The Lost Child

You are hiding here inside me

I know the flutter of your

heartbeat

feel the stifle of your

laughter

hear the childish footfall

pounding

as you run the terraced

streets

of this small provincial

town

Where have you gone now?

I know you live within me

somewhere

feel your distant shallow breathing

catch your first time sense of

wonder

at your new seen world

unfolding

now overgrown with

passing time

photograph All Saints Church West Bromwich

Birdlike

Charles Mingus
frees Eric Dolphy, birdlike
from his orchestral sound-cage
squawking & honking like an
angry goose devoured by
a Lovebird, while bells &
whistles sound a retreat.

Notes hanging in the air
with the impermanence of smoke.

photograph : Andy Hamilton's hands

Homage to Goldsworthy : Secret Friend

I am the Rock
You are the Sea,
a secret friend
washing over me.

Time and erosion
will make us one.

my photograph inspired by Andy Goldsworthy, words inspired by a friend

Hands

You have beautiful hands
When hands were handed
out
You were head of the queue.

You have beautiful hands
long, slender stem-like
fingers
Your favourite foliage?
Palms? Digitalis?

You have beautiful hands
If I were a guitar
I would love you to
Stroke my strings, pluck me
until I gave sweet music

You have beautiful hands
If I were Braille I would
have you read me
gentle sensitive fingertips
moving over me

I would offer up this
one simple truth
Your hands, they are beautiful.

Summer 2003

Meditation on Epstein's Head of Rabindranath Tagore

A curator's creaking shoe
damages the reverential silence,
the well modulated tone of tour guide's
voice echoes in the space.
Beneath the opaque glass dome
with its shifting play of light
thrusting bronze made flesh,
firm flowing beard touched
by a thousand curious fingertips,
gazed upon with mild passing
interest, ignored by some, hollow
eyed coldness radiates something
of wisdom, something of death.
Its inner life ticking like a
God-given mechanism,
it says, look at me, I'm creator,
created, manipulated, patinated,
I know your secret.

written on studying Epstein's bronze of Tagore in Birmingham Art Gallery

Quicksilver

When thinking of me
Remember this

Colourful words once
tinted my speech

I had a childhood,
now forgotten

Responsible work, hobbies,
a strong sense of right & wrong.

Dreams, some realised, some
of which I never spoke,

Nor will I ever.

My hands, my mind,
fine cutting tools.

My tongue too.

I was not always good,
or bad. Always myself,

And ever shall be.

Though I sometimes appear
beyond reach.

Like liquid,
like smoke,
like quicksilver.

Summer 2003 - John Dando House

Rain Spells

Tiny flying insects
suspended weightless motes
hang in heavy air above lavender.
A sudden rumbling of thunder and
fine rain beats a small tattoo
on the canopy above my head.
Parched Earth sighs her relief as
the last rays of angled sunlight
rake vibrant green leafed bamboo.
A delicate watercolour of sound
washes this singular moment
clarinet, piano, flute & strings
suspended notes cluster in
Summer evening air
like small descriptive insects.

Written in my garden while listening to 'Rain Spells' by Toru Takemitsu on headphones.

Unrequited

It wasn't the sex he craved so much
as its aftermath.
Lying naked, entwined, the soft
feel of skin against skin,
Imagined whispered, intimate
breathy conversation.
Drifting gently into dreamless sleep,
waking to renewed passion.
These were his constant distracted
thoughts in her presence.
Thoughts of which he never
gave voice.
Neither did she.

Summer 2003

Beached

Feel my feet anchored
firmly to the Earth
its diurnal turning
telegraphs throughout my
bones.
Venus skims her arc
across the sky above my
head
I am waiting, waiting.

Waiting for that memory to arise.

The moving tide shifts
its waves towards the Moon
it sucks and heaves its spume
in elemental
motion.
Breeze with tang of ozone
circulating air
draws its silver clouds about the
ocean
I am waiting, waiting.

Waiting for that memory to arise.

A Brief Life

He awoke
early one morning
Short of breath
not for
Long


march 2002

Gilt

We shared a bottle
of vodka,
Reminisced about
things which never
happened.

I woke, my head
shrouded in guilt
fingernails painted
Gold.

What was all that about?

21/4/2008

The Storyteller : John Russell

Written on June 11th. 1998 and found this evening April 13th. 2008 in a notebook.


I'm sitting in the bar of the British Legion club at the end of my road. I've had a pint, read some of my book, grudgingly exchanged a few pleasantries with the bar man. He's a 1950's throwback, tweed trousers, bracers, shirt, tie, plastered back dark hair.

I've been thinking about John Russell.
He died on Monday. I received a 'phone call on Tuesday from a family friend to let me know. John's been ill for over a year off and on. Pneumonia has kept him hospitalised for the past six weeks. When I saw his wife, Molly, on Friday I took him a 'get well' card from our photographic society members. I was due to visit him in hospital on Friday but he'd had an operation to remove fluid from his lungs and according to Molly was "out cold". I also took her a copy of the portrait I'd made of him which I call, 'The Storyteller' together with some talking books that I'd promised to pass on to him. I don't know whether he regained consciousness.

Earlier today I was trying to compose a letter to Molly. It was more difficult than I'd anticipated. I wanted to say so much about how I feel about him but found the right words wouldn't come.
Last night I sat trying to find a quote from Shelley's 'Adonais' which John and I had discussed one night in one of our many pub conversations. I intended to finish the letter with it.

"Peace! peace he doth not sleep
He hath awakened from the
dream of life"

Goodbye John.

11th. June 1998

Blues for Booker Ervin

South West Texan rasp,
redolant of late night bars neon streaked streets whorehouses;
muscular, masculine scalding tenor horn,
life lived, breathed through mouthpiece reed and keys,
buffered blue notes floating on air,
collide, collude with my eager, earnest ears;
'Cry Me Not' 'A Day to Mourn' 'Our Love is Here to Stay' 'I can't get Started'
now its finished.

Burning Up the Pain into a Gale of Jazz

"Burning Up the Pain into a Gale of Jazz"

Snakehips could have moved to this -

random, rhythmic, serpentine undulations -telegraphing through bones and nerves like loose electricity, in search of Earth.

A single breath begins the dance -

Spring renewed, green energy, visceral and Pagan -

Autumn; the notes fade to silence.

Thunderous applause - like quenching rain.