Thursday 28 February 2013

Saddleworth Moor

 Some of the local wildlife..."Lepus Timidus" (I think it is...)


 My successor as huntsman: Jack.


 Some pretty wild country....
 Two avid sportsmen...

"Bob"

 A dragon's skull!
 Last but by no means least. "2e"

The Oakley Foot Beagles visited us yesterday. The sun shone, they never really stopped all afternoon, though as I mentioned in my previous post I did for a while, then went back to find them about 4pm...still going strong.

We ran both packs together, and when they were on the music was tremendous, echoing all the way around the valley down to the rocks above Dovestone and beyond....


Just Driving



After the first hour and a half of hunting yesterday, when they'd gone way out over into the next valley, I went off to Morrison's to buy our kid a box of beer for his birthday, I know hardly original, but what did you expect? This clip is part of the drive down into Meltham.

It contrasts somewhat with other previous driving videos I've posted.

Thursday 21 February 2013

Rebus 1







De Rebus Cognito. pt I.












Question Confession Prayer Dirge
Fable Story Moral Tale
Not a Hymn or Chant.

For You.



Can you hear the thunder ?


The car pulled up and we struggled
to climb onto the pavement.

The light that swept thoughts from,
glassy eyes and cold hair in our mouths,
Seemed unreal and a backdrop in this
sentimental drama, this love trip.


Across this charadic town, the carrion
stalk and hungry faces lust for you,
The winter night pulls blood from
vampyric skin and now we're here.....

We know what to do,
What to do.

We take a hand and climb through
Into the abandoned moments of a
Long term big deal half sorry dream.


The time drips onto cold wooden floors
And our cold kisses restore the moment.


Now your chemically enhanced eyes,
Droplets of witchhazel burst and soakaway,
Blood veined tell-tale life style late nights,
Reach through smoke to pin-point my weakness.

I catch your vulnerable strength,
and in this damp cold room we carry our
Thoughts, in blanketed baskets.

Full-cry in silent movies,
And seventh sense catches the storm,
Flinch and swim in this hour,
In deep draughts of cheap wine,
Blood drips from your lips and chin,
To my tongue and laughter,
And kissing away the grapes truth,
We kiss away the time and reason.

Whereupon the cards are thrown,
Tricks are spent, and strategies owned,
To perceive the real place for this our love,
And to catch hold of some bejewelled skin.
The changing wind of ice
Gives this game to sacrifice,
And quick to bed to hide within,
To relive unoriginal gift and sin.

And now we truly sink in seas,
Of arms and legs and scented breeze,
And cold harbour for these heated plays,
To forget the coming of foreign days.

Whereupon the returning actor....


Leaves one game to begin another,
Finding shelter in long forgotten arms,
To burst through the veil,
To succeed,
Not to fail.


And while on one hand, I know you're gone,
You're here and your influence is fairly strong,
My betrayal to the non-committed one,
Leaves me inside where I was all along.


Can you hear my hard lonely heart ?
As the storm screams out to muffle this ?


And not so sure,
Not so proud,
The car driver catches my eyes,
In the mirror of the car in front,
And the warmth of your hand,
And the clenching of love, so blunt.

Choose which of these lanes is yours,
Deny the thrill that I know we seek,
And walk with me on high blown moors,
in pitch night meandering real dreams.

But alone and lost at 2 thousand feet,
In low dense cloud,

I felt real fear, cutting and taunting,
"Give up ! Give up !"
"You cannot go on...!"

And I knew the silence was my strength.

Playing games where rules change,
Playing with you, who play with me,
Doesn't stop this actor bleeding.

Wet kittens, by their near dead mother,
Return the warmth she needs to survive.

The fire behind the wall of stone.


And, melting your reserve
The wine and dope and genuine minutes,
The ships and hills and beds,
The party that killed us dead,
The seductive sounds of intimate breath,
Warmth in real kisses,
And damp hair,
And tight hugs,
And thunder storm demonic sex.

