Memories

Carved in Stone 67 & 68

Carved in Stone
67

At night, on the cool
sea-shore of my dreams,
the calls of shore-birds
at Ste. Luce-sur-Mer
are borne on the wind.

High-pitched, they are,
like the voices of children,
or of men and women,
in distress.

I walk on the sand
at low tide and a lone gull
flies past my head,
battering itself
against the wind’s cage
with outraged, sturdy wings.

68

Sunset.
Sea mists descend.
The church on the headland
steps in and out of darkness.

Shadows gather, persistent.
Gulls surround a lone heron.
It clacks its beak in anger
forcing the gulls to scatter.

These words are not my words.

They came to me in the speech
of birds hidden in the foliage,
or carried on a feathered plume
sprung from the osprey’s wing.

Some came from the click
of the crab’s claw as he dug
deeper into the sand
a refuge where he thought
he could live safely.

Commentary:

Sunset. Sea mists descend. The church on the headland steps in and out of darkness. And so do I. I seek clarity, but there is no clarity when the sea mist descends, just the blurred image and the clouded thought. The cloud of unknowing, one philosopher called it, many years ago, and it is still with us. Especially when the sunlight fades and we are left wandering in the mists of unknowing.

“Is it here, you ask, or over here?” Well, if you do not know, I cannot tell you. But I will ask you this, and think very carefully before you answer – does the answer come from outside of you, given by another, or does it come from the deep, sacred intimacy of your own soul? The answer to that question will tell you all you need to know, one way, or the other.

These words are not my words. They came to me in the speech of birds hidden in the foliage, or carried on a feathered plume sprung from the osprey’s wing. Some came from the click of the crab’s claw as he dug deeper into the sand a refuge where he thought he could live safely. Sunset. Sea mists descend. The church on the headland steps in and out of darkness.

Carved in Stone 65 & 66

Carved in Stone
65

Flames flow sparkling waters,
a cataract of fire,
down church walls
as the Castillo burns.

Fireworks claw upwards
to knock on heaven’s door
and waken the sleeping gods
reminding them
not to forget their people.

A knife edge slices sun
from shadow, heat from cool,
solombra, Paz calls his neologism
with its combination
of sun and shade / sol y sombra.

66

I will never forget the taste and smell
of my own sweat as I walk beneath
the heaviness of a midday sun,
its heat falling vertical
and rebounding in waves
from concrete and cobbles.

I recall the roughness
of hand-hewn stone
heated by that burning sun,
the smoothness of silk
contrasting with the harshness
of tares in hand-woven wool,
marketed in the central square.

Commentary:

Fireworks claw upwards to knock on heaven’s door. The celebrants would buy their rockets in groups of 3, 6, or 12. When the first rocket went up – whoooosh – BANG! – we would wait for the fourth. When the sixth rocket went up, same thing – do they have a full dozen? And when the seventh rocket goes up, indeed, we know they do. Sometimes, we would be woken up in the early morning, as the joyful people returned home after a night of reveling. When that seventh rocket flew skywards – we knew it was useless to try and go back to sleep!

I remember leaving the zócalo one night, turning into a side street, and being met by a wall of people. A whole village, with its accompanying band stood there, waiting. Up went the first rocket, the band started to play, and the dancing broke out. No sleep for the gods that night. Their people needed them and had come knocking on the door. I was always amazed by the way the old gods stood shoulder to shoulder with the new gods of Christianity. The number of people who worshiped both also surprised me.

I last visited Oaxaca in 2001. I wonder how much has changed. I hope the dancing trees never change. Inside them, young children, their eyes peering through the bark, followed the band music. Occasionally, one of them would stop, open his or her tree, and invite you in. Alas, I never had the courage or the skill to accept the invitation. Even by 2001, the traditional carnival figures – monos – were gradually being replaced by Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse. Tragic, in so many ways. I hope they keep the traditions of the rockets and the music and the trees.

