Posts

17 Syllables

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Getting almost sociable with my blogging lately: part of a poetry project today run by Suze at Subliminal Coffee . She explains: 'It's called Tiny Harmonies. What I'd like to do through the first of spring is introduce a theme at the weekend so that the following Friday, participants can post a haiku in response. The collaboration would run for three weeks and the first week's theme is origin .' [Hai·ku 1 . A form of Japanese verse, written in 17 syllables  divided into 3 lines of 5, 7, and 5 syllables, and employing highly evocative allusions and comparisons, often on the subject of nature  or one of the seasons. 2 . A poem written in this form.] On the theme 'origin,' I did some doodling, and here's what popped out of my biro. Might not be entirely in the count, admittedly! Attempts, in order of origin, (seems appropriate.) First, origin as the place that new life starts: Baby opens palm Mo

Legacy

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Half stub of mouse on the doormat this morning. More description, though I do a poetic job of it, is rejected: sometimes, even poetry must be on a need to know basis. What remains is placed under the garden hedge with the usual country wisdom: You are part of the earth now, little mouse, and probably part of the cat. Everything comes back to the earth. To make the best of this experience we are having, being sentient individuals, Mr and me and Dog make a brisk morning walk. A gentle run simmers up, and then we get home to work out arms with weights and then we go back outside to run through our Tae Kwon-Do patterns. The Nextdoor Chickens cluck at our kihaps, and a neighbour waves as she walks up to the village. Clarice plays cards every Thursday with two friends, 'For the company, dear, not for money.' I like her ethic. Old Poet Larkin preferred misery to daffodils, but I side with Wordsworth on that: the cyclical nature of renewal and the beauty of the unrepea

Lucid Walking

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Squid Tree  Cool humidity washes over the morning. It fades the hilltop backdrops to vague misted cliffs, to shapes of faraway things, like islands, like many dome-topped islands. In this muted sea I swim, along the root knotted lanes, dreaming, discovering. This bobble-eyed tree is a land octopus: Plantae Cephalopoda Gigantis. This fungus is dark as a smoker's lung. Birds dart, as fish do, flashing colours. This Squid Tree is diving. Sun deepens its reach, presses warmth, retreats behind a fine foam of cloud. Discovering, dreaming, in these root knotted lanes: mangroves coral reefs forests mountain trails anatomy oceans. The universe stretches from here, to back here again. Plantae Cephalopoda Gigantis    

A Journey Up

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In the bank of the river the roots of a fallen tree: sickly pale, lumpy metatarsals, poke out and shiver. The tree is further down, flood dumped and gathering its own beach. I climb where birds have nested and watch out over the water. Sun plays in the eddies: some look friendly and some deceiving. Daffodils on the path are budded; a warm spring smell of earth, onion, water and a hint of baked dung; see how the light makes a flowing jewel of the river: I follow the path through the odorous ramson leaves, over tunnel mazes where badgers mark their territories with gleaming coils of excrement: amazing what there is to marvel the senses here. All the way up the loose steep path, to see the river shining like cut citrine quartz.

Fizz

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One brain, fizzing full, like an effervescent tablet, full of bubbles and whirl, and, while from the outside a pattern may be seen, something fractal, universal, microcosmic: on the inside of these eyes it appears a drowning blur. Being worried for it won't help. Now is not the time for stilled waters. Now is a time to stir, to fizz… To the Deep!

A Brush With Death And Life

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Blood in its mouth, still red-wet, over bared badger teeth. Eyes sunken, dehydrated, unconnected. For a moment the creature seems to breathe: the wind moved its fur, that was all, but Dog and I are wary still: a force of life hovers in the air: a sense of displacement. I could touch that thick fur but a death taboo stays my hand. Dexterous paws with dangerous claws lie quiet. Pads of feet: so common to mammals: thoughts of kinship jump. A woodpecker knocks, somewhere in the trees: it harshly tolls. Off the lane and into the woods we walk, climb over the incumbent giants there. On each storm-felled tree something new grows. Green pushes from the cold earth, fells me with delight. Life: life is here: we are all here: my roots reach down: down to the molten heart of the earth. On the return journey I put my hand on the fur of the road-killed brock: thick, wiry, soft, like a good paintbrush.

