Carpe Diem

Clepsydra 18-20

18

… as free as the birds
     a sky full at North Cape
          where shores retreat
               year after year
 
the big red mud diminishes
     under advancing waters
          sea-threatened cliffs
               undermined roads
                    houses
                         the lighthouse

gulls follow the fishing boats
     herring gulls
          blotting out
               sun and sky
                    above the reef

with its seals
     basking in sunshine
          knowing themselves
               being themselves
                    thinking themselves safe

kings and queens
     of their sealdom
          never questioning …

19

… an osprey
     sudden the swoop
          turned into a stoop

water shattered
     total immersion
          then emerging
               with lusty thrusts of wings

claws clasping
     imprisoned prey
          prised from the sea
               raised to the skies
                    up and away
                         murderer and victim

oblivious below
     the black horse
          with cart and farmer
               gathering seaweed

all of them
     having no doubts
          safe in the security
               of their roles …

20

… while lost in the labyrinth
      I searched for a thread
               on life’s loom

a thread woven
     by an unknown
          unseen hand
               a hand and thread
                    I could never control

yet one day
     that thread
          will lead me out
               from the dark

then shall I see
     the sun’s great candle
          beneath which red rocks
               wave and water battered
                    crumble

here at North Cape
     in a way that nobody
          can understand …

Commentary:

The osprey “emerging with lusty thrusts of wings, claws clasping, imprisoned prey prised from the sea, raised to the skies, up and away, murderer and victim.” The words are based on the photograph. A quiet day, somebody shouted, and pointed, and clickety-click, I was lucky enough to capture the whole thing on my digital camera. This one shot summarizes it all.

The stanzas (16 & 17) that precede this moment are available here. Clepsydra, the book, is one single poem, one single sentence, that rambles on and on. Each stanza stands alone, each poem (numbered) stands alone, and the whole book stands alone as a single sentence summarizing what I have seen and where I have been. Bakhtinian Chronotopos – my dialog with my time and my place. In this case, my many dialogs with my multiple times and multitudinous places.

Albert Camus lent me the phrase ‘murderer and victim’. ‘Nous sommes, ou meurtrier ou victime‘. Quoted from memory. I hope I am not too far wrong. My memory fades as I age. Louis Aragon suggested I borrow his line “rois tombés de leurs chariots” – that I found in his collection Il ne m’est Paris sans Elsa. Here, I have applied it to the seals at North Cape, PEI – “seals – basking in sunshine – kings and queens of their sealdom.” Intertextuality – texts talking to texts and recalling segments of texts within other texts.” Wonderful. Alas, I fear the coming days when the memory may no longer be so clear. ‘What will be, will be’ said the Osprey as he pulled the flounder from the sea and carried him too his nest in a nearby tree.

OAS

OAS

I take up my pen to scribble
my name and a riddle in the sands,
neither seen nor understood
by folk in far off lands.

Yet here I stand on foreign strand
my body twice marooned
by friends and fate and oft of late
my achievements all lampooned.

I bid you spare a thought for me
and also for my fate:
I came, I saw, I got a job,
but retirement ain’t great.

A pittance for a pension,
a life on OAS,
a walking stick and SOS,
that’s all that’s left, I guess.

Commentary:

A Golden Oldie from way back (2013 or so). Things get worse, in many ways, but yma o hyd – we’re still here. And that’s the main thing. We need rain, more rain, and yet more rain. Yet the damp really gets to those of us who suffer from osteo-arthritis. Maybe we should put a tariff on it (250%) and then it would be priced out of existence. Then it can rain as much as it wants and the aches and pains will stay in Aix-les-Bains and not come running after me.

I asked Moo for a painting of rain drops falling on my head, but he didn’t have one. So I found a photograph of a real rain storm falling on the back porch, a year or so ago. We need one of those right now. Moo is nodding his head as I type. Oh dear, he just snored. He must have fallen asleep. He does much more noddy now than he used to. And so do I. Maybe I’ll do a photo of a big yawn next. Or he can paint one.

