Bertram Mill’s Circus
Won a competition organized by my Comic: 2 ringside tickets to Bertram Mill’s Circus. Know what a Circus looks like because of a colouring book with pictures of women standing on backs of palomino horses that run around a sawdust ring making cyclic rhythms. It was a long time ago but can still image it. Did dad take me? Let’s say he did. Not sure but low slow ‘ee’ sounds sound so good.
dream grows
in imagination
lights sparkle
Everybody adores trapeze acrobats. Even with a safety net upside down swings somersaults coiled catches scare startled eyes closed. Still see whirls of stars flash across a sawdust arena stage. Shadows enter unbidden. Never thought to think what dad thought about these beyond thought actions what with his missing limb. Bet he wishes for something different as he pushes up a heavy body before a drop onto clutch crutches.
high atlantic wind
catch twisted clouds
no one blown away
queue
They push. They barge. They bang into anyone or anything coming any other way
inside silence
between dirt filled moments
transparent screens spread
listen to that heated crackle
inside dark grey smoke
Pedestrian walkway narrows into a quagmire that ends at death camp path of sloshy food detritus, garbage noises and mixed-up bones.
not a long time
before that final meet
try to assess this day
against others that burst
with heart pounding stars
In STARBUCKS coffee queue is long. There are insufficient seats for all. Blonde hair, over an underlying base of another black undercurrent, is wind rambled. Dark grey clouds break into torrential rain. Few escape STARBUCKS
longest walk
of an unexpected epoch
young rabbits
swim thin inside watery pies
and short term concubines
wizard of landescapes and of things scalpel
short tomorrow
beyond flow of daffodils
deep grey clouds layer
Valley floats in frost skin shimmers. Under cover of
dark, copycat fields stirs a brew of decaffeinated carols from a
combination of owls, sleepy sheep, squawking geese, choirs of
Primary School children. Ice-clinging branches glisten. For a
moment stars cover dreams that are more Yes than No. First
dragons drug into sideway rhythms. Small ones from Llandysull,
up valley north of Carmarthen, arrive late. Push before pull.
Chased into corners, rushed shadows fade inside wet orifices.
Wee tree fairies tinkle into smiles before a puff raise them
above circling bats. Covered in lights, fluttering tinsel, they
explode into bits that blizzard onto a frost skin valley, dark
copycat fields, owls, sleepy sheep, squawking geese, children.
Images on mirror frames plagiarize this pick-and-mix landscape.
forever hill
strains over waterways
more icy road
In such a night, silent snowflakes fill gaps with faintest
of scents. So want to be a living part of it, attached to a silk
stocking fantasy from which come most bedtime pictures.
Against a grey background, new cirrus clouds overlap.
High winds drag edges into wispy webs. Below, a line of hills
layer behind a lake’s broken surface, play passion games. Sated,
we are lured along a long beach that appears as if from within
silver blurred poetry. No reason to complain. High, inside grey
colours, movement is slow as you like. Here they come, finding
a way through fluffy fools-gold pierced by a grey prism.
gossamer thread
filters sun gold patina
cloud shadows impinge
In front, pink drift of sun conjures colour risks. Mouth,
open to clouds, talk at a mobile telephone: “Learning to taste
smells inside false flower colours. I am. Yes I am. Can tell what is
different about triads when held under water. That’s not it.
Mean…where are sounds for it? Helicopters fly over. Pilots look
down on a fuzzy edged furrow. Intermingled sexes follow each
other along its fenced-in length. So it seems to swerving pilots.
Supermarket reached just in time. Buy sacks of mixed daffodil
bulbs. Drive home. Plant them higgledy-piggledy just in time for
water enhanced clouds to burst above a Yellow Flood.”
blue flock undercloud
rainbow follows rain
into golden dusk
So many shores in so many lands over so much time.
Dunes escape waves. Oozing river mud roads drown. Incoming
layers full of outgoings. Unranked voices seem to coo, to woo,
to glue blue-grey clouds onto me onto you. Glad you caught me.
Sound clefts open to shape of duller night. “Yes” we say. “We
accept fuzzy edged furrows seen from helicopters, grey caves darker
at both ends, echoes of wind-resonating stories, make light of
swords waving a guttural swish.” Determined daffodil leaves
appear. It is time for us to dissolve into smoke twists. “Quick.
Hide inside Sea Scroll adventures” I advise her.
stifled grass
top cover for burials
with no coffins
Late March morning, sunny with a crisp tang at ground
level. Plain fields lacerate. Others are wild with primal daffodils.
Thousands of yellow-headed sculptures sway. It is late evening.
Sudden throbs of luminescent white disappear inside an allround
smile. Emerge when full. Play turns to me. Pokers in
hand, bending, firebricks are rattled into steaming heat.
“Win” you order.
“I’ve lost. Sorry!” Cover nakedness with a clump of limp foliage.
room for sale
from an internet event
new murmurs
“Cast aside those wishy-washy ochres. It’s not becoming in a
landscape. If you take it seriously I’ll talk you through a dream”.
“OK. I take it seriously. I do. Take me through a dream.”
“There’s this bed. In my bedroom, but not my bed. ‘Haven’t seen
you for ages. Why?’ A woman smiles a distracted smile. ‘Undress.
Quick. I’ve other patients. Nights are busy’. ‘Everything?’ ‘Of
course. Lovely. I’d forgotten how tactile are your dips, your rounds.
Pure magic.’ Runs fingers over an electric quiver. ‘Now for whatever
is internal’. Reaches in. Harsh search. Then out it comes; blood,
musty smelling clots, decayed seaweed, foliated branches. Calls
over doctor of indeterminacies. ‘Look at this. Long hairs of mussel
shells.’ ‘Where’s mussels? Where’s mussels?’ Pulls out handfuls
of slime-covered mussels that agglutinate into dog shapes whose
legs thin into transparency followed by bodies until only seethrough
skulls remain. No one else sees, even after pointed out to
three boys over-concerned with a bit of a little girl’s body. Doctors,
beyond my pink blossom cleft, still forage for red gold. With a
stream of yellow grey bile everything fades out of existence.”
“What do you think? Can you understand?”
Me? Look down, eyes screwed to simulate involvement. Silent.
Stay long inside silent.
“Look at that grey area of cirrus clouds. Must be a high wind. See
how it is dragging edges into sticky wisps.”
Reach for your quivering hand. Still silent. Look up carefully.
This time I lose All and Everything
only U now
death of black back cloud
forms web attachment