This darkness charts solo missions each orbit:
by Saturn, by Dogger, by rural churchyards
in hemispheres of local time. And space travel
is what older citizens are veterans of –
set their watches by.
Only moving
in the Milky Way yields stardust at the temples.
This darkness is a field of constellations,
red shift, grey matter greying in transit
liked the neutron turned positive
inside the Crab Nebula.
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This Darkness
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The Sound
There’s no way through the sound.
There’s only the route we found
and the stories abound:
stories without grounds.There’s no way through the wall.
The handholds are gone when you fall
and the people have gone
because your technique is wrong.There’s no way round the bend.
The road’s closed off at the end:
cliffs above drop below
and there’s no turn in the road.There’s no way through the sound.
There’s only the route we found
and the stories abound:
stories without grounds.
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This Other World
The globe provided a live weather report
to boldly interrupt the thoughts
of an 8-year-old science lover
with news of constant Colorado storms
and scattered showers when you zoom into Sonning.That contraption, with its right proportions,
torque and granular mountain relief
was the height of technology:
didn’t stop speaking.It collapsed imagination
to hotel and seaside idylls projected on a screen
and snapshots of eternal sun
over low desert lodges.This world gives us so much
but where is its charging cable
and can we explore the Free State without bluetooth?The original world was more of a sketch;
great continents fused then left.
It was the work of an impressionist,
with an extra light that held deep space
projected into dots and shapes while you’re dreaming.
That model gave us space, and, as you said,
this other world is still plugged in;
this other world is lit up from within.
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Winnersh Barbarians 0 Wokingham & Emmbrook 2
Report on club website – champions!
Written by me, uploaded by Coach Pete
https://www.wefc.club/news/u13-rangers-v-winnersh-barbarians-2703962.html
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The Laying on of Hands
(written in one of the Covid interludes when social distancing was not emphasised as it had been)
After so many days without contact,
I can feel its place now –
the laying on of hands.
Still in the Co-op car park,
it looks like a pause for prayer,
meditation on the Saturday morning
grey-white sky, a moment to bring to mind
the things we’ve done or will,
but no – on the lady’s back
is a baby carrier, a momentarily
well-defined existential burden
not the weight of guilt for past decisions
marring a view of crows around pylons
from Bulmershe pavilion.The hands are of those adjusting straps,
attending to the wide-eyed bobbing head,
ensuring there’s a cushion for the neck,
reassurance for that suspended time
around the shoulders, watching from behind their mum
benign meandering dogs, families strolling
under amorphous cloud forms
skirting crows around pylons.
The laying on of hands in constant support
of a thousand forms and moments:
milk or tube yoghurts, more strap adjustments,
human thermostats attentive
to all the climate’s subtle modulations.The child is pre-guilt (forget Original Sin
on the Sussex Coast) – before transgression.
Where is that compelling argument
articulated in a sterile conference hall
on powerpoint from the pulpit,
hopped-up on notes and congregational shrapnel,
that children are born and die sinful?
The laying on of hands by cousins, aunts and brothers
from security to security, with mixed beliefs
in higher forms of providence, prop the oblivious
in the backpack carrier. Does it really take a wafer,
or some symbolic token, to show us sins forgiven?
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Whiteboard Scattergraph
It was like that angst in the chest
you mentioned, but then it exploded.My self was in a hundred fragments.
All I had was a bed and a skylight,a window on the incomprehensible.
Drifting off, I muddled cliffs and gardens:Was it West Bay, Lyme Regis or Sidmouth?
Football grounds merged: part Brunton Park,part Craven Cottage, part kickabout
at the old MK hockey stadiumwith Oxford United reserves –
or were they off duty cinema workers?About 12 0′ Clock, somehow scrambling up
for toast and a roll up, with a roll downwhiteboard scattergraph of faults,
their points the day’s shielded stars
all isolated from their cause,it was like that angst in the chest again,
but then it broke. Now you’re outat this car park. ‘No fear’ and ‘One life: live it’
on the back of a Mitsubishi Warrior,deep azure ocean beneath wild camping grounds
picked up in the eyes and a blue O’Neill shirt.This new hope is tentative. Will there be enough
finding gaps between or augmenting major leagueprescription drugs, all the dietary limitations,
the social times for which you’re out of action?It was like that angst, but then it broke
from its containment, lost its physical presence
to all our winding rivers of memory,
took root in close family and distant friends.I can’t describe the feeling so say ‘fixed’
and ‘broken’, currents surging to a tsunami.I sometimes wish there was a sole conductor
to form a single melody from all our memories.
