Category: Writings

She was in a chatty mood. Sometimes it can be tricky to bring our conversation to an end. I like it when she is bright. We talked about her going shopping with her daughter who has a wedding coming up. I don’t think it is going to be a very fancy wedding, she said, they’re all going back to the farm for the reception. There’s a marquee. She says ‘how to say’ a lot. I think it is because she is trying to translate colloquialisms from Welsh into English. It is a hinter world I can never enter, that Welsh one to which she and her daughter and many of the people I encounter at work dwell within. I felt the same living in Norway, I couldn’t get under the skin of it. Always on the outside looking-in, a restful place to be most of the time, but sometimes I long to belong. She talked about the navy dress her daughter opted for in the end, so that she can wear it again. The pink fascinator would be just the thing to make it special. Not a bright pink, she said. Dusky? I replied. And she found some shoes in exactly the same colour. Dorothy Perkins and Debenhams. So cosy. I like the inconsequential nature of our chatting. It is light, easy, and she is in a good, safe place. And I am glad.

I’ve begun Neil Ansell’s memoir about his four trips to the North of Scotland. He writes of his encounters with wildlife. I feel like I encounter something similar when I walk the Prom in the early hours. The other morning there were five bodies stretched out on pebbly beach just by South Marine Terrace. They were silent, utterly still. Were they dead? No, one, a girl’s, ankle was turning in  circles. Where they watching the moon, as I’d been? I walked by. And then today a mass of happenings. Again on South Marine, walking along the Terrace, I noticed that at least one of the B&Bs were full and then I saw a young man, a skinny man, begin to climb up onto one of the houses’s porch roofs. Had he locked himself out? Should I say something? He moved silently, except for a bashing noise as he hauled himself up. Once up he just turned about and sat down. He was still sitting there, high up, as I got to the Harbour. Prior to that I’d walked behind a couple. He was a huge man and she was small and stocky wearing  silver lame top. They’d been holding hands when I drew close but after a few minutes the hand had been dropped. Don’t, she said, as I neared. But I thought, he was saying in a tiny, weasly kind of voice, and burping and then belching. DON”T! she hissed again. Before then, two men has been standing outside the Pier Pressure nightclub, both had been in shorts. I’ll just have one more, said one, swaying imperceptibly. And then, prior to that (not sure why I’m doing this backwards) I’d watched as man walked up to another man sleeping on a lurid blue mat on a bench in the shelter and leaned over him. What yer doing? the sleeping man had shouted. I want to give you a kiss, the interloper had said. Then there had been the two lads with their bikes on the Perygyl. I’d heard their voices in the dark, as I’d approached. They went silent as I walked past. The moon had gone behind a cloud as I stood at the end. Wanting to be still and quiet. But they have a much right to be there as I, so be it. They’d turned their music on again as I made my way back. Rap music, most deliciously profane, emanated from one of their bikes. Hiya, said one boy to me. Hiya, I replied.

The author Jason Reynold was being interviewed on Radio 2 last week and he admitted to crocheting in his spare time. It’s not unlike the discipline of writing, he said. I think about wanting to interview people about their practices. I like the notion of time-consuming works, how do they sustain themselves?

She was let out for three days. What gorgeous photographs. What a smile. What a smile, he says. I wish her well, I wish her more joy like that.

I hope she goes to the carnival.

On your tod. It was one of her sayings. She used them a lot. A kind of vernacular, learnt parrot-fashion, who from I don’t know as I don’t remember my father using them. Tod. A nice word. Like Bod. Bod was an illustrated cartoon character I remember from the TV of my youth. There was a farmer too, was he Barleymow? He’d been given a funny walk where his right leg raised up slightly as he walked. All uneven-like. TOD was the first three letters of a registration plate I saw on a old Morris Minor as I walked this morning. I can’t remember where now. Was it behind South Road? I went a different way, to get away from the wind. What a clattering down by the harbour. The boat rigging was jangling, the vessels jostling and the tarpaulin fluttering. It is quite a cacophony. And eerie in the dark. The howling becomes a song, a siren’s song. How must it be to out at sea in it? Do the boats go out in the wind? he asked when I went in to rouse him. I don’t know, I said, I haven’t seen any for weeks. And it’s true, not a sign. Has the lobster season ended? The pots are all stacked up. The smell of them catches my nose with its stink. Primal. An inner, almost sexual smell of hot salt, sand, and brine.

