I have written hardly any poetry in such a long time now – March was the last time I put anything together which might be called a poem.
I’m inspired by the daily posts on Greg Perry’s blog at the moment. He is writing a canto series. Each day sees at least one new poem, and they are well worth a read. Well done Greg – now for some words of my own…..
The cowboys have gone out of business or
Pretend to be self-made commercial heroes,
The fantasy of TV is a bore,
His town and home barely exist in prose.
Scribbles underfoot were rare, too discrete
They left him to his own devices.
He looked for lovers, quiet town, no-one to meet.
Only sources of pleasure were vices.
Salt water on his skin, so the sun burns
Like breaths of healthy old he diverges,
Takes a girl out and watches as she turns
From beauty of which splendour emerges.
His town and home barely exist in prose,
In poetry oft’ times anything goes.
Mar 6
Three are the ways that I have seen you
Gliding across the sky like Jove awakening
Wondering why there are honeyed spaces between
Every field of your vision, every space kept unseen
Remember the secrets you told me, kept separate
Not available for decipher
Un-placed now, re-arranged as though you want
Some bespoke arrangement that only I will understand
Never have I left such distance between as the moments of now
And the time is moving fast and slow all at once
How strange! Take a madman and put him on show
Make him a leader and watch the world glow
Mar 2
Coming out of winter hibernation, I have begun a project for the month of March. 31 poems in 31 days. I’m also carrying a camera and capturing images as the month progresses which I may use to complement the poems. Here is the second poem – unedited or worked, just in its raw form:
Whenever she says she does she does
But the light never shines above her head
The way it should – like a veil
I watch the birds, 1028 of them, fly overhead
Like one organism, flexing and changing shape
Creating a mass of darkness in a blue sky surround
The sense of menace is as real as
The sense of plenty that sometimes comes through
Just when I worry about things too much
When the light shines above my own head
I can sometimes pull it down and through
Then the warmth of it all is palpable
Here comes the birds organism again, fifth time around
With each circle of the town, I can feel a little more sense
Understand the way 2056 wings can make a unified sound
Like fingers beating on a microphone as a test –
Pulling patterns together that would be meaningless
Sense, connections, lines between – where the ends meet the means.
Jan 17
you’re at that age when
everything’s moving faster,
but you can’t play god.
Oct 21
I keep a regular track of the visitors to the series of weblogs which I host using sitemeter. This helps me to see how many visitors are looking at the site, how they get there, and a rough idea of where they are located.
Yesterday someone did a search on MSN Search looking for ‘poems on earthquake‘ and found my weblog for the poetry press which I run. There is a book of poetry which I wrote a few years ago called ‘Umbrian Images’ which includes a poem about the earthquake in Assisi in 1997. The site visitor was in Pakistan and was therefore presumably looking for poetry about the Pakistan earthquake.
Well, as a response to this, I thought I should do two things. First, post the poem about Assisi – I think it brings into focus the difference between these two disasters. This year has been filled with disasters of immense scale and suffering. It is easy to become numb to it all. But I think we just need to keep responding, doing what we can. The world of global media is a two-edged sword which offers us information on an unprecedented scale and immediacy – but it does give an armageddon quality to all of this. Our reaction and support is vital. (There’s a useful post about the impact of the internet on our view of disasters by Seth Godin here.) Which brings me to the second thing I can do as a response. Follow the link to the Disasters Emergency Committee to donate to the Appeal for the Asian Earthquake. Please help.
Assisi Earthquake
(some words taken from a Daily Telegraph article)
On the western edge of town
firemen fear the roof of the upper basilica
might not withstand
heavy rainfall.
The magnificent campanile’s bells
which sound when St Francis’s birds flock
have been eerily silenced as if
their tolling might be enough
to bring the tower crashing down.
The restorer says
“I know the fresco which included this detail.
I’ve restored it twice before,
to see it like this makes my heart sink.”
One local says of the monks,
“I don’t see any of them
rolling up their sleeves
and getting to work with a spade.”
Meantime,
twenty five thousand people
have no homes.
And
we look at moments of time
without the context of history
and emphasis becomes distorted.
3·10·97
13·47
bright by echo of bright recall
there is nothing more
only the neatness brought about when we tidy as we go along
turning everything into some sort of song
then there is the won mind-set
no idea why!
then there was the loss of a consonant in a clever
smug sort of whatever
and finally we let it all go
pretend that nothing has happened
seal the secrets in a small envelope,
light a candle,
hold the secret over it
until it ignites, then let go and
watch the paper turn to blackened feather
light, and fragment, into the air
gone forever, burnt out of existence.
Sep 24
The words begin
Like something that slips down the page – not sure
And an image
that is all that poetry is
something that we can picture in our mind
like the arrival of god
at a party when he hasn’t been invited
and the host is busy pouring drinks
nobody knows the way to speak
so the first person to open the door, says
“sorry, I know we must have met, at some point that is,
but I have no idea who you are, and you’re not coming in here!”