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Three Triolets
Clun
Clun is the quietest place in England
if you can also quieten your mind.You’ll never see it around the headland;
Clun is the quietest place in England.Though you’re kicking up a stretch of sand,
there is a bench and park no-one can find.Clun is the quietest place in England
if you can also quieten your mind.Two Jabs
Two jabs or two jags, the illness comes after
high points and low lights, whatever you’ve seen.Buoyed up by syrups, compounds and laughter;
Two jabs or two jags, the illness comes after.Against any danger, always a grafter;
you sense what’s coming, a long time since green.Two jabs or two jags, the illness comes after
high points and low lights, whatever you’ve seen.The Old Theologian
Says the old theologian, kind eyes, slight smile:
‘Here are ten thousand words to add to the Lord’s.’If a person says ‘Walk with me’, go one extra mile
says the old theologian, kind eyes, slight smile.On Zoom with the bookshelves, home life on trial,
he could only get over a few broken chords.Says the old theologian, kind eyes, slight smile:
‘Here are ten thousand words to add to the Lord’s.’
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The Syntax of the Wind
I followed it over the new school,
a spire touching fingertips with God,
and temporary traffic by Sol Jol Park —
the syntax of the wind.
I thought about its temporary graces
collapsing vessels in rubicund faces,
setting down a hoarding or Caution:
Changed Priorities Ahead sign.The syntax of an isolated gust shifts a cedar in the dusk.
That’s the power between spaces and dots,
an ellipsis gone before we cycle through the verbs.
Now the hills are not quite full stops
in contrast to the highest city peace walls.
The syntax of the wind finds fraternities of silence
in lowland weather systems
we can’t see meeting.
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Notes from Bryanstone Quay
On this southern shoreline, weathered signs
are falsely worn above a film of sand,
surfboards on the wall and designer clothing brands.On rocks off the quay, closer to the deep,
spot the line of the horizon, Smuggler’s Cove,
fulmars in their restive dives off the sternof Carpe Diem alone in its rust
in the wind above a herring army.
Voices on the breeze call nightlyinto nothing but the air
from far co-ordinates of memory.Do souls mix with the wind
in the fixed gazes of fishermen?You won’t find the smoking solitary man
or his flat-coated retriever in the old hotel.
This new century does admin on the recent past.It watches itself talking through touchscreen glass,
hoping for you to ‘hit the like’ and subscribe —
hoping for some more thumbs up.
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Holy Land, Instagram
Wind-ruffled oaks in common grasses;
a castle that stands in swathes of time.
Do we need these places so we feel small and free
disappearing ripples on a constant sea?Venture across soft grass and concomitant nettles,
interloper on royal grounds, taught to show reverence.A Quaker would never bow, except to divine energy,
cumulonimbi piling up over a sequoia treeline
seen from a town centre car-park top.Lost in the National Trust’s gold and green
insipid Crown Estate heraldry, you forgive great men
foibles, would rather they were private.Isolated villages, Great Park council properties;
You’re a child with inferiority signposted daily
in ancient stone, drawbridges, Range Rovers.A prince marries in a Christian church,
hears a standard gospel message: the family smirks.These ancient oaks, Mildmay plantings,
are so much less derisive. Yes, lose yourself,
your ego, self-importance, conceited dreams
of greatness: lose it in great rivers,
unknown nebulae, at just a glimpse
of someone who stands apart through learning
or instinct; lose yourself before a farmer
who humbly read the weather, a taxi driver
who baffled with all the London streets,
a player who created time when others snatched.Never lose yourself to fortifications,
a curated garden, some farcical sage green
punt at prestige, falsely weathered wood
or new authentic signage, those people
who filter the Holy Land through Instagram:
‘Here’s a picture of me wading through the Jordan,
beyond the profane; here’s one by the holy sepulchre,
hope I got the lighting right and you see me
in Jesus’ footsteps. I’m wearing a hoodie &
a cowboy hat as per the megachurch uniform
so young people can relate to me.
Hope you can ignore the salary,
but look at the followers, the reach,
and who I’ve saved from hellfire –
hope you’ll forgive me.’
Wilderspool Causeway 