Heavy-headed hyacinths struggling to stand straight
are lolling, lowering their heads
like children overtired, longing for rest
but graceful, still holding their pose, ballerinas
perfect poetry, as Degas’ dancer
motionless for all eternity.
22nd February 2022 Hounoux
Someone at Apple has been selecting and sorting
swiping through my photographs
to create surprises, albums
sometimes set to music
Now there’s a nice job, and thank you
I’m thinking, person at Apple
sat I imagine for too many hours
wrecking your eyesight
swiping and sorting
surely a person - jeans, sweatshirt, casual attire-
no algorithm
curated today’s delight, worked through my night
and called those sun-risings and settings
mostly with mountains, pinking
Golden Hour
17th February 2022 Hounoux
Do you remember?
Do you remember Jen, I said
on WhatsApp casually called
my midnight your late breakfast
our Christmases long passed, sixty years ago
and, no surprise, you do.
I think of licking gummy strips for yards and yards of chains
aged 6, class 3, and holly sprigs on bottle tops
doorstep harbingers; my mother steamy in the kitchen
harassed by giant ham, and mince pies multiplying
chief Maker of Magic stirring fudge and fretting.
And I remember Jen, but do not say,
my stricken self as you, departing, waved
Australia bound.
It seemed a kind of death, too many miles and far.
But who’d have guessed, imagined in a dream
such fiction fantastical
a casual call at midnight, free and clear,
two old friends in a video link
reducing the years and years, the farewell tears
too many miles and separation
all now nothing
curtesy of WhatsApp, bona fide on an iPhone
our marvellous miracle.
21st December 2021 Brighton for Jen, with love
Love left behind
The crochet hook’s a lovely thing
slim and slippery, with shine
apt and fitting as a pen
describing, fleet and flash
a dance with ribbons or a song
rise and fall in and out
the even rhythm soothing
and in its wake the memory of summer
click clack of spinnakers, wild white waves
gulls’ cry, salt in a spray
sunlit days, autumn’s abundance
sweet smoke rising.
Watch the wake unspooling
love left behind
in legacy.
 |
Product and legacy
I listen to Stella who knows about art and artists
their lives and work
what others thought of them ( too often Ruskin)
and I try to piece together, this one before that one?
Whistler influenced and influencing ( unpleasant modern verb)
how to go from pre to post
realism / neo,
from Ah a chair, a jug, clearly an interior
Dutch perhaps?
To colours spattered, carefully it seems
Pollock not random
and certainly not Rothko, those colours most deliberate
and on the canvas making each other sing
zing out loud,
via Turner, moving to abstraction
Academy decisions unheeded
and Monet by the water blurring as he aged
or Picasso dissecting his women
and the dead of Guernica
Klimt and Klee, gold alluring like kintsugi
Japanese poured in cracks
or Midas in the myth.
I think of Haiku, sonnet, quatrains, ballad form
heroic couplets rhyming and words
tossed in the air like Pollock’s paint
spattered random, rearranged, free fall
and ponder history and timeline
art in all its forms adored/ abhorred
poured from the pen the brush
or pebbles spiralled on the sand
Gormley’s men submerging by the sea
product and legacy, sand blasted into glass
or castles just between the tides
art in all its forms or shapeless
head hand soul
product and legacy?
November 11th 2021 Hounoux
A show and tell
On nightly news, grim
Attenborough and Thunberg
affirm the fearsome truths
message not obscured
clear as catastrophe
whilst islands drown and forests burn
and storms are fierce raging
all balance thrown, the planet out of kilter
Here through the windows
Autumn’s blaze is beautiful
bright in the low sun’s slant
and spotlight
furrowed fields with lines of vines
vibrant yellows, red
first snow sparkle along the blue haze chain.
So all our world’s a picture book
glorious and aglow
a show and tell
one wordless plea, on bended knee
a Look, how lovely !
All balance thrown
our planet out of kilter.
November 6th 2021 Hounoux
Lured by the lustre
Iridescent gold
curling in coils, palette knife
lilies for gilding
Lilies for gilding
angelic wings and haloes
Iridescent gold
Midas and magic
alas, lured by the lustre
glamorising touch
Glamorising touch
indigestible error
Tutankhamen’s tomb
12th August 2021 Hounoux
