Written Words

As a woman,

I should speak but not too loud,

Aspire but not too much,

Reach but not too far,

Be but not threaten.

I have no country.

As a woman,

I give life,

I have my own voice,

I have my own ambitions and opinions.

I should be able to be the greatest I can be.

Deserving respect.

Because,

My country is the whole world.

‘As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.’

There is no gate

That a voice can not go through.

No lock

To place around our lives.

No bolt

To hinder our right to the choices inside us.

Nothing can hold a human soul. 

Nothing,

That you can set upon the freedom of my mind.

‘There is no gate, no lock, no bolt that you can set upon the freedom of my mind.’

Your gaze fills my body with holes, 

Waiting for me to break and scream.

Then you'll be satisfied of insanity.

From my cigarette I smoke,

Knowing what you desire.

But my innermost thoughts,

Will forever be trapped inside my chest.

No one will know what I feel or see,

Only the water can soothe a soul like mine.

When I flow in the waters,

Through the creeks and meadows,

The soil and mud that made my veins,

And pumped my heart with poisonous blood.

How fast I'll run when I hear your voice.

-

Oh find me,

Find me,

In bones.

Wonder how far I've gone,

Lost….loose trampling through woods,

Flowing into your eyes when you read my infectious words.

- Lily E.S (Poem about Virginia Woolf)

Picture Source

The sails drown in the angry tide, 

While the sailor moves his axe upon the mast, 

Looking over at the forlorn man,

Staring out at the misty sea and the land behind,

With only one thing, one feeling inside...

“My love....”

He runs his feet into the depths of pebbles.

“Where.....?” 

Her feet keep running, 

Lifting from the ground,

Like a bird trying to take flight.

Her skirts billow with the wind like a sail in a storm.

“.....soft yellow ribbons.....where are.....you..?”

Another shadow chasing....

Growing up the walls.....

Watching over her.

“.....ribbons....so soft...”

Moving his hands across his eyes,

To clean away an imaginary pain, 

His echoing calls for her, seep into the wind,

Falling forever at her feet.

- Lily E.S

Picture Source

Fraying curtains flutter against the black, dense walls,

As the moss covers her lungs in an emerald gold,

Her fingers painted with the finest jewels, 

Falling against the deep layers of her silky robes. 

Everything is still that lives in a cage

Dropped by a delicate finger the needle finds its place.

Slowly a creeping light bathes the walls in its new tune,

Her feet turn, turn, turn........slowing, falling, building, 

Music fills her head and bounces in her chest.

Silken robes, gleaming jewels fall at her feet.

All is bright in her petticoats and slippers, 

The moon’s light coats her in a tangible, liquid light.

Soft embers burn in her heart,

Doors fall onto their hinges,

As her light fills the still cage of yesterday. 

- Lily E.S 

Inspiration

- Marin from The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton

Picture Source

The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton

I found it initially difficult to get into, the first paragraph didn’t grab me so I found it easier to put down and not go back too. However eventually, I picked it up again and started reading more. By the second chapter it became more engaging and questions started to arise that’s when I became almost attached to the book. 

The writing style is easy to absorb, any word that isn’t needed has been taken out making it more concise and direct. 

The characters were I felt well developed, there is very little description of the characters which has worked out rather well as it allows the reader to picture how the characters look in their own mind’s eye. 

What became abundantely clear is the amount of mystery, which was well managed and brought through the story. It did seem to be very controlled at certain points it was very clear that the writer wanted me to know this piece of information which was perhaps a bit too obvious. It did feel as if you were being led through the story at times, at others it felt like the characters had taken over a bit more which made it more enjoyable. Perhaps if it had been loosened a bit more it would have felt more realistic. 

The ending I felt was good, the characters were in completely different situations as to when the story had started which certainly made it feel like you had witnessed their journey. However there were a couple of loose ends, questions still unanswered such as, ‘what does all of this mean for them now?’. Evidently the phrase, ‘Things can change’ meant a great deal to the story, perhaps even the main message of the story. But I wasn’t sure if it was a bit too a simple a phrase for everything the main character Petronella had been through, certainly things do change naturally in life but everything had changed in hers and only at the age of nineteen. 

Overall I thought the book was excellent especially as a first novel. The characters were brilliant some more believable than others and certainly some plots more realistic than others. However it all adds to the mystery and to the fact that the main conundrum the one that Petronella was so desperately searching for remains unanswered. Was this a good idea to leave it so open? I’m not sure but certainly if there is a sequel in the works, which I hope there is.

