroy that naps a darker brown when stroked because it hasn’t washed worn yet; the tie I bought from a charity shop before I even started teaching – deep burgundy red, slim and tonic in the light; I have been meaning to get in to Virginia Woolf for quite some time, but the afternoon light of the parlour has never been quite right; am I pathetic: oh yes, but at least I can write about it; Carol likes to travel as an instinctive way to comb-through the threads of career and life; we planned a trip to the stones in Wiltshire started with the Avebury stones …

 

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

breath wormhole: and smile / like a bud
brown wormhole: occa / s / i // o / n / a // l // l // y
eyes wormhole: darkness
hair wormhole: handsome
identity wormhole: bud
life wormhole: somewhere
red wormhole: love and precision
retirement wormhole: retirement
writing wormhole: no / thing

 

no / thing

Tags

2013, 5*, cause and effect, circular poem, creativity, emptiness, interdependent origination, writing

                  all be
             lets it
         that                            there
   thing                                   is no
the no                                     thing
     cept                                    that
  else ex                                 is not
         thing                          con
            every                   nec
                               ted to

 

 

 

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

circular poem wormhole: breathing
creativity wormhole: the // orange rose
emptiness wormhole: breathing out
writing wormhole: redundant

 

redundant

Tags

2013, 6*, achievement, answers, awareness, being, letting go, questioning, quote, thinking, writing

                                              the penultimate
                page of this notebook, do I fill it up
                                in order to let there be

                                              no waste
                or do I leave it bare because that’s where
                                I finished anyway

                                              to almost-
                full or fallen-short, achieved or not
                                achieved, that

                                              is the question,
                whether thinking makes it so or not
                                is the answer,

                                              but that
                awareness accompanies all            and
                                the writing

                                              of it
                makes either – to be or not to be –
                                redundant

 

 

 

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

awareness wormhole: passing below
being wormhole: where it has taken birth / may it not decrease …
letting go wormhole: reading // unstirred
thinking wormhole: was there a moon / on the alleyway wall / confused in front of / the city skyline?
writing wormhole: handsome

 

handsome

Tags

2013, 4*, Carol, face, grey, hair, handsome, London, love, passing, portrait, thought, travelling, walking, writing

                                I’ve said it before
                but she doesn’t get my writing anyway

                                but after a day of travelling
                side by side and making thinking adjustments and

                                allowances for passing
                circumstance, whether she’s aware of it or lost

                                in open-eyed wondering
                her grey curls coruscate handsome around her face

                                and dark behind her neck
                                              still

 

 

 

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

Carol & London & travelling wormhole: Day Out
grey wormhole: vastly
hair wormhole: my seat // now
love wormhole: singsong chant
passing wormhole: somewhere
thought wormhole: seen but not heard
walking wormhole: reprieve
writing wormhole: the // orange rose