People of the Mist
A Poet’s Day in Oaxaca

If you want to read more about Oaxaca
Click here to purchase this book.

Carved in Stone 64

Carved in Stone
64

I cannot bring you
the sounds and smells
of my own backyard,
let alone those of Oaxaca.

The pungent odour
of the first drops of rain,
falling from a blue sky
into dry dust.

The tang of bees’ wax candles,
burning in the cathedral’s darkness
where la Virgen de la Soledad
clad in black velvet sequined with stars
stands on guard in her small side chapel

Nor can I bring you the high notes
sung at the golden altar
in Santo Domingo
by the old woman, dressed in black,
who sings here every day.

The central market
is a bustle of bursting scents,
rooftop goats snicker above me,
my neighbor’s German Shepherd
patrols the roof-garden
and growls in my ear.

Commentary:

Sun and Moon is the first book in the Oaxacan Trilogy – Sun and Moon, At the Edge of Obsidian, Obsidian 22. I travelled to Oaxaca for 6-8 weeks each year between 1995 and 2001. I taught there and also researched the language, the culture, and the Mixtec Codices. Quite simply, my Oaxacan experiences changed my artistic, linguistic, educational, and cultural life. How? I earned to distinguish between what I could, and couldn’t do. A simple lesson, but one that needs to be understood at the deepest level of understanding.

The lessons took in all of my five senses – touch – dry dust, carved wood and stone, the tares in woven blankets -, taste – mole, flor de calabaza -, sight – the castillo burning -, sound – animals, goats and sheep, herded to the market-, smell – the central market is a bustle of bursting scents – hearing – rooftop goats snicker above me. A select few that blended with music of guelaguetza and the dancing that accompanied the village bands. But the experience(s) went beyond that. I began to realize, deep down, who I was, what I was, and, perhaps more importantly, what I wasn’t, what I could never be a part of, what separated myself from the other, the other whom I loved, who loved me, but who could never be a part of me.


As Right as Rain

As Right as Rain

It’s the day after the night before
and I awake to an ache
in each of my arms.

I went to bed early, at ten,
and slept until eight-thirty,
but my AI watch tells me
that I only got six hours sleep.

I found a bump in the bed,
on the right side,
when I look towards the window.

I must have lain my arm against it,
during the night. It was so sore,
my right arm, the Covid arm,
when I got up this morning,
but the left arm, the flu arm,
was perfectly alright, except for
a little itch, and a tiny tingle,
like the jingle of elf-bells.

Black coffee and an aspirin
soon cleared it all up, and now
I am as good as new,
as right as rain,
except the rain that fell last night
brought power losses, cold,
and an absence of warmth and light,
and that sort of rain is not all right.

Commentary:

That’s a golden oldie from a couple of years back. I did both jabs in the same arm this year and didn’t feel a thing. It didn’t rain either, but look at the muck coming down in the photo – we had a bit of that a couple of days ago. Welcome to our Canadian half-winter. We used to get 3 metres / ten feet of snow every winter. Last year I only used the snowblower of three occasions. No wonder I think of it as a half-winter – winter ain’t what it used to be.

Carved in Stone 63

Carved in Stone
63

Words descend, soft and peaceful.
They brush my mind
with the hushed touch
of a grey jay’s soundless wings.

Yet the grey jays have gone,
vanished along with the grosbeaks,
evening, pine, and rose breasted.

Words can hardly express what I feel
in this diminishing world
when I inhale color and light.

Dawn bursts into bloom,
and the indoor hyacinth starts,
once more, to blossom.

Its immanent beauty
fills me with a warmth
that disperses night’s shadows,
taking away all sense of gloom.

Commentary:

The indoor hyacinth starts, once more, to blossom. Its immanent beauty fills me with a warmth that disperses night’s shadows, taking away all sense of gloom. Indeed it does. Once upon a time, it became infested with little bugs and was reduced to one leaf. Clare worked with it, spoke to it, cajoled it, and bit by bit it came back to life. Now it lives in the front porch in summer and returns to the house, southern aspect, in winter, to flourish when least we expect it.