- LINKS

BUY 

Yes, I remember Adlestrop -- 

The name, because one afternoon Of heat the express-train drew up there Unwontedly. It was late June. The steam hissed. Someone cleared his throat. No one left and no one came On the bare platform. What I saw Was Adlestrop -- only the name And willows, willow-herb, and grass, And meadowsweet, and haycocks dry, No whit less still and lonely fair Than the high cloudlets in the sky. And for that minute a blackbird sang Close by, and round him, mistier, Further and further, all the birds Of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire.

Out of us all That make rhymes Will you choose Sometimes - As the winds use A crack in a wall Or a drain, Their joy or their pain To whistle through - Choose me, You English words? I know you: You are light as dreams, Tough as oak, Precious as gold, As poppies and corn, Or an old cloak: Sweet as our birds To the ear, As the burnet rose In the heat Of Midsummer: Strange as the races Of dead and unborn: Strange and sweet Equally, And familiar, To the eye, As the dearest faces That a man knows, And as lost homes are: But though older far Than oldest yew, - As our hills are, old, - Worn new Again and again: Young as our streams After rain: And as dear As the earth which you prove That we love. Make me content With some sweetness From Wales Whose nightingales Have no wings, - From Wiltshire and Kent And Herefordshire, - And the villages there, - From the names, and the things No less. Let me sometimes dance With you, Or climb Or stand perchance In ecstasy, Fixed and free In a rhyme, As poets do. 

Now All Roads Lead To France: The Last Years of Edward Thomas by Matthew Hollis

-

It was that time again to go looking for a new book and happily after some searching I found one I quite liked the synopsis of. I had seen Now All Roads Lead To France before but at the time I didn't buy it, until now of course.

That same day it arrived I started reading it and from that moment on until today I haven't been able to put it down. A real test of a book is how long you can go before you feel its nudge to go and read it again. For Hollis’s first biography it is a great triumph and shows a lot of skill. What becomes quickly apparent is the amount of research that has been put into the detail of the writing, holding it all together at the seams. 

The style is open and friendly, reading like fiction Hollis seems to ask of the reader to get closer and get to know Edward Thomas for themselves. A man who certainly had his own battles, most evidently with depression. However Edward Thomas is portrayed with a great honesty and rather refreshingly through the eyes of his loved ones and even reflected in those he didn't much love. The book also manages to keep the true personality and the talented, great traits of a successful author very much at the forefront of the writing. 

At first I wasn't sure how transitioning between Robert Frost and Edward Thomas was going to quite work, but then I saw how actually both complimented each other quite well. Keeping the connection solely on the friendship that they formed and not into a joint biography served very well. I think had it been a joint biography it wouldn't have finished half as well as it has. 

By also combining information about other writers at that time, mostly those Edward Thomas knew (which turns out to be a lot if not all the best ones of the era) has a great way of adding more depth and meaning to the biography. The book suddenly morphs into a different genre of biography, one that at core has a sole subject, but then also a sub-subject and then a perception on the First World War and the great writers of the day and what the changing landscape of England meant to their lives. Making this biography  gigantic and epic of sorts, encompassing literature, war and two of the world’s greatest writers in one book. The time it must have taken to draw on all these aspects to accomplish them all so well, is a great achievement in itself. 

I haven't quite finished reading it yet though I am near the end, and I can say that it is definitely one of my favourite books, certainly a must read. 

- LINKS

EDWARD THOMAS

ROBERT FROST

BUY

Life pours like torrential rain, 

Where it seeps it flows, 

Into gaps of unseeing souls, 

Moving like a restless creature,

Within thousands of chests. 

Where it'll take you and leave you,

Flows through red veins, 

Restless

Thumping

Frothing at the mouth for more. 

Beating

Like a wild heart to find something beyond ourselves.

The big blue open skies,

Exposing the sand dunes, the grassy hills of our thoughts. 

- Lily E.S

 Picture Source 

Water came down the pathway,

Such splendour and radiance,

Never have I seen something so pure,

So simply divine,

Silver light lining my throat with beauty,

Slowly the water embraces, soothes,

Making way for the flow of every beat of time.

- Lily E.S

Picture Source

Bitter cold flakes of ice creep down the walls.

Sitting below the windows,

Neither of us can move to see the world outside.

