Monday 19 March 2018

S'been a While.

 Overdone HDR. "That Tree"


Yessir it has, and then we find a particularly dire period, fallow is an understatement, especially on the heels of the whirlwind that blew herself out at about the time of the previous post......

Let's crank up the nostalgia engine and tick a few more off the list then, and keep ruminating on the new ones that keep failing to reach pen & paper, but they will, boy oh boy, the themes are the only thing holding me back really as they became a bit too predictable, even if the love-sentiment is as predictable as ever. Love and loss, love and mis-match, hurricane-love, and so on.....Just not rock solid, dependable, reliable, understanding, compromise, trust and openness. Issues, on both sides, this isn't a blame-fest.






Hey ho, not going to slip further into the personal, that was never the point of this blog, in any of its incarnations.


Don't Call.


Don't call, crying out incredible wastes,
Don't offer a hand, tightrope walker,

I can blow this all on my own.


Don't say "I'm here any time for you."
Patent leather, patent lies,
Patience tested, tomorrow's sighs,

Urgent needs to feed the greed.

Don't bother, assistance as yours is plenty,
Plentiful, bountiful, but hollow and rare,
Is the genuine glint, eye corner stare.

I can fuck this up all on my own.


Write me a letter, "James, it will get better."
Just hold on that bit, to let fate work it out,
No thanks, ex-directory, moved address,

Don't call me anymore.
 
 
 
 
 This has become the age of my hermitage, and I don't really like it.



Dancer


Not a dance floor dodger
No way
Uncontrollable catharsis of all that
Nervous energy

So what then, crowd avoider ?

Not evader, not isolate,
Desolate soul portions, but much is sunlight,
Much is overfull
Crammed with dreams, memories, awareness of now,
Possibly chemicals,
Probably chaotic proactive reactions.

No matter,
Dancefloors and crowds,
Seething mass of sweaty designer skin tight,
Ebbing, flowing, swelling then shouting and
Human media for observant swimmers,
Eyes.

Half a second away from this universe,
Always "not just"
Following the lost scent trails of
Those before.

Through swollen uncomfortable seas of
Drunk dancers,
Speeding towards the edge, always.

 
 
 
Stood in the right/wrong place, as usual.... 



Kettle’s On….


And then the tiny ‘te ching’ of the heater, the ‘sss’ of the kettle on the stove, the crunch of the heart on warm shale.

Teaching.

Missions to other dimensions of stupid wisdoms = ˚45

But my love is far from obtuse.


I hope closer to tuse.



And to wisdom, though far from my judgement and closer than yours it seems,

Through this kaleidoscope/telescope, camera


Crappy old recycled papered sketchpad

It seems.

It sometimes seems, beyond Danny, beyond Carl, beyond Mama Mia, both and less,
Beyond me, and before.



Close inspections, microscopic interventions, and a nudge to the wise.


Too much wisdom blinds the self-obsessed Djin.



And his smoke/mirror entrapments for you, and all of your dreams,
Passported to just anywhere.

Stamped.



Pumelled.





Worlds Meet


In the in-between slice of the autumn night dark,
As in the tin-box caravan, so long left in time,
Standing at the meeting place of worlds,
Cold, freshly grated evening air running over my face,
Forearms, leg-fronts, neck, and becomes deep breath,
As behind, leg-backs, hair is warmed,
Where the worlds meet.





Wolves


Years unveiled old dreams, and scents,
Clear sight, hindsight, clarity,
Think you worked out what they meant,
Your dragon's slayed, naivety....

Assure yourself with goods, and bads,
With things that you possess,
Some make wise, some bounders cads,
All make more of less....

Wise man, woman, now see the truth,
Where will you be when come the calls?
Couldn't avoid it, now await the proof,
There always were wolves, behind the walls......




Washed Up
 
Washed up, on this tiny stone shore,
Thrown up,

from the troubled surf.

Strangely inclined sea of leaves;

Oak and ash, silver birch and beech.

Damp driftwood and stone islands.
Cool wooded beauty with ranging dogs…


Turning inward, tried hard to turn off.

Reflections and conundrums, unknowns and ‘what if?’s
The threats of adventure, impending dark loss.
Decanting thought to void the vessel…

Gaunt tired undernourished ship-wreck. Pigeon Gulls.

This body almost empty, this head quiet too,
Letting the leaves, and trees and squirrels in…
Living poems each, to deconstruct this world…

Brings no meaning, nor reasons or clarity.

Just a deep and pleasant feeling that, all is well.


The dogs return, eyes full of their own questions,
Aglow and lit with joy of life.

Check your wreckage, then again for rabbits
Flying over brambling tides and stump toadstools...
On their endless drive for the instinctive quest.



Instead of questions answered by internal voices
The flotsam moss dulls around the mind,
Calming doubt waters and a whirlpool quandary.

Darker storms brew in the woodland litter.
Distant yet, but a threat, no less.

An hour or so for the turning tide,
To stand, salt-crusted head less troubled

Summon the rabbiters and splice the sails.
Catching sight of a skimming owl,
Albatross-like to this un-drowned mariner.

Cool wooded meditative shore-leave,
…..Helped. Not much, as ideas drain out,

The empty mind blown clear of leaves,

And moss, and stones, and dogs, and rabbits,

And stumbles towards the waiting kettle.



View From Lose Hill.


Objecting to your inter-personal politics,
Allegations of, rumours of,
Chinese whispering in late Yorkshire bars,
I find solace in peak striving.

You would never believe how far I can throw 
My shadow.

Lose Hill to the valley below.

Frozen silver sunlight,
Striding, walking, stick man.

Thoughts of other filmic dreaming,
Battle with panic anxious death flows,
as once more your lungs strive to climb
Out and up, pulse to match.

No, you'd not believe how far I can throw
My shade, your politics,
My voice to echo this sentiment,
My ambition to descend.

Crossing paths with your insulting bright kagoules,
Anachronistic, we level, but briefly,
To the river,
The railway,
And the warm farm,
With whisky and cake,
Without you. 
 
 
 
(For what it's worth, "Lose" is pronounced "loose" in this context,
 it's near Edale, Derbyshire...)
 
 


 
Unknown Pleasure.


Crazed-fingers, on glass, on steel,
On rubber-matted floors, to feel,
To studs, and belts and jaws so taut,
Never stop just when you ought,
To taste the leather Eden apple fresh,
And whip the frenzy, up on flesh,
To kick, and scream, in agstacy,
While choosing how not to be,
So charged with yearning, and yet,
So unwound-up, on a losing bet,
That life so quick, so sure and able,
Won't leave you, dead, beneath my table.



 
 
Visitor.

My dreams are as real as the night,
I believe in a second sight,
I know how to set things alight,
And I know what's not black is white.

Why do I have to dream of death ?
When foul corpses try to steal my breath,
From whom did I get this curse ?
Losing you only made it worse.

While you once were a visitor to my dreams,
I think you left with the morning beams,
Now the dream-skin slips away in streams,
Leaving me to drown, or so it seems.

I know I should not fear to sleep,
Should long for where willows weep,
Should dip into unconscious pools so deep,
But the grim one lurks and yearns to reap.

My nights are longer now you're gone,
I should have guessed you were 'the one',
But I didn't really understand your song,
Couldn't see how I'd been so dumb.

But these dreams are more real than the night,
And give me a glimpse of second-sight,
Some strange way to set my head alight,
Or a way of falling, from great height.


 


Really??



 

Well, that's a few more off the list, but I'm afraid there are still some more to go.....

Bear with me, I'll get this chapter behind me eventually.....

I'll try not to leave it three months before the next not-especially-gripping installment....