Hyacinth, Jamaica in Spanish. And nothing more delicious than the miel de jamaica that one is offered in Oaxaca, fruit juice squeezed from the hyacinth flowers. “My wife has gone to the West Indies.” “Jamaica?” “No, she went of her own accord.” Humor flows and the hyacinth flowers, and I spend my winter hours sitting and watching my indoor flowers.

Yet the grey jays have gone, vanished along with the grosbeaks, evening, pine, and rose breasted. They used to flock on the picnic tables but as the weather warmed, they went further north. I remember when 64 mourning doves perched on the power lines. Now, we have two or three who look lonely in the garden and sound even lonelier. Words can hardly express what I feel in this diminishing world when I inhale color and light, but long for the passerines’ morning and evening flight.

But, in spite of all that, sad as it is, the hyacinth’s immanent beauty fills me with a warmth
that disperses night’s shadows, taking away all sense of gloom.

Carved in Stone 61 & 62

Carved in Stone
61

Water through the water clock,
water off a duck’s back,
the waters of life,
continually flowing,
trapped in our children
and their children,
and the love we create
never lost, just circling,
like the hands of the clock,
like the planets and stars.

But who will wind up
the clockwork universe,
and tend the mechanism
that balances planets and stars?

What will happen
when the clockwork
finally runs down,
the last candle is snuffed,
and the water clock dries up?

62

Whoever, whatever remains
will be left to contemplate
Ozymandias with his two vast
and trunkless legs of stone,
standing in the desert.

“Look on my works,
ye mighty, and despair.”

Commentary:

“Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair.” Well, Moo does have a sense of humor after all. I thought he did. From Ozymandias to the meaning of “works” to the destiny of the work we did. What a journey. It goes from the joy of the children who build a snowman to the warm spring wind that melts him to the crows and the dog who do what crows and doggies do. Intertextuality – the links between verbal and visual and think about it – such strange things happens in Moo’s creative mind.

But what do we leave behind? Think about it. Only the wake of the ship in which we sail. The wake – that white trail we leave behind us, on the surface of the sea, slowly vanishing as we also vanish, pulling away into the unknown that always lies ahead. Moo is right – so many things disappear out of the frame of the painting. “There are no pockets in shrouds” said the preacher in the hospital where I took my father, so long ago for treatment.

And even if there were, how would you fit a snowman, several crows, a cardinal, and the rear end of a dog into the pocket? “Contemplate Ozymandias with his two vast and trunkless legs of stone, standing in the desert. Now contemplate the fate of the snowman. Now look on my works, ye mighty, and despair.”


Carved in Stone 59 & 60

Carved in Stone
59

St. David of Wales once said,
“Do ye the little things in life.” 

I do, and I wander
along the banks of the River Taff,
admiring how wild daffodils
flourish each spring, in Wales.

Young, I run on the beaches,
Brandy Cove, Pwll Ddu, Langland,
Caswell, Swansea Bay,
and, as I write these words,
I hear my footsteps
echoing back through time.

Baudelaire’s words ring in my mind,
“Creativity is nothing more nor less
than childhood recovered at will.”

Or, as Pablo Picasso said,
“I have spent my life
learning to see, paint,
and write again, like a child.”

And on and on I go –
child-hood, youth, maturity, age,
then back to my second childhood,
when I can recreate
that youthful world
in all its joyous beauty.

60

Does life flows through me,
like water in a clepsydra?

Does it flicker like a candle
guttering on a church altar?

Is it circular, like a sundial,
or the Roman numerals
on the face of the clock?

Am I just flesh and blood,
doomed to blossom and flourish,
then wither and perish?

Or will some small part of me
linger on, an unchained melody,
with all my memories slowly erased.

