MARGARINE TUBS OF MARBLES AND ERASERS
This morning the air brings a sense of cleanliness and has no particular scent that I can determine. A gentle chatter of birds sounds from the aerials and chimney pots. I get the sense the day started a while ago for them.
Alt text says this week’s photo is a glass jar with a blue ball on top. I say it is a glass jar with three marbles inside and that a large blue marble is placed on top to act as a stopper.
The grass has sprung back into shape after plenty of rain and it seems strange to be needing to be cutting it after weeks of watching it turn yellow (and rather crispy) and not need much attention. Pleasingly its flourishing green renewal has renewed my energy for gardening, and I have thoroughly enjoyed being out in the fresh air. I have also enjoyed the scents I have carried with me on my skin as a result of doing some cutting back and weeding. On the first day I smelt of rosemary, on the second lavender, and finally blackcurrants. A heady mix of scents.
I have often been found at my desk this past week squeezing in some extra writing time for the Tea Towel Poems. Those that have been out in the world have received feedback from their recipients, and for those yet to reach a couple celebrating their anniversary I have invited my lovely wife into poetry corner to listen to my drafts. She is good at giving me a succinct and honest reaction and can easily alert me when something I have written only really makes sense in my head. At one point I realised that I could make the necessary tweaks by changing the title of a particular poem. And Kath’s response to the fact it might mean the poem had a long title? “It can’t be any longer than that one about drawers!” Reader, there are drawers in the title of that poem but it's not just about drawers!
An image that flashed into my head recently is of me during my time at junior school happily skipping back into the classroom after playtime singing Dolly Parton’s ‘Love is Like a Butterfly’. Whilst singing I was swinging my margarine tub of marbles that I had been playing with. I was feeling joyful and all of a sudden the lid flew off scattering the marbles across the classroom floor. I remember the way so many people in my class quickly helped to gather them before our teacher entered. This flashback brought to mind old school friends and I was thinking about one particular friend... together we had collected erasers in a margarine tub (I obviously loved an empty tub back then and this could well have been the precursor to my love of things in jars.) and I had lovely memories of spending time with her at her house. And then a few days later that very person connected with me on Instagram. At first, I couldn’t believe it and thought that it could be a coincidence and simply someone with the same name. I wondered how to phrase the question to ask until I heard the coach in me say, “You want to find out so just ask or you’ll never know”. And a lovely echo of Claire Pedrick’s wisdom, “Don’t make it weird”. I chuckled at the different ways I could phrase the question and settled on: “Lovely to connect with you on here. Perhaps you are X from the house with the saloon doors. If not I hope you have lovely doors and that you also had a lovely friend that enjoyed collecting colourful erasers with you many moons ago!” And it was indeed X and my heart did a little glow of happiness at being remembered, and for then being reminded of one of the games we used to play in the playground that involved us donning a range of different style bomber jackets. And that gave me a wonderful reminder of the joyful youth that sits in the core or me and might begin to explain why I find it difficult to be silent when I share an office with someone or when Kath is also working from home.
Here's the poem with the long title that isn’t just about drawers. It comes from my second collection Welcome to the Museum of a Life published by Black Eyes Publishing UK where it is featured in The Gallery of Dreams...
Last Night I Dreamt I Slid My Poems into Drawers of Disinfectant to Sterilise Their Titles
Today, a poet in black stands at a lectern
reading us her words.
At the end she straightens her pages
says she wants to sing for us.
Feet together, shoulders back, she begins.
Her eyes are closed as she sends out the song.
I want to listen, but she is moving now –
her, the lectern and the music she is making
are rising into the air.
I see no ropes, no pulleys
yet she is up
beyond the curtain fringe.
Then a slice of the stage drops open beneath her
and I gasp as I see what is planned.
Down into the trap room she goes.
I wasn’t sure her song fitted
or exactly what she was trying to tell us,
but her poems had me clapping.
I turn to you realising that I don’t own her books
or remember her name.
No one in the audience seems the least perturbed;
they are going for ice-cream.
Come on, you say, they’ve got three different vegan flavours.
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