We stayed up late to taste our
Instant intimate short-lived love.


You, who would take my life from me,
Would run me to the very edge,
Make me worship what we never had,
And then drop me upon Act II.

And the local radio station pisses me off,
Reflecting popular abused complaint,
The darkness is no less real,
Or cold, or needed.

And I wake to cold, cold night.



This freedom, tied about with thongs,
And straps, and rope, and string,
Is the power to act upon free decision,
But your wicked influence is strong.


During the night, the fox-call,
The screaming,
The screeching of another drunk car,
And a casual dust-off,
Pin-point this target,
Scan, and lock missiles.


And as the flaming heads,
Fly invisibly in silent sorrow,
Clinical and mystical,
The bloody hand of man,
Shakes the white hand of a white god.

Another ambulance, another victim,
Another chance to remove your ideas,
To pull back from the norm,
Tongues entwine to forget the night.

And the music rolls on,
Washing that untouchable point in your mind,
Enhanced by fatigue,
Entwined with smoky motives,
Enshrouded in this hot dark room,
And accompanied by stressed heart-pulse beat-strong.

The night is indefinite and infinite,
Ending only momentarily for starlight,
And the caress in passing, of your lover.



Upon reflection of lidded eyes,
The call came to bury the saints,
To enflame the engulfing hypocrisy,
And to just back off and apologise,
A sorry sight for sorry eyes.

Bitter wine, another bad year,
Another vintage best forgot,
And now I climb through these rocks,
To forgetful iced air.
Grazed hands,
Grit in mouth,
And sweat on my back,
And now I can breath,
Now I can taste you,
Dear mother of all,
Leave me here to dance,
And dream, and fall down dead.

Another monument to wasted life,
Time perhaps to question why,
To remove the arrow from your eye.


Touch the pain of plate glass,
The pane of your vision,
And the screen of the voiceless,
The scream of reason,
And drums,
And kiss my throat,
Throttle my objection,
And choke my antipathy.

Wise moth hear my words,
Chasing round and mania,
Insania,
Crazier,
Crazed glass moth,
Burn quickly.
Die young,
Die young.


And the joint burned, your dress,
And my eyes,
And the candle killed the moth,
Of our futile games.


For this sensitive reaction,
Tears in the theatre of lights,
And weeping at old songs,
And stories of loves long lost,
We find out so much by midnight.

There is no substitute for time lost,
No time at all to count the cost,
No way to unfreeze cats killed by frost,
And there goes another grey haired corpse.
Bodies of living dead drive past
At blurred speed to unknown ends.


Your face has changed, you've put on weight,
And your name ?
What was your name ?


I suppose it hardly means anything,
Hardly seems to capture the essence thing.
Flute or violin ?
Sex and love ?

Beer and fags,
Loving girls, and tired slags.

Remind me when I'm up,
When you know its my turn to live,
For "live" is all I look forward to now,
Being nearly one of you,
The living dead,
Washed out old hacks,
Tie-dye jeans and cotton sacks.


Relive my truest fantasy in your body,
In your head my eyes look out,
And, casting round your eyes....


I see

I see a whole of oranged blue,
Something more for us to do,
What we may well become,
And nothing's ever really new.

Been done before,
Will be done again,
Scratching at the rotten sore,
Clucking of a pregnant hen.


What do I see ?

I see
I see...

A blank page, face and life,
Trapped in your head when
You're my wife.

I see


Images new of stories old,
Goddesses green are bought and sold,
And Indians, and Jews,
And drowning in the blues,
And jumping in the snooker queues,
Slipping silently inside of you,
I slip out again.

I see

Naked paradise birds with french-fried chips,
I see semen running on sweaty hips,
Dripping sex from your pouting lips,
Fingers whitening at the very tips.
You touch me, and I grow hard again,
I am swimming in macho bravo,
Love-lust and a foreign train,
Play it all, with plumb bravado,
And I've seen you before,
What's your game ?


