Finally

Finally 

 Is the mountain still too steep? 

I think not, my step is light. 

Can I see the peak from here? 

Does it really matter? T

he scene below breath-taking! 

The climb lifts me to a different height. 

 Have I reached the top? 

Who can tell? 

Not I! 

Is this the peak I searched for? 

Or has the perspective changed the shape? 

How can I know? 

Do I need to? 

 The importance is the journey. 

This one done. 

This one finally complete. 

Do I need to tread this way again, 

Or seek this path, 

Or brave these rocky crags? 

 No, I think not, 

But there are other peaks 

With other views, 

With different ends, 

With easier tracks, 

Or harder. 

 From here the possibilities expand, 

To tread a thousand peaks, 

And tracks and rocks and valleys. 

The challenges forever there, 

But I can choose this route, 

Or that.

 Never again? 

Finally? 

Well that matters not at all. 

The journey beckons, 

The adventure, the exploration, 

And they will always call. 

And if the path leads to the top then … So it will. 

 For Dee

(Later addition ...  the power of the internet - this poem brought Mortimer back to us ... see his comment ... my blog is worthwhile after all ...)

The Search

Do you know the thing you’re searching for?
Do you know just where to look?
Is it stood behind a tight locked door?
Is it written in a book?

Is it swirling in the flowing stream?
Does it drift across the sky?
Is it melting in a hazy dream?
Is it caught behind his eyes?

Is it blowing in the misty wind?
Is it deep beneath the ground?
Is it held within a wise man’s mind?
Will you know when it’s been found?

Do your closest friends hold the answers?
Do the games you play reveal?
Does the love you make bring you chances?
What you look for, is it real?

Is it there inside you all the time?
Does the searching bring relief?
Is it crouching there within your mind?
Is it linked to your belief?

And when perhaps the answers seem clear,
Will it bring the peace you seek?
Or will you still keep looking through fear,
Till you reach the final sleep?

Retrospect

The snare, set long before it closed,
So slow did it grasp, that my brain was locked tight,
The trap springing, unfelt, unseen.

Entangled by the net of mind,
Struggle closing the binding mesh round my thought,
Then, just falling into the tomb.

No place to run, no crack could hide,
Daily life seen only as a distant blur,
Normal routine things as cage bars.

Release, a candle flame away,
Creeping slowly from the ........
.............deep shadowed cave depths,
To emerge, wary, still unsure.

The track from below, steep, unmarked,
Escape seemed flimsy, unclear, pretended strength,
Liberty only paper thin.

Then came the unexpected chance,
The air blew clear, the hidden bonds flew shattered,
Freed by the freshness of your hope.

And now perhaps grown stronger still,
Guarding against traps, confident of the road,
And aware of growing chances.

How could you know or see the need?
Or did I just take it from what’s always you?
Did you not feel the healing flow?

The in-between moments.

There’s a place back in time
When my footsteps fell light,
Where I knew I was safe,
With the sky clear and bright.

But the in-between moments
Take my strength, take my sight,
Leave me weak with despair,
And lost in the night.

At that place back in time,
I could see and was sure
My resistance was high,
And my feelings secure.

In the in-between moments
My mind disappears,
The cold eats my bones,
The terrors are near.

In the place back in time
As expectations ascend
I felt love and concern,
I knew I had friends.

Just the in-between moments
Rekindle my fears,
Gnaw into my sleep,
Melt my hopes down to tears.

19/12/01

Poem

Forlorn

No one knows what it’s really like,
No one ever will,
Locked in our own private torment,
Our own private hell.

I’m sure that we have all been there,
In that place, alone,
Where the clouds gather and darken,
And the skies are torn.

Nothing can ease that deep brooding,
It seems at the time,
But clouds lift and thin every morning,
The outlook is fine.

Put dark thoughts away in a cupboard,
Hide clouds in the sun.
Look back in a while when you can,
You will find them gone.

(So I did refine it a bit after all!)