Monkey Meets Pontius Parrot

Monkey Meets Pontius Parrot
(With glorious  memories of Macarronic Latin)

Pontius Parrot is very clever
and very pontifical.
“Pretty Polly!”
He pontificates from his pulpit.

His name isn’t Polly
and he doesn’t have a pulpit
but he parrots words
in Macaronic Latin:
“Caesar adsum jam forte.”

Pontius Parrot is perky at the podium
and bounces up and down,
preening himself self-consciously,
rattling his chains,
shaking his bars,  and speaking Latin:
“Brutus aderat.”

He is marked with shame and scandal.
A dysfunctional family of feathered friends
 has henpecked him until he is black and blue
and he has thrown up copiously:
 “Caesar sic in omnibus.”

He dips his wings in holy water,
calls for some soft soap, 
and washes his feathers and claws.

Poor Pontius Parrot,
he can only say “Repent!”
“Brutus sic in at.”

Commentary:

I asked Moo if he had ever painted a parrot, but he told me that he hadn’t. However, one of his favorite viewers, had once called this painting a pile of spaghetti wriggling in tomato sauce and he thought that spaghetti was close enough to macaroni for it to serve as a painting for Bony Macaroni Latin.

I had to explain to him what we mean when we say Macaronic Latin. Back to that boarding school and we used to invent all sorts of Macaronic Latin phrases. They used to cane us with bamboo canes. So here’s the verb paradigm in Latin for ‘to cane a student’. Bendo – whackere- ouchi – sorebum. Of course, it helps if you know what Latin verb paradigms look like. They are easy to remember and are aide memoires for the four main parts of the verb. Bendo – I bend over – first person singular, present tense – whackere – to whack or cane – infinitive – ouchi – I said ‘ouch’ – past tense – sorbum – the inevitable result – past participle.

Now, if we look at the italics in the poem we see a poem within a poem, and that smaller poem is written in Macaronic Latin.

“Caesar adsum jam forte.
Brutus aderat.
 Caesar sic in omnibus.
Brutus sic in at.“

Translation

Caesar had some jam for tea.
Brutus had a rat.
Caesar sick in omnibus.
Brutus sick in hat.

Oh never underestimate the ingenuity – linguistic and / or otherwise (and we won’t go into that one right now) – of the bored-to-tears Public Schoolboy. Especially if he is not destined to be a Perfect Prefect like Perfect Prefect Plod – who was never any good at Latin, if I remember well. Neither was I come to think of it. Horrible language, dead and reeks like the dead rat that Brutus ate.

As for the ‘repent’, well, usually, just before he beat you, the master doing the beating would enquire as to your health and ask you if you repented of your sins, crimes, bad language, being cheeky to Perfect Prefect Plod, or whatever else you had done (like smoking or holding a girl’s hand in public instead of a boy’s). You always said ‘yes, of course I do, sir,’ in the vain hope of avoiding a beating. But, bad luck, the cane descended anyway, ouchi was heard, and the victim retired to the bath room to examine his past participle, also known as his sorbum.

I bet you never imagined any of that. Wow! What a great lesson I have taught you today. Think about it all and think about it carefully. Now you know why Pink Floyd sang “We don’t need no education.” But what an education it was. And remember, the Duke of Wellington, Old Nosey, once said ‘my battles were won on the playing fields of the pubic schools of England.’ Oh dear – I hope I got that right. I fear there’s a letter missing somewhere.



Monkey Visitsthe Chimpanzees’ Tea Party

Monkey Visits
the Chimpanzees’ Tea Party

Dressed to the nines in their gala outfits,
they have come here for the tea party.
Hairy penguins, they waddle back
and forth across the temple,
then lunge for a table with its jumbo shrimp,
smoked salmon, scallops, baked oysters.

