“I work in a match factory.” “Do you put the heads on?” “No. I put the gloves on. They’re boxing matches.”
A golden oldie, still vibrant, from the Goon Show, BBC, 1950’s.
Your gloves are off now and they lie on the table where you work. How long have you had them? Fifteen, twenty years? Like good wine, carefully stored, old friends are better with age.
A second chestnut from the Goon Show: “Have you put the cat out?” “No, dear. It wasn’t on fire.”
And that’s another good reason why the water tower, and its full renovation, is so very, very important.
Bible and Water Tower, hand in glove: “And Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like any of these.”
Comment: A gorgeous photo, colors and textures, light and dark, from my friend, Geoff Slater, the line painter and muralist. He is working on restoring the mural on the water tower in St. Andrews-by-the-Sea, New Brunswick, Canada.
so easy to forget the troubled times when the lines of life did not align with what we thought we wanted even if we didn’t really want it and it wasn’t any good for us anyway but we did it in spite of knowing all the time the harm it would do short term long term and the results of that one false step walk with us still and we wish we could wash away the stains on our hearts souls minds memories underwear but the strings are knotted and tied and we can forget them knot
On days like these, the center must hold, but not just hold, it must writhe and strive to live longer, be stronger, to hold together so that the periphery understands that it too is at the center of an extended web of life that contains us all, you and me, past and future generations, in a great chain of being alive and knowing that yes, we are here, we are, at heart, really only one, and totally unique, is spite of the sameness that sometimes surrounds us as time’s spider-web unravels, oh so fast, so slow, and yet still we are here, and still the center holds.
On a sunny morning, the sun lights up my bedroom wall. Each day he arrives earlier and earlier, a minute a day. Now days grow longer, a sure sign that spring is on its way.
As I lie awake, waiting for the sun, I sing my morning sunshine song. It keeps me warm and comforts me. I also count the birds that fly across the garden in search of sunshine and food.
Crows come first. They perch atop the highest trees and watch and wait. Mourning Doves come next and their dawn song is a mourning chorus, “Who-who-who’s next? called from branch to branch. With the sun come Chickadees, Pine Siskins, lazy Blue Jays, Juncos. These are all regulars.
Irregular are my neighbor’s Cardinals, orange and red, American Goldfinches, two small woodpeckers, a Downie and a Hairy, a Nuthatch.
Gone now are the Gray Jays, Gorbies, Whisky Jacks, those ghosts of the woods. Lost too are the Greater Pileated, the flocks of Grosbeaks, Evening, Pine, and Rose-Breasted.
They may come back, but somehow, I doubt it. For now, the Blueness of Jays, the Blackness of Crows, and an unsubtle dawn chorus of Caw-Caw-Caw-Caw-Caw.
Some days the clouds roll in. Your world turns from gray into fifty shades of black.
These are the days when the sun seems as lost as you. But the sun isn’t lost. It hides behind clouds, maybe, but it’s there.
That’s where the sun storm comes in. Clouds have silver linings and the sun, once seen, will never, ever be forgotten.
Hold its image in your mind. Breathe in the sunshine. Let it flood through your body and shine out through your heart.
Now, you will never be alone, and the sun will walk with you, all your days, and be remembered even in the darkest night when paths disappear and all seems lost.
Mood music caught between brush and paper then trapped in notes that sing in acrylic colors.
Colored music and music expressed in colors that dance on the page and light up my face and the room with joy and light.
What figurines dance here, before your eyes, partners, each one different for each of us, moving in a musical mood that captures a moment of magic, brush magic, with silent colors flowing but all too ready to burst into song.
Paintings: doors you can walk through, windows that open onto visions of another, more beautiful life. Deeper than the paint, the thoughts and words that formed them, brushed them into life, an ephemeral life, so brief that butterflies seem to last longer and flowers live for all eternity.
Transience and insubstantiality. Change is all around us, we are surrounded by change. But the deepest changes, the ones that affect us most are internal, set deep within us, death’s eggs hatching slowly since the day we were born.
Life is indeed short, and art endures. Carved five thousand years ago, in stone, this magnificent henge, first Wood-henge, then Stonehenge, majestic at the dawn of time, with its sarsen stones, pillars, post-holes, and labyrinths, circling within circles, a frail spider-web of sunlit brilliance.