Just a thought

The traffic lights near home were not working today. It's a busy & awkward junction. People were carefully crossing, waiting, waving each other on & moving gingerly. The traffic was still moving steadily from all 4 roads, just slotting in, no aggressive pushing. The queues were less that 5 cars long in any direction.
So it made me think, "If there were a few less rules, if we were ordered about a little less in our daily lives, would we become a little more gentle with each other and help each other solve our joint problems with a little more care? Would life flow a little more slowly and a little more smoothly?"
Of course there are always selfish people, but if the rest of us are careful, does it matter? Just let them go on their selfish way. If there were any selfish people on the road today I didn't see them, and I crossed the junction twice at busy times.

Moon 1

Am I alone?

Staring down,
Seeing my every move,
Watching with a large white eye.

Seeing you,
Wherever you are,
Sleeping, dreaming, staring back?

Are you aware of it?
Does it catch your eye?
Does it haunt you and follow you?

Am I alone,
Or do you share?
Am I the only one in this gaze?

Does it touch you?
Do you feel its white scrutiny?
Does it carry you beyond reality?

Are you like me,
Defeated by the strength,
In the control of the white watcher?

Or am I alone?

Moon 2

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.
.
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Set Free

Thoughts fly like the clouds
Driven by that unrelenting glare
Flying free beyond the reach of normal
Lost in the open desert of the sky
Where dreams and daily life merge in fantasy.

to Mannix Point

Now is not the time
Nor this the place for sadness,
But a stay and respite
From the torment of our routine madness.


This was in the back of a sketchbook with 2 pages of watercolour sketches.

The finished piece is framed on the wall in Mortimer's campsite. There's another one for the same place if I can find the right sketchbook!

Summer 1987

Water Thoughts 5

Lonely Beach

Left behind by tide
Overlooked by time,
Natures dustbin.
Endless sand,
Littered bits of shells and
Yellowing weed.

Broken wood from worn out ships,
Each piece telling its lonely tale,
After Autumn's final fling,
Clawed by early storms,
Home to hungry gulls
.............................................and me.

Started Jan 1984, continued Dec 1984, finished Oct 1986

Yes I would alter a few words for style, but I still like this one as it is! It brings back surfing memories!

Water Thoughts 4

Water

Washing up the pebbled beach,
Against the rocky cliff,
Through dark and hidden caves,
Each swirl in tree hung pool,
Rushing streams and rivers flow.

1986

The worst of the bunch really. Beth is correct when she says my style has changed. Then I was satisfied with pretty pictures, raw emotions just poured out and satisfying phrases; now I want meaning to accompany them. Reasons, conclusions, purpose, analysis, insight ... But I'm not going to alter them.

Water Thoughts 3

Rivers

Rushes bend and sway,
Icy fingers creep,
Valleys snowbound lie,
Entwined in winters sleep,
Ragged sheets of jagged ice,
Show rivers too caught in the vice of cold.

1986

A bit bland, but I would not alter it even now!

Water Thoughts 2

Ocean

Over rocks, weed and sand,
Crashing breakers fall
Energy spent it slides away
Again to form, again to break
Never ending, unrelenting.

1986. (Not a bit like anything I would write these days.)

Water thoughts

What do you do when you go surfing and there is no surf? Well in my case I carved bits of wood and made notes to write into poems. There are 5 from 1984 to 86. I taught children to write a variety of forms for poetry. These days I would quickly scan something someone else has written. In those days, pre National Curriculum, I shared the process of converting my notes into poems. This is why these poems ended up as acrostics and a "shape" poem. Let's start with that one.

I can't remember if the spelling mistake was accidental or included to make the shape work, or whether I wanted a bit of hiss in the crash!

Acrostics for Peace

In October 1986 there was an "event" to raise awareness of the need for both personal & world peace. I think it was called A Million Minutes for Peace. Everything I wrote about world peace seemed so inadequate that I focused on personal peace and chose to write acrostics. They took me exactly 35 minutes. Here they are, unaltered - Peaceful Moments & Peace.