Faces slashed from ear to ear
by enormous grins,
“Food’s free!” they say
and stuff themselves
regardless of the consequences.

Serviettes tucked into collars,
they scoff lobster and crab.
Birds of Paradise, subtle delicacies
flown in from half a world away,
decorate the tables.

There is something about them, though,
these chimpanzees,
gripping cup handles
between finger and thumb,
enormously pleased to be the centre of attention,
however clumsily they walk,
in their hired-for-the-occasion,
ill-fitting, black and white penguin suits.

Commentary:

Moo apologizes. He hasn’t painted any chimpanzees, but a long time ago (2018) he drew and colored this cartoon. Pink and Purple Penguin Parade with Grand Marshall, Princess Squiffy. You can just see the end of Princess Squiffy’s tail as she vanishes out of the cartoon, encouraging the Pink and Purple Penguins to follow behind her behind. Oh the joys of leading the parade. Not everybody wants to do it though, many are content not to lead, but just to follow. Perhaps we should have called our cat MacNamara. After all, he was the leader of the band. But I don’t think Princess Squiffy would rather be anything other than what she is – a princess.

This poem, from Monkey Temple (of course / wrth gwrs) reminds me of Parents’ Day at my Boarding School. After several weeks of scarcely edible food, the tide would suddenly turn. Thursday, prime rib roast beef for supper. Friday, roast chicken with all the trimmings. When our parents arrived on the Saturday, all we could talk about was the wonderful food we had been eating for the last two days. Cunning, eh? We all had to dress up for Parents’ Day. Sunday starched collars, collar studs and all, and nice clean Sunday School ties.

Tea on the lawns in summer – unforgettable. A marquee, in case it rained, but otherwise tables laden down with a variety of skillfully cut sandwiches, little triangles, with no crusts, followed by endless helpings of strawberries and cream. The boys served their parents, fleeting back and forth to full the rapidly emptying plates. One boys father, I won’t say whose, devoured 12 bowls of strawberries and cream before the headmaster call the son over and begged him to beg his father not to eat all the strawberries and cream as some other parents’ would like some also.

Griffin Hunting – not a typical public school sport but one in which my school most certainly indulged. Our school symbol – a griffin – woven with gold thread on a dark blue background symbolized for the younger boys the perfection of the Prefects. To Hunt a Griffin was to behave in such a way as to attract the attention of older boys (already Perfect Prefects) and the school masters so that one became a candidate to climb the ladder and become a candidate for Griffin-hood. Some of us, myself included, preferred the anonymity of Robin Hood and were happy in our chosen roles of outlaws in Sherwood Forest and agents provocateurs and anarchists. Not for us the gentle counting of innumerable sheep. We chose rather the perils of after-dark transistor radios and the joys of Radio Luxemburg.

I remember being caught out of bed one night, on my knees, in a corner of the dormitory. All the dorm occupants were squealing and making a terrible noise. This attracted the attention of Perfect Prefect Plod – and in he came, threw the door open, and switched on the light. “You!” he pointed at me. “What do you think you are doing, out of bed?” “I am catching a mouse, Prefect Plod,” I replied. “You are a nasty little liar,” said Prefect Plod. “There are no mice in our nice clean house.” “Oh yes there are,” I replied, and I showed him the little mouse that I had cradled in my hands. “Give that to me,” ordered Prefect Plod. So I did. And the mouse took an instant dislike to him and immediately sunk its sharp little teeth into his thumb. I remember Prefect Plod running out of the dorm screaming “Matron! Matron!” and the little rodent swinging back and forth and hanging grimly on.

Those boarding school days ended 63 years ago. Hard to believe, really, but I still have such vivid memories of them. And of the Perfect Prefects, gripping cup handles between finger and thumb, enormously pleased to be the centre of attention on Parents’ Day, however clumsily they walked, in their spruced up for the occasion, Sunday Suits and Shirts, with their Golden Griffin ties. I always think of the Chimpanzees’ Tea Party when I think of the special performances of that little lot ‘for a Prefect’s lot is not a nappy one, nappy one.’

