Singing as the darkness lifts 20/11/2023
I sense a vague smell of
disinfectant wafting along on the air, but it is not a crisp clean smell. I do
not get any other notes and the morning does not feel as November-cold as it
has done lately. Streetlights are brighter than stars this morning, but the
stars are there as the sun begins to light the sky.
The week saw the opportunity for me to immerse myself in the cinema experience of Dolly Parton launching her new album, ‘Rockstar’. It was wonderful to feel myself pulled into that amazing space of being totally in the moment of joy as the big screen gave me the visuals and the sound surrounded me. I love that feeling. Some of the songs in the album resonate with me from the past and I don’t think I will ever forget the time in a pub when someone asked, “What did you say?” and without a moment’s pause I sang back the lines from “What’s Up?” (I said, hey-ey-ey. Hey-ey-ey. I said, Hey, a-what's going on?". I think you had to be there, but if you ever find yourself in a similar situation I can highly recommend it for surprise and hilarity.
The week also included three days of coaching training which means that the taught element of the course is now seventy-five percent complete. I feel proud of my progress so far, and this week reawakened my desire to read around the subject again. Most of my book reading was done before the course started in September and now I want to revisit those books and also explore more widely. For me there is a real energy in coaching that suits me so well and seems to totally complement my love of poetry. There is a balance to this energy for me which makes my heart sing.
There is a Christmas pudding in the cupboard now that was not there last week thanks to a friend who makes an extra one each year as a gift for Kath and I. My kind of gift, because it comes with love and thought and is delicious. I am already looking forward to the moment of making it flame blue before enjoying it the first time with custard and the next times with ice-cream! Oh, and meeting to exchange gifts meant going out for coffee and this is something I am learning to do since my new relationship with Mondays began and I seem to be quite good at it now.
I read a little about fruit flies following last week’s blog and I think I might set down my own drosophila poem ready for Top Tweet Tuesday this week so if you see that on social media you will know how it originated.
For now I will leave you with ‘Silence’ (originally published by ‘One Hand Clapping’) because it has a line about Dolly Parton in it...
Silence
Silence stands in the hallway all night
says
she doesn’t need to sleep.
In the morning she is in the chair
waiting.
Sometimes
she smiles
I think she gave me the dream
about meeting Dolly Parton for the soundcheck.
Sometimes
she is so aloof
I imagine she sent me the handless mob
lumbering
towards me,
bloodied boxing gloves
where fingers should have been.
She
has birdsong in her;
sends the call of a bittern
to make me laugh
after she has taken me to the darkest silence.
Once she tapped me on the shoulder
at
3am, handed me the car keys
got in the car with me
and directed me to a forest.
She took me over a stile to the darkened path
where we could not see our feet
and the bumps and gnarls of roots
sat
under the mud.
Before my eyes adjusted
she stopped me
stood
with me
to hear the last owl
and the first blackbird.
Once
she wrote me a note
folded it, put my name on it
so that she could watch me open it
and
read, I am your shadow.
Her drawings tattooed the page –
a
tarnished axe,
a coffin,
and a holly bush,
all its leaves on the ground.
*************************
A discarded elastic band makes the shape of a matryoshka doll. It is above a leaf in the gutter and temporarily becomes a moon. #ElasticBandPhotos.
Here's to making time for things
which bring us joy, and to noticing what makes our hearts sing as the darkness
lifts...
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