Peacerful Moments

People walk quite close, but do not speak,
Each one trapped by the spell of early morning,
Awake, but
Caught in a web of thought that
Even noisy trains cannot break,
Following the daily path to work,
Underground,
Leaving me to dream my silent daydreams.

Morning, sitting underneath the trees,
On back to back seats in a haze of rain,
Motionless, silent,
Entering the world of "maybe, if, perhaps."
Nearness and sharing,
Treasured frienship
Speech unnecessary.

Peaceful came from when I was 19 and lived at Grandma's in Gant's Hill for a bit. I travelled by tube across London to Stanmore. The Moments was a very specific occasion sitting in the new abboretum at Rufford Park.
Finally Peace - written about the moments after a climb called Toreador in North Wales.

Peace

Perhaps the struggle of the climb,
Energy draining, full of danger,
Afraid of falls, of death,
Causes me to pause and refelect on
Everything I value.

Museum

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.




I’m surrounded by the exhibits of my tiny life
The things that make me, me.
They reassure, comfort and offer strength,
Their loss a cutting knife.

To you they may be useless, dusty old and frayed,
Things from pointless pasts,
Fragments of unimportant lives, unnecessary,
Debris of my life’s twisting road.

They tell of all I’ve known and thought and done.
Important people yesterday,
Places where life was strong, excitement, fear,
Or brief success that’s gone.

I can taste salt on that rock & feel the cutting wind.
Each time I touch the little jug,
I can see the friend who gave and hear their voice,
And feel the touching hand.

Our house was built in a fleeting span of time.
But the museum where I stay,
Has taken all my life to craft, yet still I add more flotsam,
To keep alive the flame .

(Revised 31/12/2010)

Lost Love

Originally written between 1969 and 1972, this poem nearly went in the recycling.













I reworked it (a few times) to be a little less raw and more consistent with what I currently do. So ...

Lost Love 3
The things I remember are hazy and dim,
Like faint scattered sunlight on a tree limb,
Or the echoes of thunder away in the hills,
Cobwebs with dew and grey morning chills,
Cowslips, mown grass and freshly baked bread,
And people and places in books that we read.

I go through villages, places we went,
Remembering old men tired and bent,
The places look changed and the taste of them sour,
Not as they seemed then; yet for an hour
I can still see the faces of those that we knew,
But they whither and die, lost without you.

I go to the town, those same dusty roads,
The same old grey buildings crouching like toads
On the meadows of concrete, kerb stones and tar,
Grazed by the people, chewed down by cars.
Signs in shop windows, the names of the streets,
The rustle of voices, the shuffle of feet,
Remind me of laughter and when you were here,
Now the streets seem deserted, empty and drear.

Original written between 1969 and 72
Revised Sept 2007

Of stars and sand and clouds

Of stars and sand and clouds.

The sand has trickled through the glass,
The time run out, the journey done.
Speckled with stars and gold-dust,
Tangled with skeins of fleeing clouds,
It now lies still, energy used up,
Memories buried beneath the drifts.

Was it only yesterday the glass was full
Of clean fresh sand; each grain a promise?
There seemed so much, so many hours to spend,
No cares, no urgency, no demands
To hold on to life and grasp it tight,
Or decide, or take responsibility.

Why did it run so fast? What has passed?
I hardly noticed the steady flow until
With a final flurry in settled still, all spent.
With only the stars and flecks of gold
And clouds to remind me of the places,
The times, the faces, the fears, the expectations.

Stone People

Stone People

Stone People, frozen to the sky,
Remote from reality and wondering why,
Struck by the blaze from the light on high
Statues. Unmoving, however hard they try.

Stone People, left here for always,
Held in static pose by a mindless daze,
Standing rigid, stuck in unending stance,
Passing their existence locked in a trance.

Stone People, caught somehow in time,
Unbending, petrified, cast hard in lime,
Isolated, trapped, abandoned by the stream,
Part of the landscape, part of my dream.