This car stinks, the traffic stuck,
The lady in front still holds my eye,
In her mirror cold,
And deep, 2 cars between,
Breaking through from Wonderland,
Into a stranger's car,
And eyes, and thighs,
And now the lights change,
I'm spat out out of her car,
Like unwanted pips,
Or stone, or nothing known,

Off the rails,

"At last !" she cried,
She let slip and the clock,
Killed the moment.

Off the tracks, missing it somehow.

But, when I realised the 3 Goddesses
already knew where I lived,
and what I liked to do in bed,
I laughed.
I sat back on the rocking chair verandah,
And laughed until I split my sides,
And bled laughter on the evening breeze,
To ears of foreign invader agents,
And to the miserable bastard next door
(..kind of feeling..)

So the laughter drifted to ears of unborn
babies who never lack for anything,
except original love.

Original, fake, the Eleventh commandment,
Broken stone tablets on the table,
And razored mirrors,
Stinking bedsits,
Stinking beds,
And a straw up your upturned nose,
To that empty space, your head,
Wait for me.
For christ's sake,
Wait for me, I don't want to die yet.
You were all "the one",
Different kind of smiles upon,
Some to teach a different song,
And some to teach me right and wrong,
And some to hurt me.

Some to hurt me, I know you're reading this,
Wherever,
Whoever,
Whenever.

I sit here in the '90s, in a crumbling night,
And, somehow, you're here too,
The music, stopped at a scratched junction,
Between, my head now,
And yours, out when.

See what I am ?
What do I see ?



I can't really see you of course,
When you sit next to me...
Will I know ?
Will I see its you I need to be,
Stop worrying, you'll be me.

We eventually leave the car,
Though much is left unsaid,
Borrowing hints of furtive looks,
And a look that left me dead.

And stumbling through words,
To your front door,
I know you know I know you know,
And it hurts,
I think.


I bet you hurt a bit don't you ?

Well, darkness and light, and all that,
Sitting in this little flat,
Deaf to reason, and perhaps to rhyme,
Never seemed to really find the time,
To tell you all I want you,
All at once and all alone,
To suck at your pelvic bone,
To kiss you on the telephone.

Untold dangers lurk within,
That second layer of second skin,
But ignore them now and feel my love,
Intimated emotion in a red hot glove.

And while there are no more crossed lines,
We still confuse love with mellow times,
Try to be what others want us to be,
Never ever really truly free.


The fire burned out,
The gas ran out,
I sit in silence,
In solitude,
But
Not really.

Swing, baby swing,
Now we remember everything.

(And the night is but young.)


Living days of unstructured plays,
Await us on this exposed hill,
When the wind changed direction,
No heating could save this love.

But now we see, the picture's cleared,
Revealing what I always feared,
Brittania's face, all scratched and gaunt,
Images that linger, and us do haunt.


In the whorls of sound,
On the mountain rocks and dwells,
In the icy clouds,
In my petrified head,
On the cliffs I walked,
The distant sound of cries for help,
And, nothing.

I see everything in my world,
Its here in this zero visibility,
When the traitorous kiss of cold dead air,
Licks the hope from frozen skin,
And lost hours in darkness.


Two finger gesture to your gods,
To rob me of my only hope,
The scrub and rock-strewn, high sheep-trods,
Images of falling, caught in noose of rope.

Because at the very last second,
When all fear and hope are confused a bit,
The strength never quite gives out,
And, meandering, fatigue-drunk,
Your goal is viewed.....


What do I see now ?
A distant light on a foreign hill,
Beacons to guide these faltering steps,
Meander with me,
What can you see ?
Kittens in straw and an open door,
Sanctuary for this scary night.

By now the games had gone too far,
And no amount of time could save me.


Which girl are you this time ?
(Some have kisses and some love crime,)
I called to see if you were fine,
And to pass love down this telephone line.

