BEING SOCIABLE AGAIN (49)
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This morning the air smells fuschia pink underlined with gently fermenting darkening green grass.
Alt text says this week’s photo is a collage of 2 people. I say it is a montage of four photos of three siblings ensuring they get a couple of sensible photos at the wedding of one of my nephews. I also say it delights me to have had the moments in these photos. It was good to be out in the world being sociable to celebrate the joy of young love with all the guests at a special wedding.
I love weddings, particularly the speeches and the way the words people choose make me tingle at the very humanness of being. My brother, Mark, gave a wonderful address at the end of the ceremony and my sister and I marvelled at his capable public speaking and the way he made us laugh as well as think and celebrate the couple.
When talking about their honeymoon, the bride and groom mentioned that the place they were travelling to had a hot tub and they were planning to relax there while watching the perseid meteor shower. This struck me as a wonderful way to watch the spectacle. It also reminded me how different things are this year compared to 2020 when I wrote my perseid poem ‘Invitation’. We were in lockdown then and being sociable was very limited indeed. One night back then I dreamt that I was invited to see the perseids in the armpit of a lover, and there they were in great detail and great number. It was a superb dream for the content and for my wondering about how the world had changed.
This year’s meteor shower peaks on August twelfth and the forecast mentions storms so I went to sit under a fairly cloudless sky for half an hour before bed last night. Four bright shooting stars made themselves known not far from 'The Plough'.
Thinking back to the poem ‘Invitation’ I can remember a particular reading of it at an open mic where I felt incredibly nervous. My perception was that my nervous energy had spoiled my reading totally, and I remember that the next day I messaged the person who had invited me to apologise. They messaged back to say that they thought one day I would actually enjoy sharing my work and this reminded me that I could improve.
I have of course gained experience since then and am part of some lovely poetry communities, but it continued to be a focus for me because I am determined to share my poems well. I began to learn that slowing my reading down helped with my breathing and allowed me to be more centred, and of course the more I did it the more I improved.
Videoing myself, as suggested by a coach I work with, has been hugely beneficial, and I used this to good effect prior to a recent in-person reading. It allowed me to see that although I had work to do I was actually giving myself a hard time which was not purely based on fact. That pesky overthinking!
This past week I was very keen to watch back my performance from my headline set at Crafty Crows. Partly so I could focus in on how to be even better and partly because I had felt the dry mouth of nerves as I read and wondered if this had spoiled the reading for the audience. In fact I woke in the night afterwards convinced they would only remember my nerves. I love the Crafty Crows poetry space and have wanted to read a set there for a long time so it was especially important to me. This is a community I really love being part of. Reader/Listener, my performance was acceptable. I can see how to ground myself better next time at the start so I can drink fewer sips of water during the reading, but my diction was clear and my pace appropriate. I delivered the set from beginning to end with relevant intros and the poems followed on from one another well. A goal has been met... I CAN share my work and I AM able to enjoy doing so. How cool is that?
I quite like the original reading of ‘Invitation’ so here’s the link. It is a moment in time of its very own, but I will also share it here:
Invitation
She says I will be able to see
Perseids tonight in her armpits,
just as I am worrying
that I cannot read binary.
I assure myself I can Google it later
hoping that the instructions
will be simple.
I plan to have a notebook
and pen ready.
I know that joke about
there being 10 kinds of people in the world:
those who understand binary
and those who don’t.
I tell her it would be great
to see the meteors up close,
nuzzled right in.
They don’t make your neck ache
this way, she says,
and you will be able to hear
the crackles of ancient fires
it is all deep in there.
I wonder if we will ever be
sociable again after this.
How many people in the world
are hankering to see
night skies in the armpits of lovers?
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