I keep going over it. Have I said enough? Have I done the poems justice? I thought about the notion of being good enough as I walked. It is an unsatisfying, discomforting way to live. Shouldn’t it be about doing the best you can and then stopping? This is what I had to say now, the best I could. There is more, there is always more. Always room for improvement, as they say. Of course. Why this constant seeking of best-ness, of being the best. It’s all about insecurity. Needing reassurance. How about just being this, this messy, awkward, sometimes brilliant, often clumsy being? Can you live with that? No doubt she will come back with it and I can make changes. But mostly, as in all that I do, I need to learn to leave it. To not fiddle. To let it be.

Coming down that dark street after the bus station and then towards the little hill that takes me down to Llanbadarn Road I saw two figures wrapped in a blanket. They were standing utterly still. The light from a streetlight illuminated them from the front. I couldn’t see their faces or determine their sex. They were a tableau, almost biblical, prophetic. Then I heard a ping. They moved. They moved as one beginning to ascend the hill, one of them looking at a phone. The other being took it and dialled. Hello, a feminine voice said, We’re not going to stay. There was a pause. Then she started to speak again. Only if you come for us. The stress was on the us, as if there were others to be considered. I strode passed them. Still unable to make out if they were two girls or a boy and a girl. They walked behind me. A single unit wrapped as if in swaddling.

A simple day today. I shall sew, ground myself, listen to the radio and wait for clarity.

The tickets are printed ready. The thought of it hollows me out.

It’s not that I don’t want to be, satisfied that is, it’s just my default to not be. It could be better. Always. I like the books very much, particularly the one about Kierkegaard. I want to do them justice. To be kind but also to offer a reasoned, incisive response. Is it good enough? Is it ever good enough? Am I ever good enough?

Look at me there. What a sweetie. And that smile. That is me trying to hard, on my scooter at my grandmother’s house. Though she never wanted us to call her that. Just her Christian name. Was it vanity? Or a reneging of the role?

I want to live without judging. To just be at peace with myself and others. Let it be what it is. It is a lifetime’s work, that.

What a gentle girl. So earnest. Her mother was bright, full of life. And so pleased to be here, in that house. It’s got four floors and four cafetieres, she said. Imagine that? I like such meetings that occur in-between all my fretting over time.

It’s almost done. I haven’t said all I wanted to say, but I tried. Sometimes it’s just time to finish. There is nothing else to be done but close. Finish it. Left hanging? Maybe. There is space in that, room to improve, to become. Better.

They keep a watch all through the night. I see them as I walk by in the early hours. Sometimes there is one van, other times two. Sometimes the vans are empty, today there were two police officers standing beside them. There were a group of kids, well young adults, slightly the worse for wear by the decking in front of the Belle Vue. The officers were watching them, alert to ructions. Otherwise they keep vigil. They must be doing so. He is still in there. Still in that burnt out hotel. It is too badly damaged for anyone to go inside, apparently. And they are trying to get to him by removing brick by brick. Hard to imagine. Such slowness. Must it be so? They’re using a crane. It’s called Dylan Thomas. What must it be like for his family? Knowing he is still in there, decomposing.

I got warm walking this morning. There was no breeze. I saw the white belly of an oystercatcher, illuminated by the light of the streetlamp, as it fluttered across the sea. The morning smells of damp earth, Autumn is coming. We sat for a bit yesterday afternoon. I love to do so. The sun on my skin as we watched a small group playing bowls and a family playing tennis.

I began it. I feel my fear like a wall. But I persevere and allow the pleasure of the writing to come through. That forming, that sensing of words in my mouth. It is gorgeous, when I forget myself.

