Monday 17 October 2011

A day to sleep...

despite the rain and the chill in the air(talk in the 'telegraph' of wind,low temperatures an snow soon...) I have to go back to bed today. My normal work cycle should have seen me off this weekend(Mon/morning now) for four days...but the 'holiday rota' sees me taking over the pattern of a colleague who is off this week ...thus two night-shifts (beginning tonight) then off till two twelve hour day shifts next weekend..confused...well my body clocks a little punch drunk for sure...so soon I'll put up my black out curtain pop in the earplugs and try to sleep ready for the shift tonight...

Monday 23 May 2011

  so...the rain slides down the windows
    and catches all the flat chill sentiments in the world
      and focus's them over us, but today this tiny sepulchral slither shines
         unawares the spinning motion we make every day 
            power something else...
              another form of energy somewhere else...
                 in some other aspect of space....
                     the life that we live but don't know...
  some years ago I spent some months living in and (working from) the Schoenstatt retreat under the Campsie hills outside Glasgow walking through the grounds at night the long low chain of hills seemed to be a giant dragon sleeping, brooding challenging me with its ancient ageless wisdom..."Who are you" its seems to emanate "to wander thus and disturb my slumber with your unquiet thoughts and and fervent anxiety" and I the descendant of slime and creatures past rose up not to be daunted and said  to the sleeping creature we both have lived long in various manifestations in this time frame and if I am unquiet there is reason enough, I will not be gainsaid in what I think but equally I have no wish to disturb you, for that I am sorry but I shall offer no apologies for my thought to you or any other creature...and for the briefest millisecond seemed to be aware of how and with what long travel I came to be there....a humbling chastening and enervating experience


Tuesday 3 May 2011

On sunny weather...

Another bright morning...this begins to feel like 1994 when over here in Scotland the weather turned fine in April and basically lasted (in the same vein) till August...
    and as such it has moved the spirit...to be warmed and allowed to breathe in the summer light and
(for as the daffodils die so ends spring) be free...
   free to contemplate that which is beyond necessity...
     and beyond that yearning sea's tidal reach
        like plastic bottles littering the shore line
         in the last last episode of Kenneth Clarke's Civilisation
           we perceive the Fallacies of Hope..
              aging as I am the series reminds me
                with what awe and hunger I viewed it
                  as a young naive, bright and hopeful man
                    and now the passage of time reminds and carves deep into my soul
                       the savage seconds that mark life's passing...
                         the transitory stages of our expectation and understanding
Suns shining..been sleeping ready (just) for work tonight..my last shift for about a week...
  time for a coffee and some grub..
    a bath and pottering. Checked the specification on the tire wall(need to replace the two rear tyres...)
      to check online for replacements..
        Today Beatrice Hendry( who's brilliant first RSC exhibition opened on Friday) ran in the London marathon...
           Her father (who died e few years back)would have been so proud of his daughter...Barry was the drummer in our band(sweet blindness)...He died on a walkway beside a canal in Leicestershire near where the battle of Bosworth was fought(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_bosworth) He died alone with only his dog Wallace to witness his agonised passing...those who knew accept that while life remains and is a wonder and our truest pleasure its experience is immeasurably diminished by the mans death...At his funeral just about everyone in that packed ancient church believed they had lost their best friend....
        

Thursday 21 April 2011

Thursday am


  

   Just about to start gettin the kids up..Ive been up since 05:10...now 06:30..
     jump in the bath...so..off soon to verious schools in East Renfrewshire...First to
      Williamwood to drop Bronweyn, then to Giffnock primary to drop off Dan...
         some shopping/washing(clothes) and then nothing special to do til I
            collect the kids later on they are all off tommorow so there's no early call in the morning...

Sunday 17 April 2011

even' song

In the mackerelled deep blue moon ladenned sky the night slips into day..
  Spoke to Gill this evening on this the occasion of her daughters running (and finishing) the London marathon...Beatrice Hendry,( who's brilliant first RSC exhibition opened on Friday ) exhausted but happy ran the twenty six miles with the heart breaking logo (in memory of my daddy) on the back of her t shirt....Gills her mum and Barry was her dad and my friend and the drummer in our band(sweet blindness).... in the old church on the day of his funeral to most of those three hundred people who packed together on that emotionally charged day their best friend had died....

Saturday 16 April 2011

early morning taking a break eye's stinging very tired...
  lots of driving weather overcaste but (at the moment) dry....
    Saturday evening and the young population's out on the town...
      another twenty minutes of the break left.then back into the van..

when an old cricketer leaves the crease...

tired emotional expectant...
  the penultimate day of my working week and then off...thank the lord...for a week
     watching the genius of Roy Harper..on various mediums and at various stages of his life 
        the poet and performer...
      man and his music ringing clear and precise
     shuddering the hills 
unstill after all this time....
  and my old friend Gary...whose Roy Harper albums stressed his Englishness alongside his deep devotion to the Grateful Dead... my old pal Gary wherever and whatever he be, if at all...whose rejection of crass pretension was heroic and whose guitar technique I could never emulate...may he ever linger on the edge of the green...

Saturday 9 April 2011

the return of the car...

Its a beautiful spring day here, probably the first consistent (high)double figure warmth of this year..and my cars back...haven't had the use of it for nearly three months...working shifts(mostly back-shift 1600/2400) and nights(2400/0900) has made it really difficult, having said that using public transport(with my over 60's bus pass) has been a great experience... my colleagues(have mostly but not all!) been so helpful...thanks..also the little matter of seeing my kids...my child care arrangements are predicated on me having my own transport..the down side is having to pay for all that's happened....(more later) so its off to work in just under an hour...sqts(smiles quietly to self)....

Wednesday 6 April 2011

awake briefly after again, a brief sleep, working tonight(1900/0500
 a bagel/cheese and drink..
   this post amd soon back to sleep's champion facet(apart from dreams) oblivion
live on an ex council estate(project) that received E.U. funding to upgrade the housing stock, now its a "Housing Association"...was fairly rough and ready drink drugs all the malaise of transitional urban life...
  now a lot calmer and my home for ten years..

Tuesday 5 April 2011

before the journey the anticipation...

As of this dreer damp soft grey chill morning..
   the world in all its sharp obscurity
      breaks into my quiet mundane existence
        illuminating teasing threatening tending to...
          to pull and push raise and squash the tiny rhimed spark
             of creativity in every second of every century in each mote of dust
                in my atticed cells dancing arc through time...