Garden thoughts

Something else I need to remember is how the garden looks when it's almost tidy. It doesn't happen often. Thanks Shob & Beth

The shed bits, barbecue area, pond & stream still need some work!

Chances

Chances

The barrier reaches the sky,
As high as the eye can see,
I dare not look and contemplate
This way to insanity

This side is the normal world,
Secure, mundane, well worn ,
Step into the land beyond,
There’s treasure as yet unknown.

But the dangers that lurk are threatening,
Are the gains really worth the risk?
Can the solid things this side the wall,
Be gambled against a wisp?

How can I refuse the beckon,
Or the promise of what is beyond?
Is it real, will it fade, can I take it?
Can I live in that ephemeral land?

The fire is burning still brighter,
It throws light to every side,
Should I jump and cling to the flames
And go on their wild flickering ride?

Reason demands only caution,
For safety it’s better right here,
Wild abandon offers rich prizes,
But carries a burden of fear.

Now you choose which one if you dare to,
The choices are both very plain,
But the outcome of one is stagnation,
Of the other? Could be bliss; could be pain.

August 07

Butterfly

Butterfly

Awkward
Movement slowed, gripped tight,
In a straight-jacket of pain.

Bending
An effort of will, forced round,
Sometimes too much.

Frustration
The need to escape, wrenched out,
Inner strength winning.

Curling
Close to the goal, comfort glimpsed,
The final heave down.

Freedom
Relaxed, graceful flowing glide,
In her natural element.

for Kath August 2007

Hope

Hope

Closed in, dark and pressing,
I’m searching for the light
My lungs are full and burning,
Cold fingers clutch me tight,
I’m losing hold of reason,
All that is left is fight.
And one small scrap of, “maybe …”

The only sound is crashing
Thunder in my ears,
The only thought is, “final,”
Torn from my darkest fears,
The aching overwhelms me,
And stabs and cramps and sears.
But one small scrap of, “maybe …”

Calm is spreading outwards,
From that one small scrap inside,
Catch hold once more of reason,
My mind is open wide,
Reach out, take hold, control it,
Now purpose is my guide.
But …
August 2007

Real Hope

I thought I'd better post the alternative ending, before too many of my friends think I'm feeling totally depressive. Mostly the opposite really, not manic, but elated! However, this is not the "director's cut." I've limited it to the last 2 lines of the last verse as it's only the last line that is different.
I nearly published this version instead last week, but ...


Hope




...
Now purpose is my guide.
From one small scrap inside.

August 2007







I prefer the other line, although I like the alternative graphic.

confusion

confusion

nerves jangle
brain fogs
decisions not made
solutions unfound
visions cloud
thoughts stumble
plans fade
no relief
or rest
just confusion

2:30 7th Aug 2007

Dilemma

Dilemma

The words just fall into place,
Each in its own special time,
They arrange themselves with ease,
Without searching for rhythm or rhyme.

The songs for the places are simple,
The poems for my thoughts seem to flow,
But the ones for people, they haunt me,
Where they belong I really don’t know.

The ones for places are bland,
The ones for thoughts are obscure,
But the ones for people are dangerous,
Should I chance it and share them? I’m not sure!

They mean more to me that the others,
But the damage they could do is immense,
Should I keep them, show them, or hide them?
Should I risk causing offence?

Do they leave me with feelings laid bare?
Do they show what I really should hide?
Should I write them and burn them straight after,
Or just keep them locked safely inside?

They torture my brain with emotion,
They wring out my spirit with pain,
Feelings burst to be free and be noticed,
But I crush them back down once again.

2:15 7th Aug 2007

Killing Moon

Killing Moon

The full moon screams through
my bedroom window,
Scorching patterns on the wall.
It burns my brain,
Causing wild thoughts,
To answer the silver call.

No rest

possible,
I get up and

roam
in search of

nothing.
I find a

drink,
Some

words
I’m yet again

writing.
Words forcing themselves out,
Tunes

from the day
in my head,

endlessly repeating.