Commentary:

Moo’s daffodils are painted and potted, not growing wild at all. They are still the national flower of Wales and they still grow wild, in the spring, in Blackweir Gardens and beside Roath Park Lake. At least, I hope they do. I haven’t been back to check for 37 years now. Maybe things have changed, and the daffodils have gone the way of the sky lark, the cuckoo, the cowslips, and the bluebells. I wonder if the foxes still wear gloves? Let me know if you know the answer to that one. Just write “I do” on the back of the usual postcard. And you know what to do with it.

As for me, I am moving into my second childhood and, in may ways it is so much better than my first one. Here, I am free to look back on my life, to harvest my memories, to paint what I want – well, what Moo wants, anyway – and to think my own thoughts. Thank heavens Moo doesn’t think for me, though he does get his fingers covered in paint when he reads my mind and puts paintbrush to postcard, and designs his designs.

I feel very sorry for Moo. I guess he never had a childhood, so therefore, ipso facto, he can never have a second one. How much he is missing even he doesn’t know. How could he? Mysterious Moo – I like that idea. Sólo el misterio nos hace vivir, sólo el misterio. Only the mystery keeps us alive, only the mystery. And if you guessed that the author was Federico García Lorca, then you can award yourself a glow of satisfaction, for I have no prizes to hand around.

But hold on a moment, that was the title of one of Lorca’s drawings, so he was the artist, yes, but maybe not the author. Picky, picky nit-picky! Another of the joys of second childhood – annoyingly spotting the minor slips of other second-childhood thinkers – and never, never ever admit the mistakes you might, or might not make, are your own. Blame someone else. There’s always somebody out there whether to own up to your errors, especially if the price is right.

Dorset Knobs and Old Vinny

Dorset Knobs and Old Vinny

Five Lysol wipes remain in the can.
As rare as hen’s teeth or Dorset Knobs
and old Vinny, they have become precious
items sold in marked up prices online
by people who stocked up at the beginning
of the crisis on commodities they were able
to seize before rationing stepped in
and limited quantities were permitted
to each purchaser who waited patiently,
in line, to enter the super-market.

I place my leather glove on my hand
and move to the gas pump. How many people
have used it, pumping gas with bare hands,
and the metal surface retaining how many germs
who knows for how long? I cannot wear my mask
while pumping gas. Cover my face and they will
not serve me for fear I may flee without paying.
I finish pumping, open the car door, remove
my glove, put on my mask, pick up my cane,
and walk into the gas-station shop to pay.

As I limp towards the door, a man, mask-less,
holds the door open for me, his face less
than a foot from mine. “There you are, sir,”
he says, showing his teeth. “Service with a smile.”

I return to the car, remove a precious sanitizing wipe,
clean my glove, the car door handles, every spot
my gloved hand touched. Then I wipe the handle
of the gas pump and dispose of the precious wipe
in the garbage can nestled between the pumps.

Commentary:

Well, I am willing to place a bet with my favorite bookmaker, at Covey’s Print Shop, that not many of you out there know what Dorset Knobs and Old Vinny is or are. Moo has joined me in my wager and he is willing to bet that very few of you know where the line “où est le papier?” comes from. Even fewer will be able to sing the whole song! Oh dear, our world is only artificially intelligent, not really intelligent. In my teaching days I would ask the class if we were in a smart classroom. “Yes, sir,” they would reply. I’d then walk to the wall, tap it and ask it “What’s 2 + 2?” The wall never answered. I’d try again. “What’s 2 + 2?” – Silence. “Not such a smart classroom then,” I’d say to the students.

But I bet you all remember Covid, the days of taking all sorts of precautions, of wearing masks and gloves, of washing everything that came into the house, of washing hands, and not touching surfaces in public places where the unwashed may have left a winning lottery ticket with your Covid Number upon it. Oh dear, those were indeed the days. And this little poem, a golden oldie, recalls them. Let us hope they do not return. And let us doubly hope they do not return with a mutating or mutated helix of sinister proportions.