The door slammed shut…and then silence
nothing to say
the music dies away as the guests wonder whether
they have missed something really important
of consequence.
for it is all of consequences
outcomes
within the chaos of complex adaptive systems
we all try to make some sense.
seek out a god
and then when we find one,
we shut the door, refuse to recognise
ignore the voice in our head
and strike him off the guest list
safe in the company of those we know.
Sep 14
New words
New creations
New intimations of creativity
Old spaces
Seen before spoken
Somewhere we have been before
Law taken over
Wondering whether there is more in the dust
Specks that have recovered
Speeches that have been replayed
Once the lines have opened
There is not much left to the sands of timeliness
Such as the scan of a mission best replayed
Sep 1
Taking
Opening all out
Splitting a cloud like candy floss
Breaking air apart
An atom-smasher
Blaster.
Other words
Pretend
But do not understand the flow
Through all connections
No rejections
No sorry.
Not part
Not apart
Not even one strong sense of innocence
Would be enough
To split sides
Make asides
Not see.
Even when
The words are spent
The spoken sounds are louder than the heard
The things I say
Are not the same
As yours.
Jul 14
I mentioned recently that I was due to give a reading at our local poetry group on the first Thursday in July. There were about 60 people gathered for the evening. It was the same day as the bombings in London, so there was an air of sadness and shock hanging over the audience. Earlier in the evening I had begun to wonder whether reading poetry felt like the right thing to do in the circumstances. In the end, like many people that day, carrying on as normal felt like totally the right thing.
I read 8 poems, including a number of poems included on this site recently. They were all taken from the “28 poems in 28 days” cycle which I wrote earlier this evening. I find that reading poetry to an audience changes my relationship to the poem. I hear it differently. In this reading I heard some lines as really strong, which I had not noticed before. I heard rhythms which worked, and some that didn’t. Overall I was really pleased with the material – I was taken by its intensity. And I felt that I had rediscovered some of the playful side of using language again.
What did the audience make of the reading? It is always difficult to tell at a poetry reading. Unlike a live music concert, it does not conclude with booing or frantic cheering. Poetry readings are an altogether more polite affair – at least where I come from they are.
I felt an empathy from the audience. As I looked around whilst reading there was an attentiveness which is always helpful. And there was a good level of applause at the end too. The highlight for me was after the event, when one of the organisers came up to me and said “that was fascinating. Thank you.”
The rest of the evening was excellent too – there was live music from a duo playing accordion and bagpipes, another poet reading, a poem of the month, and a talk about the poetry of Edward Thomas.
One good outcome from the evening was a resolve on my part to travel further afield and do poetry readings. Further reports here as they happen.
Jun 28
I am due to give a poetry reading at a local poetry group at the end of next week, so I am busy choosing poems to fill the 10 minute slot which I have available. I’m going to take the selection from “avenues of in between”. Here is one which I intend to use:
I am the reaper, the big repeater
Spinning out the lines, the ones I’ve heard before
Echoing and etching everything I find
The craftsman at his task
Needing only to serve words to myself –
Or to anyone that will listen.
Having something meaningful to say
Screwing up pieces of paper, pieces of all
That I throw away, of the words that I hold on to
The turning wheel, the replay, and the play back
Finding my way to the something
That is new.
Inside the bones of my skull
A good tune, a few words that are useful
A speech, a list of things that I keep
Special delivery and a knock at the door
Searching the feelings just beyond reach
Opening out the corpse to examination.
Obsessive seeking, needing one more splice
A few moments in the recess of the day
A replay, then separate times that have not played before
Long tunnels under roads, scary times
Crazy instances of the books that I long to write,
The speckled memories of a few cheap rhymes.
Mike Snider’s Formal Blog and Sonnetarium
The link above takes you to Mike Snider’s Formal Blog and Sonnetarium, a place I visit regularly to read his comments, poems etc. It seems that Mike has been doing a little late spring cleaning, and come across some poetry booklets which I sent him a while back. I still have a stack of his sonnets to read too – looking forward to doing this. I will post some comments when I have read them.
I can relate to the whole issue of spring cleaning as I look with dismay at the chaos around my desk, on my desk, under my desk and everywhere around the house. I am on the brink of a change of jobs, so need to get the paper chaos under control as soon as I can.
Mar 28
A few days ago someone posted a poem as a comment to this post . I say, someone, because I followed the link to their own blogger profile and found a host of names and aliases. I think he is Desmond Swords – but not for certain! He is also Scalljah, Sloppy Bob, and Jan Manzwotz. The writer behind these names has series of blogs here, here and here. As well as being part of a group poetry blog here.
