tuneful9

Sweeping the pink blossom (or is it confetti?) from the church entrance, into the early morning breeze of Mill Lane, the old verger busies himself between weddings.

Is it my imagination, or have the birds stopped singing?

A life unwritten, but at what cost? Long forgotten faces, old haunts forever lost. No trace of school for in its place a mart stands there in bold disgrace. A bustling market once rife with life fell to the council and its budgeting knife. Yes, cameras I've owned but not nearly enough did I shoot a youth past to recall the small stuff.

Oh for the beauty of France now, and that villa basking. Overlooking the fig trees that frame the tapestry beyond. There, early mornings are greeted with cereal and orange juice 'neath the shade of the ivy-strewn veranda. Then down to the pool where wet feet slap across hot stone flags, and the air is filled with the sweet scent of chlorine.

Night, after the day, when the sun has baked the earth dry, and frazzled the house, I stand half-naked at the open window, cooling in the dark and listening. Listening to the perpetual hiss of silence and a distant whirr from an unknown source always there. Finally I turn and head for the bedroom where I flop onto an unmade bed and wait for the release of sleep.

a brain festering on words that refuse to flow, on a poem that will not grow. So for the sake of writing, i write this.

Sunfire on grey pavements. Had there been any rain they'd be steaming. But there's no rain, only the sun and the heat it brings, humming steadily in the quiet of an April afternoon. No traffic moves. No people walk. Above, a dozen seagulls beat their way across the blue as they flee the deserted coastline, their cries making me long for fish 'n' chips, ice-cream and hot doughy donuts.

Outside all is still. The sun shines, the swifts soar, and enveloping it all, the silence.

Walking home from the supermarket mid-afternoon, I was consumed by a strange sense of the sea. The sun shone bright and high but a breeze blew cold and fresh and I could almost taste the salt on my lips.

Waxing gibbous moon over rooftops opposite, silvering the wet slates. It slides silently behind the chimney stack and is gone.

Lying in my bath the water half way, warm and comforting. Above the suface my knees, belly and chest, like an iceberg and just as cold.

When I die, let it be under blue skies, with my face warmed by the sun, my skin caressed by the breeze and birdsong in my ears.

Anyway, I just needed to get those thoughts down. There are a couple of poetry references in the film (Byron and Yeats) so this post counts.

You've led a hard life, battered, used, passed around. Bruised now, but oh so beautiful. More so than when you started life. Yes your spine is broken, your corners dog-eared and your edges smudged. But oh so beautiful.

Why is it that when you gain employment and suddenly find yourself with money to spare, bitter irony steps in to make sure your expenditure goes through the roof? Your car/washing machine/fridge/boiler dies a death, or an unexptected and very large bill arrives on your doorstep... anything to ensure the extra money you're earning is immediatley taken away.

I do not ask or try to understand why, such monumentally mundane thoughts and anticipations fire within my mind and flood me with joy; A mug of coffee not yet made, an unopened pack of biscuits, a long-forgotten film. But such pleasures are short-lived and born only from the expectancy. The other thoughts, far more common; the dirty laundry, a Monday morning, are like sewage to me – a torrent of shit to contaminate my soul and slay my spirit.