Monkey Meets An Anarchist Ant

Monkey Meets An Anarchist Ant
(Memories of El Camino de Santiago)

The anarchist ant is dressed in black.
He has a little red base-ball cap
worn backwards on his head.
His eyes are fiery coals.

“Phooey!” He says.
“It’s folly to go with the flow.”
So he turns his back
on his companions
and marches in the other direction.

Some ants call him a fool.
The Ant Police try to turn him.
The Thought Police try
to make him change his mind.

Others, in blind obedience
to a thwarted, intolerant authority,
first bully him, then beat him,
then bite him till he’s dead.

Commentary:

I wrote this last century, no – last millennium – in the 1990’s, after walking the Camino de Santiago in Northern Spain. I travelled alone, on my own. An incredible journey. One of the sayings along the road is that if you do not make the pilgrimage to Santiago while you are alive, you will have to walk it in ant form, when you are dead. I often saw ants on the lonely, dusty roads, especially off the beaten track, and they were all headed for Santiago, except for one or two, who headed in the wrong direction, and were cut off by their companions. From these humble roots was this poem born.

Looking back nearly thirty years, I am surprised – and rather shocked – by the ‘little red base-ball cap worn backwards on his head’. I aways associated red hats with cardinals and bona fide llamas from Tibet (Kim – Rudyard Kipling). It obviously has a totally different meaning today, but I was definitely not aware of that thirty years ago when I first wrote this poem.

I was aware, however, of that in human nature, that made some people rebel and some conform. The conformists were rarely able to tolerate the rebels. This was particularly true in the Monkey Temple where the animals are bound by rules to which they must conform – or else. Thus, our poor anarchist ant broke away from the norm, refused to go with the flow, and suffered an awful fate as a result. Moo and I have always loved the rhythm and alliteration of that final brutal line ‘first bully him, then beat him, then bite him till he’s dead.’ But Moo definitely didn’t want to paint that picture. He encouraged me to use the photo of the ants in the honey pot instead. And guess what – there were fifteen ants floundering in that pot of honey. The luckiest ones were the anarchist ants who adjusted their baseball caps and fled!

How many anarchist ants, I wonder, baseball caps of any color askew on their heads, have suffered a similar fate? Some things, my friends, we’ll never know. And sometimes, my friends, I think we are better off not knowing.

Monkey’s Clockwork Universe

Monkey’s Clockwork Universe


Some days, monkey winds himself up
like a clockwork mouse.
Other days he rolls over and over
with a key in his back like a clockwork cat.

Monkey is growing old and forgetful.
He forgets where he has hidden the key,
pats his pockets, and slows right down
before he eventually finds it
and winds himself up again.

One day, monkey leaves the key
between his shoulder blades
in the middle of his back.

All day long,
the temple monkeys play with the key,
turning it round and round,
and winding monkey’s clockwork,
tighter and tighter,
until suddenly the mainspring breaks
and monkey slumps at the table –
no energy, no strength,
no stars, no planets, no moon at night,
the sun broken fatally down,
the clockwork of his universe
sapped, and snapped.

Commentary:

I guess we normal human beings, not the monkeys who live in the Monkey Temple, think of this as a sort of mental and physical burn out. It can happen to anyone really. You don’t have to be a monkey. But if you live in a clockwork universe where you clock in at nine and clock out at five, and regulate everything – your eating, your breathing, your visits to the loo – by the tick of the tick-tock work clock, then I guess this can happen to you.

Escarmentar en cabeza ajena – a lovely Spanish proverb that means ‘to learn from the blows delivered to another’s head’. Much better to let this poor monkey teach you that yes, you have to take breaks or, like monkey, you will break down. You must learn to pace yourself, not to be put upon by others, and to look after yourself. Because, if you don’t, others will take advantage of you and push you to, and beyond, your limits. Don’t learn that lesson the hard way, by ending up broken, run down, and in hospital. Learn from monkey’s experience. Keep the key hidden. Don’t let other people see it, or steal it, or wind you up with it.