Are you "the one", or three ?
Something completely new to me ?
Something hungry, or to be set free ?
Or are you just here to drop off my key ?

As the druggy vapours lifted,
And we came back into life,
I could see you were truly gifted,
I'll be your man if you'll be my wife.
The moors were dark dreary,
cold places, no need to
give them a second thought.
But this mountain, hell-fire,
severe and stark a mirror
to your mind this time.
And the sea-storm,
The fatal air-crash,
The erupting exploding fire ball,
And long train journeys,
And beers,
And smokes,
And sounds,
Perfect shells in my ancient ears.
Lost love, seconds grabbed in frenzy,
And sordid ?
Not anything we could ever be,
Not when I am you, you are me.


A thunder crack decided our path,
To shelter in the secret folly,
To secrete ourselves from skies of wrath,
In groves of hawthorn, elder and holly.

The horses stayed awake all night,
As the storm screamed through from
West to East, and through your heart,
Cleansing all pretence,
All kidding over,
Kiss me, my blank faced lover,
And shed your clothes, my skin,
your cover.


Later that day your heat had died,
I had aided a murder, and you froze over.
Your loving eyes now full of hatred,
Perhaps the dream was a sham as well.


Looking into the Rhosilli sea,
From the last resting place of man,
I saw your loving eyes and flew free,
What had ended, now re-began.

New skin,
New hair,
New face,
But you're still the love I need.

Does it matter if you're old ?
Or if you're far too young ?
Come here, take away my cold,
A new song, to be sung.

And shall I love your children ?
How many are mine to give away my love ?
To give all, my love ?


We flew with men-birds,
Over the Irish Sea,
And surf and sand and free,
So free.

You were sixteen in Bretton Park,
Or twenty-four in a holy place,
You were nineteen in endless dark,
And had an older face.

You needed me,
I tell myself its true,
You were the one, the three,
I must believe in you.

For what else do we strive for ?


I am utterly found, and lost again,
And all that I need is to be held,
I need to catch tomorrows lonely train,
Not to be the tree you felled.


Oh hell, woman come here.




The music grows now, from a background colour,
with mellow streaming,
To a leading force.
A prime mover to obey,
A damn good reason not to be here at all.


We sit in our own silence and follow,
Solitude strolls to other worlds and times,
Driftwood trips to rocky pools,
To unanswered questions,
To our private ghosts,
To those painful gaps,
Where childhood lost love should fit.

To the cure,
To find an answer; "Why ?"


Why did we need so much more love
than they could ever give ?

You were so wild,
So erratically erotic,
And so scared and scarred and
So frightened, so hard.

We needed to close those gaps,
For just that briefest time,
As our mirrored love around us wraps,
And just then, amid the grime...

I must have touched too far,
Inside your head,
I must have pushed too hard,
To keep the moment fed.

For you snapped back in,
To this sorry frozen plane,
My needle jumped its tracking,
And out came, poured, your pain.


Give me speed,
Give me pills,
Give me instant
Sorry thrills.

The pottery smashed the moment and
The wine ran over the glass
And you stood in it all and killed me.


Its weeks or months later and we only
now realise that we should have
blamed the music, our parents, our
friends, our pets, our selves, but
never ever ever each other,
Not again.

(Years later we slot back in bed.)

Same name, but you should have left,
For now I'm part of something else,
Someone else owns a piece of me,
And this second is very briefly false.

I always believed I loved red-heads more,
Not blondes,
Maybe now I need your darkness,
I need to believe it was all for me.


The gaps,
From this high mountain I see clearly,
The gaps in my life,
My sad and sorry self blaming and fears.

And now I know that it doesn't
seem so much,
To know the truth, to feel the
mother's holy touch,
To carry this thought, through the
timeless moment at the midnight
hour.


To where we need no more names
Or sex
Or words
Or bodies.