No self, no problem.

I lie in bed and welcome the emptying, the white space of nothing of non-being. It is restful.

Another early session. So be it.

A lot of life makes me uncomfortable. It is always an adjustment. A weighing up of other people’s viewpoints against mine. Think again. How could you have handled that better? I am uncomfortable with anger, with irritation, even. I am scared to be in another’s black books. His in particular. He gets this look over his brow. It is a cold place to be outside of his lovingness and warmth. And she was so sharp. A hint of German or possibly a Swiss accent. She was sarcastic, hard. I could’ve yielded. I know this. But I was irked. I hadn’t been considered. My amor propre was rattled. Does it matter? Does any of it matter? Not a jot. There is so much more that does. Nevertheless, I wake and I feel grey.

An early morning session this morning. But he is nice. A good man. I smell of the new perfume. I used to wear it a lot. It reminds me of younger days.

I want to begin writing. To make a dint in it. To make it less scary, less daunting.

She liked it. Said it was fresh. It felt honest, if a little un-cohesive. I am tired. The darkness is back. No sign of the blue of morning. No wind this morning. I stood at the top of the little hill and watched the rain soaked shrubs, not a flicker. Nothing.

New ideas for project come through all the time. Reading Rooms. I want to travel the country, preferably on foot going from one public reading room to the next. Do they still exist? I know of the one in Aberdovey but anywhere else? What would I do once I got there? Read, write, sew? Would I write a journal? I want to do a journey, to connect it with silence, reading and nostalgia and a sense of place. Would it just be in Wales? It is an artificial affiliation. Belonging. The play was about belonging. What is that? Do I belong? I yearn for it. From my family mostly. I keen towards my sisters, their femininity. Their femaleness. I want to be in their light, not their shadow. She has grown cold. Can I warm her, ever?

We’ve heard her the last few afternoons.

It begins with a quiet, rather winy voice. Reggie, she calls. Reggie, Reggie. Ron and Reg are her cats. Named after the Kray twins. They are gorgeous animals, sleek, spotted and grey, their bodies as lean as hungry tigers. They are her children, he said. But they are cats, I answered. How do they come when they are called? Does it work, the calling? Does Reggie obey? She keeps it up for quite a while. I am napping on the bed next to him. We mimic her, not unkindly, for I would never willingly be unkind, but gently. Reggie, Reggie. Sometimes she whistles. If she offering a bribe? Why is she calling him? Is it supper time? Do cats have supper? Or is she going out and wants them safely in? We never hear her calling for Ron. Is Reggie her favourite or is he the wanderer, one of the cats I often see pussy-footing their way across the wilderness beyond our window?

There are several cats in the Quad. A favourite is Betty. Have I told you of Betty? Everyone knows her. I even heard the big bearded man who smokes outside C block talk of her. You can hear her coming by the jangle of the bell on her collar, an anti-bird-killing bell no doubt. She has a toy, a furry black and white teddy thing, maybe a panda, that she often abandons on the roof. When she sees anybody she trots after them. A sociable cat without reservation. Not so the Krays. They are suspicious of strangers. Keeping their own counsel, sidling off, under bushes, under fences.

It rained. It wasn’t forecast to do so. I feel my irritation. It isn’t personal and so what, think of those hundreds in India enduring those floods. Get a grip. Eh?

I was moved to stillness, catching the end of it while I did yoga. Sue Macgregor’s Reunion with four Auschwitz survivors. What eloquence. Not mawkish sentimentality, just hard reality. We were displaced, one said. We were told we were free but where were we to go? said another. The miracle of his gentleness, said a third referring to the ambulance man who liberated her. Their voices were cold with the memory of it. Beyond living. It has to be listened to. The British gave them too much food. More died in the three months after than before, said one. Could that be true? Kindness killing. Killing with kindness. There is so much I do not know. Is listening enough?

A milky grey sky. My phone pings. I finished the writing just now, just one more review to go. I will begin tomorrow. For now I am tired. Yesterday was full on writing. A breather, a gathering time. Then begin again.