Life is hard enough anyway. Look after yourself first. And then you will be much better able to look after other people – especially your family and friends – when they need your help. A difficult lesson to learn, especially in this world of multi-tasking where too many people hold too many low-paying jobs and work long, long hours, day after day, just to make ends meet.

There is no escape from the clockwork labyrinth, you think. Alas, that too is true, all too often. But escape you must. Somewhere, Ariadne’s thread will lead you out. You must seek it, even in the darkness and the gloom. Once found, it will lead you out from the darkness and back into the light. And that is what we must all hope for and work for. Pax amorque – and blessings.

Monkey Turns Down Promotion

Monkey Turns Down Promotion

“I hereby appoint you head of the asylum.”

The young office monkey with the plastic stethoscope
was dressed neatly in a white sheet.

“Dr. Freud, I presume?”
Monkey held out his hand
but his witticism was lost in a flood of water
flowing from the flush and over the floor.

Monkey stood there, paddling in piddle.
Inmates with crowded heads and vacant faces,
fools grinning at a universe of folly,
paddled beside him. He wiped
a sick one’s drool from his sleeve.

The office boy spat on his hands,
slicked down his hair, and placed
his stethoscope on monkey’s heaving chest.

“You have no pulse.”
“How do you know I have no pulse?
Surely, you cannot hear my heart
for you have a banana stuck in your ear.”

“Speak up!” said the doctor,
“I cannot hear you:
I have a banana stuck in my ear.”

Then monkey felt fear.

Daylight diminished
and waters closed over his head.
He spurned the proffered paw,
the life belt thrown
by the offer of a new position.

Exit monkey left,
pursued by a chorus:
“Run, monkey, run!”

Commentary:

A Golden Oldie from Monkey Temple (2010). I came across it by accident as I thumbed through some older books – wow, fifteen years ago that came out. A Golden Oldie indeed. I had forgotten all about Monkey Temple. However, the last couple of days I have watched New Zealand vs Canada and England vs France (Women’s Rugby World Cup). Both semi-finals took place at Ashton gate, Bristol. That’s when I started thinking about Bristol and Bristol Zoo.

We had family in Bristol (Westbury-on-Trym) and from an early age we visited Bristol Zoo. One of my favorite places was the old ruined Monkey Temple, full of monkeys that impressed me with their antics. A small, walled zoo, it was full of innovations and I remember well Alfred the Gorilla and Rosie the Elephant. I loved the rides on Rosie’s back. The camels too offered lifts to young children and the elephants took apples from my hand with their long trunks. I also remember the bear pit, and loved watching the brown bear climb to the top of his pole and catch food thrown to him by the visitors.

I think everybody’s greatest thrill came with feeding time for the seals. What a racket when the attendant appeared with his / her pail of fish and he/she threw them to the waiting seals. Almost as thrilling was the penguin house with its aquarium and glass windows. Animals that seemed so clumsy, waddling on land, turn into sea-angels when they dived and we could meet them, face to face, so to speak, almost in their own environment.

My love of zoos reached out and I recall the zoo in Madrid, established when Columbus returned from his voyages with species of animals hitherto unknown. And who could forget Copo de Nieve, the albino gorilla in Barcelona zoo.

Alas, my zoo day’s are over. But the world is wonderful. Today, two deer entered our front yard, lunched on the fallen crab apples, and went to sleep underneath the trees outside our window. Joy to the world and the world brings me joy -sunrise and sunset, colored clouds, the deer in my yard, a fox passing through. However, I must admit I am not impressed by the little red squirrel that nests under the hood of my car and gnaws my cables. Nor by the porcupine who loves the salt in my garage doors and nibbles at the door frame every chance it gets. The love of nature – red in tooth and claw – I guess we have to enjoy the good and put up with the bad. Life’s like that. “Ask the animals, they will teach you.” Bristol Zoo motto.