As our entropic minds break down to
Unholy enraptured chaotic mush,

To intense orgasmic, exploding highs,
To touch the skies
To run on water
To fields of blue
To where we can see its true
It doesn't matter what you do
And, no words.


I can see clearly, these gaps now.

Clumsily climbing like blind rats,
Through each others lives,
Our perception subtly altered
Before the death rush.

I need MORE now,
Tommorow I go.


Like a reversed role opera,
I praise the death of love,
Perverse reverse revenge on them,
Who hurt me as I hurt them.

Them.

They, we, us, you, me, him,
Now her, I and those,
Start to drown while away I swim,
Join, my friends, the carrion crowage.



(Crow Age, crows age, Age Of Crows, the age of the crow is indeterminate, The Age Of The Crow is now.)
Can we sit here and really blame the music ?
You scream at me :

"Stop playing bloody games !"

(I know why you're here, but not why I came.)

She walks home, alone, and in a temper.


So who are you ?
Her interfering mother ?
Her man, her friend or brother ?
Are you
Really here ?
Or, like me, freer ?
Are you her daughter,
Or perhaps Sister Slaughter ?
Perhaps you wear skin and fur,

Maybe

You are her.


Camera opera on dripping walls,
Prints of stolen second glances,
Living under poor roof water falls,
And taking dodgy chances.



This shutter blows hard back the wind,
A hailing storm of loves lost,
With hail
And sleet,
And acid snow,
Remind me when to go.

Yet the passionate person you glimpsed,
For a brief slip within,
Was once alive and alert and free,
But now you own all of me,
For I must be gone,
For you to be here at all,
That stinks to me.

And where did you go that night ? When we fell, and tripped through light ?
When necklaces were over-tight, and you lead me to this blight ?

Scream at me you love me,
And hang down high above me,
Stroke and velvet iron glove me,
Hate and white peace dove me.

And need me
Feed me
Taste me and
Waste me.


A short while before dawn I turn to you,
"So, do you know me anymore ?"

The answer was nothing new,
Having never really seen you,
Do I really know you ?
Were you there, when we flew ?


Intense and deadly serious,
Mind games are frightening things,
Tired, stoned, drunk, delirious,
Can sell, or topple kings.

Can kill and burn and maim,
Like your love can do the same,
I'm a picture in you Hall of Fame,
One to carry all the blame.

3 little words, fly above me,
The best words, you love me.

And coming to the edge of communication
We blank out fear to bridge a gap.

But, despite illustrated mimes and shadow plays,
Puppetry, mummery, mirth and summer days,
I have a deep smouldering temper hot,
Slow to ignite, but don't say I warned you not.


But, the point is so far removed from the hilt,
When buried in this eider quilt,
Time now to disbelieve the guilt,
Paddling shores of love, sand, silt.

Many the dawns, quick coming morns,
Echoing horns......and now we awake,
In the place of our fathers, land of our children,
And ripening orchards,
And the lintel above the door proclaims the year...
Seventeen thirty six.
Come, awake my beautiful sister bride,
Harness yourself for this wonderful ride,
And wrap me in your love.

Shake the night from your head,
Slip out softly from the tousled bed,
And step out with me to
A new day, full of new promise.


Cold winter's fresh crisp frozen lawns,
Stone and white-washed rails,
Logs chopped, chipped, spilt and sawn,,
The smell of bacon never fails.

A steaming mug of fresh made tea,
And a serious stolen touch,
Kiss me.

Come here, kiss me.


Back into the car of worn stories,
Back to the winding river paths,
And the three score and some endless trip,
And the quiver of your delicious lips.

Come here my girl,
Look, can you see we are alive, and real ?


Did we clamber up into sunbeam dust attic space,
To taste cobweb breath and smokey quiet laughter,
To listen to Pakistan and Paraguayan "Ham" radios ?
To descend into today and drive away,
And holding hands in public bars,
Declaring our interest in each other
Before tattling hordes of peerless zeroes ?