Like a distant memory it moves on without us.

So many nights have I sat here,

Watching your eyebrows twitch in the dim light,

Your fingers flexing,

Each hand wrestling,

Wrinkles forming and your mouth frothing,

Ice cracking and breaking beneath our feet,

Like shards of glass, falling over me.

Then the light turned to darkness,

“Let’s see the sunrise.”

Your hands firm around my arms.

You heave, you moan,

Till the ice breaks and covers the floor. 

- Lily El Seoud

I have been working on my first biography, Marian Lewes & The Mill on the Floss: The Life of George Eliot. It is coming on very well and it has been quite the process, writing a biography can be incredibly absorbing. It has meant that writing poetry has been put aside but I do mean to start writing more poetry again as my biography is now finished needing its tweaks and editing. 

Our hands linked together, rising above shrubs and old logs,

In our quest to run the fastest our legs could go. 

You always found the highest point, climbing to heights no man had known.

You did it for me and for the joy of adventure, risking your youth to be the big brother. 

I ran in your trail, listening for mother's shout above the hills and shimmering lakes. 

So carefree were we even the thought of a future was as distant as the night. 

But gradually our adventures became only mine, 

I ran pretending you would follow, the excitement too great to miss. 

I came to see that you'd grown out of these hills and lakes.

Like your coat had shrunk on your thin frame,

And your toes ached from the shrinking shoes.

Everything became too small for you to fit. 

I feared, like your shoes I could only suffocate you.

The future was no longer in darkness,

It came upon us when you left for the Army, 

And I stayed for the memory of when I used to fit you.

- Lily El Seoud

Picture Source

I was at the supermarket looking at carrots of all things. I never look at carrots it is almost given in my household that anything orange is not ‘food substance’ or so according to my son Timothy. I was thinking about all of this when a large, muscular man in the category of Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger looked at me with a meat eating look in his eye.

“Nice arse.” He said to me. My first thought was ‘Really?’ then it was ‘what an arsehole’. I turned my back to him and moved on deciding that standing in the face of potential danger for the sake of carrots isn't really worth it. Because really what grown man would say that to a lady with ‘Baby On-board’ across her top? (…sorting out my wardrobe is on the ‘to-do’ list) or to any woman. A year ago it would have enraged me and I probably would have called security. But now I just think what’s the point? if he’s got all those muscles and no morals, that’s his problem.

When I told my brother that evening about this he said, “He’s just paying you a compliment.” I decided to dig a little deeper. “If a muscular woman who did press ups and chin ups all day said “Nice arse.” To a man she could easily wrestle, with a sort of meat eating look on her face how do you think he’d feel?”

My brother scratched his chin and concluded that I had a point but then interjected, “…yes but that would never happen.”

“What a body builder champion woman would never say ‘Nice arse.’ To a man half her size in a supermarket?”

“No that is possible, but she wouldn’t look at him like meat.”

But men can look at woman like meat. My brother didn’t know what I was talking about but then again you’d only know that if you were on the receiving end of that look.

“We’re not all like that.” My brother said.

He has a point; it is important that you don’t blame the lot for the sake of a few. Something I often tell myself. 

I can feel the feathers on my back,

Softly folding between my shoulder blades,

Other fishtails circling my feet, foreign ridged and empty of love.

This is life, a window into another break of wonder,

Fires spilling out of our pink mouths,

Tied to the roots of these trees, where it began with you and I.

Always thinking back to when our feet were new and soft,

Wondering where the creases came from,

That take hold of our jumping hearts.

- Lily El Seoud

I was waiting in an open space, the same triangular corner covered in high trees and red blooms. It was the first time that I had stood there to truly see and consider it other than just a view. Otherwise my world was a rather grey, sleepy and dusty city.  The presence of the tall buildings around me, made them appear stark and removed from life. I had time to look, to breathe and prepare myself for what would come.

He stood in the Moroccan tiled archway of the barber’s across the road. Puffing on a cigar and aimlessly watching me ponder over a red Hibiscus bloom that had wilted to the ground. It looked like there were galaxies in his blue eyes. Each one he carefully considered and moved on in due course to the next.

We didn't flinch; there wasn't any pressing need for either of us to do anything. It was a comfort at first. But then you do inevitably say to yourself, “You can’t stand here all day".

He walked across the road looking like one of the trees, with his long frame and serious gaze.  

“You came.”

-  Eloise (Fiction)