Lost now, the message, as my own message is lost, covered by paint, though words emerge in the strangest places, allowing us to peer in through windows as long-lost words and worlds whirl out through carved and painted windows and everlasting doors.
Doors First version
Paintings are doors you can walk through, windows that open onto visions of another, sometimes better, life. Deeper than the paint are the thoughts and words that formed them, brushed them into life, an ephemeral life, so brief that butterflies last longer and flowers live for all eternity, or so it seems.
Transience and insubstantiality. Change is all around us, we are surrounded by change. But the deepest changes, the ones that affect us most are internal, set deep within us, death’s eggs hatching slowly since the day we were born.
Life is indeed short, and art endures. Carved five thousand years ago, in stone, this Towie ball with its labyrinths and circles. Lost now, the message, as my own message is lost, covered by paint, though words emerge in the strangest places, allowing us to peer in through windows as long lost words and worlds walk out through carved and painted doors.
Comments: Limited edition. 40 copies. Self-published and printed by Covey’s, Prospect St., Fredericton. Free to workshop participants (all four of them!) and to anyone who asked for one. I also gave away free copies of my books to all participants as a reward for having the courage to brave Covid – masked and socially distanced – and to listen to me and share my ideas.
Comment: My first publication with Cyberwit.net. A pseudo-autobiography masquerading as a memoir. The original version of On Being Welsh was awarded first place in the D. A. Richards Prose Award (WFNB, 2020). It is available online from Amazon and Cyberwit.net.
Comment: My second publication with Cyberwit.net. allison Calvern helped me select and order these poems and my thanks go out to her for all her hard work. Geoff Slater and Ginger Marcinkowski also read and commented on the poems. Stars at Elbow and Foot covers 30 years of writing poetry, 1979-2009. It took a year or more to pull those thirty years together. It is available online from Amazon and Cyberwit.net.
Comment: My third publication with Cyberwit.net. An early version of The Nature of Art and the Art of Nature placed second in the A. G. Bailey Award for a Poetry Manuscript (WFNB, 2020). I revised it during my second residency at KIRA (May-June, 2021), sharpening the vision and concentrating on the links between one creative form and another. Geoff Slater and Ginger Marcinkowski again read and commented on the poems and Geoff suggested that I write the Prelude: On Reading and Writing Poetry. It is available online from Amazon and Cyberwit.net.
Comment: My fifth book of the year, self-published and printed by Covey’s, Prospect St., Fredericton in a limited edition of 40 copies, once again given free of charge to my creative friends. Patti painted the flower on the poet-painter’s cheek and I thank her for that. Geoff Slater played a large role in my pain–ting and drawing by persuading me that my cartoons were not worthless. John K. Sutherland has long supported my cartoon art, and he encouraged me to ‘leave tangible footprints’ and to get some of my art work into print. I couldn’t have done it without Salvador Dali, though, and that’s my version of his watch going over the waterfall.
Comment: My comments on a year’s work as a creative artist would not be complete without a mention of the Kingsbrae International Residencies for Artists that take in the summer months in St. Andrews, New Brunswick. I received an invitation to attend KIRA in May-June, 2021. I would like to thank Lucinda Flemer and the KIRA support group for their kindness in inviting me back. The creative friendships that I have made with KIRA artists over the years have just been amazing and the whole atmosphere at KIRA is not just inspiring, but awe-inspiring. Just look at this. How could a writer not be inspired.
Dawn from the Red Room at KIRA
I would also like to mention the online workshops that I have taken with Brian Henry, of Quick Brown Fox fame. I attended the Friday morning advanced writers workshops from January to March, and again from September to December. His knowledge, skills, organization, and support are second to none. I have made many wonderfully creative e-friends across e-mail and our Zoom classes. My year’s work would not be complete without a tip of the hat and a great big thank you to BH & QBF.
Final Comment: I am grateful to Jan Hull, Stoneist, for her reminder that today is Old Year’s Day and that the Roman deity, Janus, is a two-faced deity, with one face looking back towards the old year, as I have just done, and the other looking forward to the future, as I am doing right now. All in all, a busy year and a very enjoyable one. Let us hope that next year is also an enjoyable and a very creative one.