Or did I do all that alone,
With warm but vacant space adjoining ?


Iced waterfalls,
You strip off. Ha !
Neither of us are so dumb,
So come here,
Come over here and be the one,
For now,
Or forever.


Are you the One, or none ?
I watched you bathing,
I watched you shopping,
I caught your eye and sent it back,
The glance thus dropped was held and how
We stumbled through cliched phrase and
Parrot-like we made our intentions known,
You Welsh dreamer,
Nanny,
Cook,
Frequenter of gay-bars,
Landlady,
Dreamer,
Driver of lunacy, and intense one-nighters,
And is my trip to end with you ?


To dream, to dream,
Perhaps to die,
To slip into the dark,
The glint in the corner of your eye,
And encounters in Bryn-Mill Parc.

And Swansea wasn't really like that,
A place for discovery
Instant recovery,
And love trip death games, was it ?

Then the mountain reappeared,
And to see your lakes,
Your cliffs and crags,
Was like coming in, at last.
I'm here.

Hear that ?
Swans flying over Holmfirth at 6 am,
And the herons, disturbed from Wards' Bank,
Moorland heather, comes into view,
And the wild harsh stark scene is set,
Have you come home yet ?


A million love affairs,
And you knocked on my door,
We married our eyes,
And lied hideous prayers to ourselves,
Patiently playing psyched-up gambits,
And loving for the thrill,
To fill our gaps,
The gaps I see from here,
But despite it all, I guess I'm home.

We rented our tents to the needy,
God said, "Don't be so greedy !"
Build your house from solid rocks,
Let them live in a cardboard box.

So, we abandoned all,
Nothing left to prevent our fall,
Perhaps we should give God a call,
Make Him welcome in this hall.
Stand Him up against the wall,
And set, one day a holy ball,
Amidst some great big shopping mall,
Where He wouldn't look so tall.


Have you really seen God ?

You are God.
God is.


We see God all around,
Not some high place above the ground.


Come here, this wine is for you, come.


The smell of speed on your kiss,
Was far too strong for me to miss,
Despairing just a little, slightly,
Dying here, with you twice nightly.


Bells at sunny summers' midday,
Calling out that England's okay,
And in fictional sweet meadows we stroll,
Gripping tightly, not to lose control.

Clasping at straws,
Clutching at random snow-drops,
Earlier this year,
For January, I will love you.

In March, I may wed you,
But rather the solstice,
When my gods walk free among us,
And we feast in dead gardens,
On mythical birds, and
Dreamy holly topped infusion,
Of old hazels and
Wisdom stones.
Come here babe,
Tell me you love me,
Tell me you need me,
Walk with me and
Enter this afterworld,
Dare call it Heaven ?
Or fields of glorious Elysia ?
And replant my footsteps,
In your singular Eden.
Petty daemons kissing,
In shrubbery borders,
Sharpen your love on me,
Lay all your love on me.
Babe, love-thing, monstrous,
Fits of fury and warmth,
And ardour and blood streaming.

Open cut heart wounds
From your blunt words.
Come here girl,
Enter the crowd and swim,
Emotional meetings on wet stations,
Followed by non-stop insania,
Crazier, babier, be my sweet Fabia.


Without warning, the picture remained,
And a figment of imagery died,
It was time then to stop being sane,
And to disregard, no, thought why you lied.

And after all these bloody years, my love,
My Goddess all the things I've done for you,
My fingerprints still pierced through your glove,
And there was nothing I could do.

But once more I phone and beg to recall,
Something in return for all I've done,
A little favour, hardly anything at all,
But, could you let me find "The One" ?

I listen, meditation stance and trance,
Inward minutes of brilliant insight,
My image concious subliminal, mental dance,
And hear the sound of a lonely night.

Awake my lady and kiss me now,
I pray this yearning is incurable.

Come, kiss me.