Saturday Stuff

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By ten o'clock this morning we are parked at Newbury Hilton Hotel. Boy is launching into Part 1 of the Umpire's course, so he can learn how to assist a referee in bossing a fight. He has two cheese sandwiches, a sparring kit and a bottle of water. I have a poor girl's croissant (granary slice with butter) and a plastic flask of Lavazza. Light shakes through the leaves of the boundary trees. Outside is aching, incisively cold. New buds pucker on cold branches ne'er the less: that is the intuitive optimism of Spring. Gloves on and car locked in case some crazy thief wants to steal dog hair and log bark: a walk, I will have: around big shops: quite the novelty. I am twirling frocks on hangers, stroking fluffy jumpers, my eyes are slurping up all the colours and the forms of the piled up aisles like I'm in an art gallery. Such fun, all this Stuff: one does not need so much of it but there is no denying the Fun . (Boy did well on his course, incidentally,

Back From The Future Blog Party

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Another joint blog adventure- if you want to see who else said what the list of participants is here . The premise is this: 'You're up before dawn on a Saturday when the doorbell rings. You haven't brewed your coffee so you wonder if you imagined the sound. Plonking the half-filled carafe in the sink, you go to the front door and cautiously swing it open. No one there. As you cast your eyes to the ground, you see a parcel addressed to you ... from you. You scoop it up and haul it inside, sensing something legitimate despite the extreme oddness of the situation. Carefully, you pry it open. Inside is a shoebox -- sent from ten years in the future -- and it's filled with items you have sent yourself. What's in it?' Here's how I imagined it: Before dawn? Shadows outside, first forming. Sleep has gone, I don't know where. Coffee I can find. All the way from Machu Pichu, this fair-traded pack. Scissors are in the drawer, which

Apple Chapel

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In the Atrium of iPads all the golden rectangles pulse with the life I seek for my old MacBook. I see it, don't hear it: wax dumps of each ear canal are thick with the blended oils of Earex. Arachis, almond, camphor. Smelling of mothballs then, I open my case on the problem desk. The grub of my screen, all the dirt of the faithful machine, it is hilarious in here. Even clean, the specs are laughable. I run a finger over the fault line that is held together by tape and a sticker from a Thornton's chocolate. The assistant in his saintly blue t seems genuinely, gently amused. I am too fond of my laptop to be embarrassed anyway. We try a new charger and Everything Lights Up. For a power lead, ouch, yes, that's pricey: but for a live machine and for the union of the internet, oh, yes, a pittance.

Hold Tight

A roll of images from our walk, through woods, along the collapsing river bank, are the first thing I think of, presumably to block the possibility of everything else that might be lost to me. It might only be a loose connection or a sleepy battery that is not making the spark that wakes my laptop up. I have borrowed Boy's Inspiron, which is fine but unfamiliar. I am stumbling over keys that didn't even get a notice on my grubby aged Mac. Anyway, this short post is to let you know, if I seem to have disappeared, I have not. I am busy solution hunting and will be back.

Tribe Of The Bobble Hat

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Little Granddaughter stomps to each park shelter post, hits every one in turn with two sticks, previously collected from under the giant fir trees. 'Hahahaha! Dongdongdong!' She chants. 'Doggle, woff woff woff shtay.' A group of cold teenagers lean into the wind, listening for such sounds, out on a music project. They are barred from sharing any shelter by the pink and fiercely bobble-hatted priestess. She stands at the head of the snaking path, shouts 'No!' They shall not pass, but edge on, gloveless and shivering. Dog lies on the grass, exhausted from her chain of commands.

The Path Of Contented Resistance

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So much going on with work of various kinds, distraction is medicinal.  I have wandered through some old papers, found this poem and written a sort of postscript to it. A bit rushed, a bit distracted, but happy. 1992 Solo I cannot fall in love today It will only live in one house And I won't stop moving The day before I may have Stood at the gate, wishing Dearly to be let in But the air outside Was fresh and the view Needed exploring Tomorrow my boots may be All worn down My head spinning with sights Then I will choose my loveliest place Lay down with the flowers Who comes to me there can stay And a love that is real doesn't care At all for cement and fences It moves easy as grass under breezes. 2013 Duo Moon overhead Heavy with shine Follows a gravity A fidelity Pull and lustre We see it as we feel it We move with the lug Experienced Thr

Super Badger

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Woke up, a whole ten and one half hours after the day had begun. One lazy bit of a busy Sunday. The big picture is in my head but the bits keep falling under the mind-sofa (represents an obstruction here, not comfort.) Mr says we shall go to the woods to find some refreshment of purpose and to fell trees with our bare hands because we are quite Super. On the way home I think about the old path we found and how deep it is pushed into the ground. Once upon a time the king of the badgers reached the massive age of one thousand years and it was time for him to travel out of his woodland kingdom. As he walked, his wiry buttocks dragged tracks, and these became our country roads. Because: an entirety of logical sense is not required to enrapture.