How do you frame this beaver pond, those paths, those woods? How do you know what to leave, what to choose? Where does light begin and darkness end?
Up and down: two dimensions. Easy. But where does depth come from? Or the tactility, the energy, water’s flow, that rush of breathless movement that transcends the painting’s stillness?
So many questions, so few answers. The hollyhock that blooms in my kitchen is not a real hollyhock. Intertextuality, visible and verbal: this is a poem about a painting of a digital photograph of a hollyhock, a genuine flower that once upon a time flourished in my garden.
A still life, naturaleza muerta in Spanish, a nature morte in French, a dead nature, then, portrayed in paint and hung alive, on display, in this coffin’s wooden frame.
Comment: Back home in Wales, Christmas Day was for family and Boxing Day was for friends. I guess the same traditions still exist here in Island View. And what better friend than Geoff Slater? I met him in 2017 at the first KIRA residency and we have been friends ever since. We have worked on so many projects together: painting, creative workshops, videos, sound recordings, poetry, and short stories. He has illustrated several of my books, McAdam Railway Station, Tales from Tara, Scarecrow, and I have put some of his drawings to poetry, Twelve Days of Cat. Last, but by no means least, his painting of a hollyhock from my garden appears on the front cover of my latest poetry book, The Nature of Art and the Art of Nature (Cyberwit, 2021). The title of the collection, incidentally, came from sundry discussions we had on the nature of art and the Prelude: On Reading and Writing Poetry (pp. 7-31), was written at his suggestion. Poems to Geoff can be found on pp. 43, 44, and 61-62 of The Nature of Art.
So, Boxing Day is for friends. And I dedicate it to Geoff Slater and all the many friends I have made in KIRA, Kingsbrae, and throughout my multiple meanderings through the realms of academia, coaching with the NCCP and the NBRU, researching in communities like the ACH, the AATSP, and the MLA, various editorial positions on academic journals like the IFR, BACH, STLHE Green Guides, STLHE Newsletter, La Perinola, AULA, CJSoTL, Canadian Modern Language Review, Calíope, translating for different associations, including the Discalced Carmelite Nuns in St. Joseph’s Convent, Avila, and volunteering with STLHE and the 3M National Teaching Fellowship. To all those friends out there, including my friends and e-friends in TWUC, the LCP, and the WFNB, and those on Facebook, my blog, and my online Skype and Zoom courses and meetings, plus, of course, those I know via Quick Brown Fox, you are not forgotten. Here, for you, on Boxing Day, is a hug or a wave of the hand and a great, big thank you for being there.
Selection of my books on the sea-shore at Holt’s Point.
White flame, her hair, emerging from shadows, lighting her path downhill toward water’s edge. Wind-driven waves splash lake-side where she will wander. I watch her footsteps, not now as firm as once they were. Burgeoning age
grips hip and joint. Toes and heels no longer lift in the same old way. Component parts break down, arteries clog, arthritis worms, painful, into fingers, wrists, and knees. I recall nursery rhymes: “Jack be nimble, Jack
be quick,” but she isn’t anymore and neither of us could jump over candles. Candlelight, inner light, outer light, her hair, so pure, so white, her voice clear as a bell, soft yet luminous, as she picks her way on a perilous path through wayward
woods, not stumbling yet, nor lumbering, and still she lives, as I still live, in hopes to see each other, until earth stops our eyes and we can see, sense, touch, hear no more …
Comment: Yes, we got married 55 years ago today. This poem, written for Clare, appears on page 120 of The Nature of Art and the Art of Nature in the section entitled The Nature of Human Nature. I have written several very personal poems about Clare and our relationship and they can be found in Secret Gardens the chapbook I published in 1991 on the occasion of our 25th wedding anniversary. Several poems from that collection also appear in Stars at Elbow and Foot. Selected Poems, 1979-2009.(Cyberwit, 2021). The painting that decorates this page is also by Clare. She is a talented multi-media designer and several of my book covers were designed by her. This is one of her rare paintings. We have three of them on the wall, and they are all exceptional.
rogermoorepoet 