Hair Cut

Hair Cut 

Curly locks, wisps of grey and silver,
curve around my ears, cuddle my collar.
I stand in the bathroom, look at my scissors,
glance in the mirror, and start to hack.

I turn my head swiftly from side to side,
watching white hair falling, like snow.

“All done!” I look at myself in the mirror:
hair shorter, still sticking out in clumps,
but some curls still tickle and cling.

Not bad for front and sides. I still
can’t see the back, but if feels fine.
“Right” I say. “I’m ready for the show.”

What show? The one where I sit before
the computer screen and admire myself
before I click in the code, type the password,
and join the virtual meeting that today,
in the pandemic, passes for face to face.

Commentary:

Face to Face – Moo helped me with this one by allowing me to have one of his ‘face to face’ paintings. Thank you, Moo. Sorry I said you weren’t too bright yesterday. And we both got the singer of All Shook Up wrong – it was Tommy Steele of course. Also, as you explained to me, you may not be great at adding two and two and making four, and you may be unenlightened with words, but wow, when you add a colour or two to the palette you are enlightened and enlightening and dazzle people with the lightness of your enlightenment. There – hope we can be friends again now. I would miss your paintings if you withdrew your services.

And this is a Golden Oldie. In 2020, when Covid walked with us, I started cutting my own hair – hacking might be a better word – and I have continued to do so ever since. In fact, I have only been to the barber’s three times since 2020. Each time, the hair lay so thickly upon the floor behind the barber’s chair that we walked knee deep in the white stuff. Great fun. How the young lady made fun of me. Right down the middle of the back of my head she found a large mullet that I couldn’t reach with either hand. She found that so funny. Asked me if I wanted to keep it. Of course, I said no!

I remember those face to face on the computer days. At least we couldn’t catch Covid from an image talking back to us on a screen. I always find those online meetings so difficult and awkward. I love the awkwardness of that word – awkward. The facilitator always began with – ‘Now, let’s all introduce ourselves.’ What on earth do you say on such occasions. ‘Easy,’ Moo told me. ‘I always say “Hi. I’m Moo. I’m a painter.” Nobody bothers me after that. Once somebody asked me what I painted and when I replied ‘houses’, everyone lost interest and the facilitator moved on.’

I always get tongue-tied and can never manage to be coherent. In fact, I am neither coherent nor cohesive and I often fall apart. “Hi! I’m Roger. I’m a writer.” This always opens the doors and the windows to all sorts of questions. ‘What do you write?’ ‘Have you published anything?’ ‘What’s your latest work?’ Of course, if I had any sense – and often I have less sense than Moo – when someone asks me ‘What do you write?’ I should reply. ‘English.’ Or ‘Italics.’ Or ‘Greeting cards.’ That last would be as much of a show stopper as Moo’s response – ‘houses’! Of course, I could get really inventive and say ‘Bilingual jokes for Christmas Crackers.’ Another pet peeve – have you noticed how the French and the English don’t match up? I could have a great old rant about that one. But don’t let’s talk about Fortune Cookies!

And suddenly, we have strayed a log way from the act of getting our hair cut during Covid. But, like many diversions, the journey is often more important than the destination, especially if we are amusing ourselves! And I hope you had some fun and took some joy from my words.

Time Flies

Time Flies

… bends like a boomerang,
flies too rapidly away,
limps back to the hand.

Endless this shuffle of unmarked
days dropping off the calendar.

Hands stop on the clock.
The pendulum swings:
time and tide stand still,
do not move.

The print in my grandma’s house:
seemingly moving seas,
sails swelled out,
the ship stays firm in its frame.

‘As idle as a painted ship
upon a painted ocean.’

Our garden fills
with brightly colored birds
and red and grey squirrels.