Connubial

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Mr and I were early for the wedding. This is unusual behaviour. I did forget to wear my wedding ring (more expected: it is often boxed, as I can't wear it for work. Sometimes causes hilarious misunderstandings, that I work evenings and must not wear a wedding band.) It snowed, a little flurry only. The bride and bridesmaids, even with the faux fur stoles, were bravely cold. It was easy to huddle us in for the big photo, seeking some communal heat. After the warming effects of a three course meal, sleepiness is inevitable. Little Finley half snoozes on his Auntie's lap: he's not been well lately. None of us were expecting him to vomit though. The bar staff handed over lukewarm soapy water and paper towels: luckily for them I am an adept sick handler. Then comes the disco and the dance floor covered in colours of light and twirling tinies. George does his first knee slide. Molly kicks her Uncle. Logan and Nathan stand on a windowsill shrieking at the wild rab

Play For Today

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Circa 2012 My shoulders are pinched, uptight: not a finger pinch, something with more pressure per square inch, something like a vice or a blunt hammered nail.  Over the day it distends from scrunch to pain.  I drive to work and I think: I won't manage this .  Only when I get there and set the roof mounted heaters going in a sorry attempt to warm the floor, and I'm lugging kick pads, and my flask of coffee sits on a chair, even before my students arrive, thought has nothing to do with it, this is a burst of spirit: All the world's a stage.   Across the cold wood I tread, bold, sure of my character.   Circa 2011: didn't have my camera at work today. Sorry about my fangy teeth.  

Hedged

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Iced and singing the wind, slender as a blade, slivers through every chink in every wall, drags through clothes and skin, etches over bone, turns muscles to flint. Shoulders are tight packed gravel. Coffee swallowed, teeth grit. Under the rib cavity, a heart squeezes. Moans of weather, beats of heart, thick-headed fretting. Somewhere a memory shimmers: Longleat Safari Park? Legoland? A dream? A sort of park recalled. There is me and my two children walking round a maze. We are bored, in the hedge shadows. Boy is quite small so we hold him up to spy a bigger picture, a clear route.

Siren Song In Spring

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Flat scales of ice on shaded roads. Plaintive, the wind sings; catches in the slung wires, in the spokes of the old aeriel, a natural and an alien sound. Out of the blue, mist veils the river, blows across rooftops. Washing is clamped to lines: see it strain to fly, the arms of shirts waving like drunks at a wake: danse macabre. Spring pushes up in pointed buds: sallow, amethyst, velvet-white. On the stems of wild strawberries, petalled eyes open.

Share

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Ice laces the edge of Roadford Lake, it breaks like sugar glass as Dog pads through. Little Granddaughter sparks giggles. 'SPLASH!' This is how she shares the joke with us. Boy is trying to photograph still water but no one can be cross. 'SPLASH!' Boy has the smile of the gracefully defeated. There's a tail wagging, a child laughing, a warm sun in a clear sky. Girl has sunglasses big enough to reflect the lake. Everyone tries on my hat, my candid heavenly-blue hat.

D.I.Y.

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  Monday evening. Boy is on the sofa, hustling friends for a midweek half term party. Dog sleeps off her wood walk exertions. Cat is in a box, also sleeping. Mr has removed his trousers for the purpose of stretching. I love my home. Beyond this remarkable family scene two things I have done today deserve a note. Thing One: Black Belt promotion application form filled out and handed in. Officially training for 2nd Dan grading in April. Thing Two: ISBN application form filled out. To bring my Tae Kwon-Do stories to the world, I am becoming a publisher. Black Belt Books: that's me, with the design guidance of my brother. He lives in Taipei so we are quite the international concern. First edition of The Time Travelling Tae Kwon-Do Tour Bus due out as soon as the final proofs are set and the printing price agreed. Soon will be wondering how to store one thousand copies of a niche market book. Fear and pride mix up like stage fright. Misfortune is an option. My misfo

Dust

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The house is swept from top to toe, cobwebs flicked and dark corners scrubbed. Original colours restored: the bath suite white as it would have been last time it saw a serious cleaning cloth. Grumbling spiders withdraw. Every window is open to the lively wind till the cold gets dark and the riddled fire is lit. The oven smells of bread, the hob of soup and strong coffee. A critical eye would find plenty more to do. Tired eyes, satisfied, rest under eyelids while the espresso brews: dream of chaos and order: a typhoon moving in gridlines. Wakes in a wave of character notes ~ The construct of the isolated self longs to escape. It seeks the Other. Caffeine, alcohol, love, all kinds of drugs are the things that compress and unfold the self, that flex to break, that break to open, that open to hope to fill that emptiness within. That's how it begins. Fear of this abyss can push a person to anything. This deconstructed self has broken boundaries, has lost control, is bound