Just sew.

I’m walking behind a group of three teenagers, one of them, a girl, is leaning into a boy almost touching him with her shoulder. I called you a sound and chilled guy on Snapchat, she says.

The main street is noisy with clubbers sitting outside or leaving the Why Not? night club. A group of three lads tumble down Great Darkgate Street, no doubt in search of a taxi. Show me the way to go home, one of them is singing, his arms up in the air and waving, I’m tired and I wanna go to bed…he continues, his friends are joining in as they walk. They pile into a taxi further down the hill and I re-cross the road. Yesterday I’d seen a group of kids outside the station. Some of them were Chinese or Korean. They too were a little pissed but not aggressively so, just giggly. There seemed to be a group leader of sorts. Right, he was shouting, we are now going to make our way to the Leisure Centre. I almost stopped walking. What? I wanted to say, at this time in the morning? But it was none of my business.

The wind was strong this morning. And I was hot. I’d borrowed his coat, hanging it in my cupboard the night before but I didn’t need it. The rain didn’t come till later. It was nice to have the comfort of it’s largeness but it was heavy and hot. Too early, it will come soon enough.

So very tired but I’ve a review to write today. Must make a start. Just 250 words. I can do that. I can manage that. The terns were dotted along the Prom. They are sweet elegant birds, far more endearing than the seagulls. They move as if on little wheels.

To work. Pronto.

I’ve been reading Kierkegaard. Well, dipping my toe, really. I am surprised at how accessible it is. He feels familiar, kin even. It’s for the review. Kierkegaard and Beowulf. I have to start somewhere, find my bearings. My way in. I am less fearful. Other things assail me. I was stupid. I cried over my stupidity. What a boob. What a waste of money. It shames me. But it’s the machines, they do what I don’t expect them to do. I just need to breathe, I know that. Just breathe. I dreamt of a lover. The sex was exquisite but he was married. I knew this. I knew it would go nowhere but just to be with him, near him. It was intense and yet I was detached. A new phenomenon for me.

This is a short one. A hello. The language is beautiful. I like it on my tongue but the rest, the architecture of poetry I do not understand. Does it matter? I only need to say, to write, what I think. It’s a great pulling up this work. Up by my boot straps. I have no courage. I have no strength, just a willingness to try.

I missed the Prom this morning, the rain was relentless and the wind. I needed the cover of my brolly. So I went where there was no wind. I walked down side streets and saw no one.

Off to the photographer. Another piece finished. I’ve tried something new. It makes me edgy, will it work?

They’re farmers, she said. And they’ve been up to the North of Norway. What’s the name of the wandering people up there? The Sami, I said. Yes, that’s it. I liked them. Open and friendly. One had such a brown face. I’ve got a degree in bullshit, he said, grinning. And it was, from ear to ear. Another told us of her fall from the scaffolding. I’ve five stitches in my head. The only problem is that every sounds to me like they’ve inhaled helium. Bless her. She’s a favourite. Alive and warm.

Soon. It’ll be longer next time. x

She was stretched out on a reclining chair, a towel covering her midriff, having a pedicure. Her treatment ran over into mine. Trying to still my irritation I joined in their conversation. I should be separating the sheep today, she was saying to the therapist, but I booked this ages ago. It’s lovely to have it done properly, she continued, lying back her hands folded across her groin, particularly the leg waxing, there’s always bits you miss.

She had the most amazing eyes. Black irises set deep in the clearest of pale blue. I couldn’t help staring at her. Do the mothers get upset when you take the lambs away? I asked. Oh yes, she said, but we only take the fat ones. 70 k some of them. (What? I wanted to ask but didn’t for fear of coming across as completely stupid, 70 kilos?) The therapist, who by now was applying the dark grey varnish, nodded in agreement and obvious understanding and then I remembered that she was Swedish and probably raised on a farm. Are they weaned when you separate them? I asked. Yes, she said, though there’s no weaning field this year, what with the weather. We kept talking about separation instead of death. For that is what this is about, slaughter of the fattest. What’s it called, she asked, when they have the fasting? I took me a few seconds to understand what she was getting at. Ramadan? I suggested. No, said the therapist with certainty, that’s gone. Diwali? I said again, the Festival of Light. Yes, said the sheep farmer, one of those, I think. The prices for lambs are high. It must be that. We must’ve missed Ramadan.