I thought I would return the compliment and post a poem to the Desmond Sword blog as a comment. I’ve copied it here too:
Yes is an s
blue light
water shine
flickers on down inside
the right-sided find
when the green blade
which rasps loudly
has passed downto beyond where
all that has clasped
has grasped
and let go
yes is an s
an expression
recessed
until
the menace of a huge open space
repressed and defaced
will open and re-appear
no fear
put it down
don’t let it in
shed some light now
fight now
just for spite now
playful but bitter
couldn’t tell who hit her
or when the game is ended
erased like
the reaction hoped and
a piece of the action.
Mar 11
Fresh from the keyboard – words that make the first cut of a poem:
Words drip down like stains
I
Words
drip down like stains on the side of the soul
when the meaning that you sent was clear as hearts
and all that was spent
Don’t remember everything then – that’s all at sight
and I will regret from the moment my mouth opens
best left aside, underneath and always
that’s the best I can offer
A single rose, a symbol of the shows
the every expression that I ever gave to you
or made for you, then leapt over rushes and bushes
like some kleptomaniac crunch of a shower.
II
Words
flow out like spit down the chin
the sin I’m in, the skin I’m in
remembered conversations
Everything speaks to me like the
genuflections of reflections in the glass
of my mind, your kind should stop
being sharp to mine
Then the words, the often heard
in each moment that I offered
would be as clear as the hurting
now it’s all forgotten.
I recently finished reading a book of poems by Douglas Barbour called “Fragmenting Body etc”. Douglas is from Canada. The book is published by Salt which is a joint UK / Australia press (read an excerpt here) – the output from Salt over the last few years has been impressive.
I really enjoyed reading this book. Douglas used a game to devise the input lines which give the inspiration to the poems in the first section. He chose a set of random lines (with the help of a die) from a book and then used these to start the poems which were written quickly over a month. The poetry in the collection is marvellously challenging. Douglas really tears apart the language and reconstructs it. One is taken one a journey through the roots, parts and segments of words -really getting inside the language which he uses.
This poetry is probably the closest I have seen to e e cummings without descending into pastiche. Douglas takes the experimental approaches of cummings and makes the interpretation totally his own.
One is left with the feeling that every part of the syllable, the word, the line and the spacing is so carefully thought through. This is a poet totally in command of the language he works with.
These are not just poems that play with language though – they also work hard with emotions, and depict events and narrative.
All in all, a read worth making!
The project ’50 Books in 2005′, is a little behind schedule. But not irretrievable.
Feb 10
and here is the remix of the 20th poem…
21 – classic deviation
Thursday 3rd February 2005
What it became
Before the slipping
Emotion
Never meant to be
Pushing all back to
A reflection of
What it once was
Now devout
World with a
With a speckled mirror
Of being
And ever shall be
Or do without
In an
Anguished shout.
Good ending.
Feb 9
The 30 poems in 30 days sequence continues to develop. Here is the 20th poem, written last week:
20 – classic devotion
Wednesday 2nd February 2005
Emotion
Never meant to be
What it became
Before the slipping
Of being
With a speckled mirror
Pushing all back to
A reflection of
What it once was
And ever shall be
World with a
Good ending
In an
Anguished shout.
Now devout
Or do without!
I’m in the middle of a creative splurge at the moment. A flood of poems appearing, generated by the 30 poems in 30 days exercise. It’s a fantastic way to clear away writer’s block. Here’s another – they’ll all go through drafts, but here are the first rough sketches…
25 – make it last forever, it just might
Monday 7th February 2005
I know I know
Don’t tell me any more
The scene, the seam, the scream
Everything untidy now, a gentle beat,
A scratching then a scraping sound
A turning and a sense of people
Everyone I find these days, all the strings
A tuneless plucking of a dobro
Just to remember that the artifice of my inner energies
Is as hollow as the rain on the plastic roof
It’s not about spinning, it’s about sitting still
Putting the cough back in the throat
Holding back, not making a point –
When the silence is easier, you see,
Than the vibrant colours that recline on the sofa
And the heart I wear on my sleeve, cliché-like,
Wondering why the music boxes all sound the same –
The point of counter-point
The silent way,
The directions, the sense of self
Make it last forever, it just might.
Feb 2
30 poems in 30 days continues. Sunday’s poem was number 17, and it looks like this (at the moment):
17 – to escape the fire
Sunday 30th January 2005
take one match, and a small bundle of sticks
place the sticks on dry grass
strike the match and set the grass alight
stand back, and wait
if needed, blow gently to increase the flames
when the flames are gathering height, and spreading
watch calmly as they engulf the plants that surround you
to escape the fire
run like the demons in the night, don’t stop until you reach
the corner of beyond, the first steps of the house outside town
now pause, and think to yourself,
if you had waited, if you had allowed yourself
to be consumed by the flames
the cleansing of the fire, the burning
would have left you clearer, removed from the flaws of today
now think, would you run,
would you stand and feel the burn,
take the process as the cleansing of soul.