Carved in Stone 58

Carved in Stone
58

Modern shamans
roam the pyramid’s flat top,
looking for its energy point,
not knowing that, seated,
peacefully in silence,
that power will seek them out.

The more they seek,
the less they find,
yet that power seeks me out,
because I no longer seek it.
Is that the secret of creativity?

Commentary:

A long time ago my judo instructor taught me the following –

“The more you strive,
you cannot grasp it,
the hand cannot hold it,
nor the mind exceed it.
When you no longer seek it,
it is with you.”

It was the same with the St. John Ambulance course that I took. The instructor told us that we might not remember now exactly what we were doing, but if the occasion arose, everything we were practicing now would appear before us and we would just do it, knowing exactly what to do. A rugby coach, I saw and met and solves several such injuries on the field of play. Something took me over and I did what I had to do.

I still don’t know how or why. But it is the same with creativity. “When you no longer seek it, it is with you.”

Just breathe deep and believe.



Dog Daze

Dog Daze

Memories deceive me with their half-remembered shows, shadow shapes shifting over the walls with a flick of the magician’s fingers. What magic lantern now slips its subtle slides across night’s screen? Desperate I lap at salt-licks of false hope that increase my thirst and drive me deeper into thick, black, tumultuous clouds. A pandemic storm lays waste to the days that dog my mind. Carnivorous canicular, hydropic, it drinks me dry, desiccates my dreams, gnaws me into nothingness. At night a black dog hounds me, sends my head spinning, makes me chase my own tail, round and round. It snaps at dreams, shadows, memories, anything that ghosts through my mind. Hunter home from the hill, I return to find my house empty, my body devastated, my future a foretold mess. Tarot Cards and Tea Leaves are lost in a Mad Hatter’s illusion of a dormouse in a teapot raking runes from an unkempt lawn.

Commentary:

Well, what a muddle. Images flying everywhere, in and out, like Von Richthofen’s flying circus of WWI fame. And look at that last line! Tarot Cards and Tea Leaves are lost in a Mad Hatter’s illusion of a dormouse in a teapot raking runes from an unkempt lawn. No wonder Moo said “Nein!” when I asked him if he had a painting to illustrate this one. In fact, he quoted Salvador Dalí at me: “There’s no difference between you and a madman, except that some days, you aren’t mad.” I guess this implies that some days I am.

“Ah well,” said Mrs. Thomas calling her son Arwel in for tea. Welsh joke. Many won’t get it. Arwel didn’t and he didn’t get his tea either. Never mind. Those things happened a long time ago when the world was so much younger, and, dare I say it, wiser! Actually, there’s nothing wrong with the world itself. The problem, as always, just like the old woman who lived in a shoe, it’s the madmen who inhabit the shoe that are the problem. And when the shoe’s sole needs a nail, who is going to come and glue it back together. Not me, said the red squirrel, laughing. And he always laughs. As soon as it gets cold he tucks into my garage and it’s a devil of a job to get him out again.

What’s worse, he insists on building nests in my car engine. That’s three times now. And it costs money to dig those nests out. Not to mention the mess. First time, I didn’t even know he was in there until the windscreen wiper on the driver’s side started to fail. Then the whole watering system broke down. I took it to the garage, and the garagemen said “I hope you’re getting rent money, you’ve got a tenant.” Anyway, he got rid of the squirrel and the nest. But the little blighter must have followed me home, because a few days later he was back in there again. He’s in there now. I can hear him chuckling as I type this.

Dog Daze, indeed. I wish I had my doggy back. Alas, as you can see from the photo, he crossed the rainbow bridge to his doggy paradise, leaving me to contend with a garage full of ham-fisted red squirrels. No wonder my head is spinning around and I am chasing my own tail, round and round. At least he’s single, that squirrel. I don’t know what I’d do if he got married. I know my maths ain’t no good (nor is my English), but where squirrels are concerned, I am pretty sure that 1 + 1 = 6 or more and a foretold mess.