The talk moved to long haul flights. When I get old, she said, I’m never going to go on a night flight. No, I said.

Fifteen minutes late and I’m lying on the couch ready for my massage. Pain, pleasure and relief. My head throbbing with the releasing of toxins. Are you sure it’s that? he said in the car afterwards, forever suspicious of what he sees as my surmising. That’s what she said, I said, and it makes perfect sense to me. Hmm, he said.

We’d got there early and watched a one-web-footed seagull across the road. It kept flying up and landing on our car, once it did so carrying an empty plastic bag. Plastic equals food to them. It is now part of their evolution. It had a regal limp but was a little battle-worn, it’s head plumage rather shabby. Non-plussed by the people walking by, it remained on the same patch of pavement, looking at us with its one dark, yellow-ringed eye. A man put a key on a shelf outside the bank.  Boy scout that he is, he first took it into the bank, then after talking to the man who first found it, he retrieved it from the bank and took it to the police station.

He is kind. Picking me up from work yesterday he told me of the Liverpuddlian homeless man who he gave a few quid to outside the 24 hour Spar. I took him in with me, he said, to choose a sandwich which he did and then asked for a packet of crisps too. Then the man asked at the till if he could claim a free Sun. No, they said. So I bought him one also. People treat me like shit, he told him.

A bitty day full of loose ends to sort out. Amen to that and the solving of it.

Less scared on waking.

Ideas come when I walk. I love that first initial rush of possibility, anything could happen. At that moment I can create anything. All technology is at my finger tips. No holes barred. Nothing in my way. The concept is pure, unsullied by fear. I want to see what silence looks like. It begins with a library, like the one in Boston. Does it have to be a public library? Yes, I think so. I like their egalitarian-ness. Anyone can go in, to read, to browse, to sleep, to think, to pee…whatever. The cliché is their silence. That imposed silence by wagging finger. A librarian with a tight bun. Are they silent? Are there sounds to capture? Coughing, page-turning, snoring, that glorious sound of the date stamp. I want to capture these noises then try to make a transcript of them. Then get someone to sign those noises. Too complicated? I don’t think so. I’d need help technically. But the idea will be mine, is mine. I even thought about translating the transcript into braille. To read the words takes away some of the abstraction. It is a beginning. Oh, and did I tell you I was selected? Can’t say for what yet. Hush, hush.

So tired.

I wake fearful. I try to get a grip on it. Today there is nothing to fear. A gentle day. A sorting out day. Then off to meet the Notary for the signature then a massage. Take it slow. Do all those little things. And read. I am enjoying the poetry, though writing the review hangs heavy. Can I do it? Can I do it well enough? Would she have asked me if she didn’t believe I could?

See what it looks like. That silence.

Today, now you don’t need to be afraid. Just read them. Get inside them. Let them get inside you. It is enough. Be true, be simple. What is the poet trying to communicate? Follow your instinct.

We are at least ‘talking’ though it isn’t warm. Not as warm as I’d like. Isn’t love enough? To warm you up?

I heard a girl wailing as I walked home. A group of kids were getting into a taxi. Would they go to her aid? Should I stop? I find myself blaming alcohol and take less notice then perhaps I should. Is it attention seeking, or genuine? I am loathe to break the membrane of my silence. Three of four sleeping on benches, one entirely cocooned in a white duvet. How is it to sleep to the sound of the sea? Are you safe? The benches must be so hard. Do you sleep?

Voices through the dark. They are coming from the little park beneath the castle. A little laughter, the gentle sounds of friendship.

Must work now. A milky grey sky and the rooks have finished their chatter.

Tea.