My eyelids prickle,
I need to sleep,
But the moon still haunts me.
The ashen shapes of furniture,
Follow me round,
Until I'm once again free.

2:15 30th July 07

Flashback - 1970

So there I was jus browsin around some sites looking for the lyrics & tab of a song that I thought Tony Joe White used to sing round about 1969 & I found a link to my favourite rock festival ever! It cost me 50/- (that's 50 shillings or about £2.50 to you) to see all those bands.
http://www.ukrockfestivals.com/Holly-fest-menu.70.html We slept in Dad's dormobile just about where the letter C for car is for MAIN CAR PARK on the map. I've still got the (slightly crumbling) programme somewhere! Go to the crowd photos & see if you can see me - I'm there somewhere!

And then I found the link to the 1969-71 Buxton All Nighters! Yes I was there too & remember the bands. http://www.ukrockfestivals.com/buxton.html

And the Nottingham ones!!!! http://www.ukrockfestivals.com/nottingham-festival.html

I've got anecdotes about all these concerts - not sure I should share them - too trivial although funny at the time, too personal or er um unsuitable.

Found that Tony Joe is still on the road singing - but never found the lyrics I was looking for. Perhaps he never sang it - I don't even know the name of the song! I suppose I'll just have to go on singing my own version & attributing it to "Tony Joe White or someone!"

Subway Art

My favourite "gallery" in the 80s was the foot subway under Clifton Bridge. I cycled to work the long way round every day & smiled at the pieces, stopped & read the statements. Went back later & photographed the new ones.
One evening I encountered one of the writers. He was a bit shifty & started to walk off. I didn't want to stop him working, so I went home & came back later to photograph. This is the first post of several as I try to enhance the old photos & separate pieces from the groups. Some were taken early morning others late evening so the light affects them.
The first 2 are general group pictures on opposite sides of the bridge.

Hard to get a good angle on this one because of the narrowness of the subway.
This was one of my all time favourites. I envied the writer his skills. I would love to be able to do "public" greetings of this nature!

A Touch of Computer Madness always appealed to me too!







More to follow ...

aRT OR vANDALISM -pArt 3

Last few bits from 2003




I was given a book round about 1985 - Subway Art by Martha Cooper & Henry Chalfont, when Stan saw my photo collection of pieces from that time & got me to take him to see some of the originals. Thanks Stan, still enjoying it.

aRT OR vANDALISM - Part 2

More from the Clifton Bridge "Gallery" 2003.

My favourite from this set carries a message!

This also tends to be lost to the tiny minds. Of course most are anti-establishment messages & so might make a few people uncomfortable.
I agree with this one though, "War is the death ... of human reason." Perhaps that should be on the side of a lorry!

Even the embelished tags can be attractive.

aRT or vANDALISM?

As we drifted down the river tonight I was reminded of my interest in "folk art." By a piece on a wall overlooking the embankment. It was actually a very poorly executed version of




and this is a poor rendition of what the statement should look like! Think New York Wildstyle!
It did however take me back to 1980 when my interest in such works of art was first sparked by some delightful pieces in the foot subway near Clifton. I need to search through the shoe boxes to find my photos of the originals which I will post as soon as I find them. However stepping back a mere 3 years, here is the first post in my series on my favourite local art galleries.
This set is for Sarah!


No entrance fee, all the galleries are open to the public 24/7.

Sadly you have to get there before the "buffers" from the local council arrive to eradicate this free exhibition.

The question is not "Art or Vandalism?" but "Who are the vandals?" Not even the men in trucks with anti-graffiti paint, but the small minded policy makers who think art costs millions, is owned by someone & hangs in galleries. If they had been around a few thousand years ago, the heritage left to us by early cave painters would have been scrubbed off the day after it was daubed!

The really funny thing is that when it is commercial, painted on the side of a lorry & paraded round the streets as advertising, it hardly gets a second look.

If it is sprayed on a blank featureless piece of concrete there is a sudden uproar amongst the tiny minds.



Meanwhile enjoy a couple from 2003







More to follow ...