Light and dark
switch back and forth
each day
a twin of the day before.

The TV screen hangs out
the daily washing.
Tired, worn out shadow,
their faces boring us
with shallow wit
and hand-me-down wisdom.

Time:
an albatross around the neck,
an emu, an ostrich, a dodo,
an overweight bumble bee,
too clumsy, too heavy to fly.

“Time flies?”
“You can’t.
They fly too fast.”

Commentary:

My friend Moo told me he was ‘all shook up’ when I read him this poem. I don’t think Moo’s too smart. He thought All Shook Up was written by the Rolling Stones when they went out moss gathering during the Fredericton Harvest Festival, but I said no, it was definitely written by Buddy Holly on an off-day when he was playing cricket. It wasn’t okay in those days to play croquet.

The last three lines come from an examination question in the General Paper, “S” Level, as it used to be. “Punctuate this sentence – time flies you can’t they fly too fast” – of course, they should have said, “in exactly the same way we want you to. Corrections and alternative versions will not be accepted.” What did they think I was? A mind-reader? I wasn’t. I was a teenager having a field day in the national examinations. I would love to have been a fly on the wall when they marked my paper.

In the biology exam, they gave each one of us a Brussel Sprout and asked us to draw it and tell us as much as we could about it. Of course, I ate mine, and I said it tasted a little bit dry and needed some salt. Then I drew a mess of potage, all yellow and green with chewed up squiggles, and added “That’s what the sprout probably looks like right now.” I failed that exam too. Didn’t even get a part mark for ingenuity, though the science teacher said I could have a glow of satisfaction. Very useful after lights out in a boarding school, I can tell you.

I can’t remember if Moo went to that school with me or not. I don’t think he did. I think he drifted into my life a little bit later. He wasn’t a painter at that stage, just a half-starved philosopher doomed to live in a garret. Of course, once he started painting houses, he made money. It’s amazing how many people will pay you for painting their houses. Of course, that was before they invented plastic siding.

About now you realize that I live in a strange world all of my own and a lot of people live in it with me. You, too, if you enjoyed reading this. Long may the ‘strange world of me, you, and Moo’ continue. I’d send you a penny for your thoughts, but they have gone out of circulation. I can’t even sing you a song of sixpence these days either. Silver sixpences have walked the dodo path too.

Love in Old Age

Love in Old Age

How do I love you? Let me count the ways.
I love you when together we start to write
for although you’re sometimes out of sight,
you’re never out of mind. So many days

we’ve spent sitting together at keyboards, tapping
at computer keys. Is this the way to please
each other, a choosing of words, a squeeze
of meaning into a smaller space, with overlapping

metaphors and images improved in ways
we never would have dreamed of? Each
to his or her own, we say. Yet we reach
out to each other over time and space,

not joined at hip or lip, but with energy and zest,
sailing similar seas, and trying our very best.

Commentary:

A Golden Oldie, the poem more than the painting. Moo is more up to date than me. He also thinks my beloved and I sit side by side, or at opposite sides of the table, gazing at each other, but not saying much. Hence his choice of cartoon – The Sound of Silence.

“Each to his or her own, we say. Yet we reach out to each other over time and space.” Sometimes silently, often with words. Silence is best – because as my hearing goes, what I hear is a mumble – like the rumble of the old Mumbles Railway – does anybody else remember that? The result of the overheard mumble is an inelegant ‘Eh?’ Too many ‘ehs’ spoil the silence. Don’t they, eh? What’s that you say, eh?

So, I am now having great fun reading a new word a day in Welsh. What a joy to pursue the language that was forbidden when I was a boy. I don’t have anyone to talk to, but that is beside the point. Reading, remembering, the old place names still there at the tip of the tongue – Brynhyfryd, Rhosili, Pwll Ddu. Each name brings with it a visual memory, usually silent, but sometimes filled with the cries of sea-gulls and the growling of corgis defending their territories. Whatever – what joy!