Imagine if our clothes
Were living things
And in the autumn they withered and dropped
Green pullovers turning yellow, dying
Blue jeans turning purple, dead tops
Turn-ups, curl-ups
Denim peeling away
Everywhere you look
People losing their clothes
Streets littered with remnants
Small brown snagged squares of tights
Scraps of socks
And everyone nude for the winter
Fat men with fields of once hidden flesh
Wobble along the wet pavements
Old thin women
Wrinkled and wafery
Huddle in Lowry groups
Like sticks blown into a corner
And naked through howling
Icy winds and squalls
Of snow, everyone struggles gamely on
Until the spring
When fresh clothes buds start growing again
From Searching For Blue Sea Glass (the book)
available from Rabbit Press
22 comments:
Well, autumn’s on the way and I haven’t settled back to work properly yet. So many other things to do. Monday a band rehearsal (learnt The Word by The Beatles - It’s sounding good - and a Kings of Leon tune. Although I’m not sure if tune is the right word), today I took the car in for an M.O.T. and tomorrow a trip to Kent to catch up with my daughter and grandchildren. Looking forward to that.
Not very many school visits lined up for this term. It’s a bit worrying. But at least it will give me more writing time. I checked the proofs of the new book for younger children – On The Way To School I Saw a Dinosaur (illustrated by one Michael Leigh) today. Lots of poems coming in for the anthology I’m doing for A & C Black and the novel I started on holiday is going well (working title Get Back). No news of the children’s book deal with Hodder yet. Fingers still crossed.
This year’s music project is going to be a folk-oriented album of songs using some very good musicians that I know. A tabla player, a cellist (that word doesn’t look right) and James, who played on Wonky Finger, a fine guitarist.
Talking of music (and The Word and Get Back) – hoping for McCartney’s new album for my birthday. It’s had good reviews and an interesting conception.
So a new year shapes up as autumn settles. We had a great crop of vegetables in the garden. Fabulous tomatoes. And two pumpkins waiting to be cut. Soon it will time to dig and get the vegetable plot ready for next year.
Happy autumn everyone. Or happy fall. Delete as applicable.
Lucky we aren't trees, gosh I feel chilly
Michael Leigh eh? How did you manage to secure his services- i hear he is a bit of a recluse these days?
Lots of birthdays in September and october. I guess the xmas holiday spirit is to blame? all that snuggling under the duvet.
I like the sound of the folk oriented musical project.
I heard a bit of macca's new album the other day on the radio. Sounded better than his usual stuff I must admit. Somebody sent me the Quarrymen CD the other day- the re-formed 1998 Quarrymen. Its pretty good in a skiffly kinda way.
That Leigh character was quite hard to track down - but I promised him a tube of smarties and a 78 of Elvis doing a colgate commercial and he was putty in my hands.
Duvets? Don't think we had duvets in them days.
autumn is so beautiful and the whole denuding ritual even more so.
gladdest to be back and checking out your blog.
i agree with
the Snuggling-Duvet Theory propounded by one Micheal, Esq.
That means we wd be wearin , buyin , cleanin real live people !!!
Blue nosies, blue toesies, and all in between,
It would help if some parts would stay evergreen!
Loved imagining the plant people, Roger. It was fun.
Snuggling under the pink candlewick bedspread then or whatever it was you snuggled under? An ex army suplus camoflage net? Miss Haverhsams old cobwebbed tablecloth? 12 yards of sequinned taffeta? A big musty pile of old otter bedding?
Several sundays worth of newspapers?
Sounds like my old bed sit, except for the bedspread of corse
I wouldn't mind this vision of yours becoming realityas long as all the high street shoppers are young, nubile ladies and not middle aged old farts like me with beer bellies, skinny legs and bums like wrinkled, rotting potatoes!
The book sounds great and good to see that old reprobate Michael Leigh being gamefully employed!
Not sure about McCartney's album. I've heard bits of it and it does sound pretty good. He used to be such a hero of mine and over the years has released some dire stuff. Fingers crossed.
"And everyone nude for the winter" hmmm if that ever happen then i'm glad we don't have winter season here. you seem to be a lot busy these days. i hope you had a funtime with your grand kids!
13 comments, unlucky for some
kick the old rebrobate up the bum
14 comments, rain pouring down
kick the old leaves that are going all brown
15 comments. its your turn next!
Number 16. Feeling vexed.
unless you are Roger who is oversexed
(how i know leaves Michael perplexed)
thanks all for having wasted breath
but this poem is really great!!
btw, rogers i'm back after quite along period. i had shifted my residence. check out my new blog at shubhodeep.blogspot.com
cheers!!
Love the poem - what a great idea that could only stem from an overactive imagination. I wouldnt mind it one bit, Roger. Ive never really experinced autumn, living in thsi part of the world. But it looks beautiful in the movies, sounds romantic in the books and I love the cold. What more?
Oh, "On the way to School I saw a Dinosaur" sounds great...love the title...illustrations by Michael can't be beat. Sounds like a winner.
Loved the visualisation of this poem...haha! Lucky, it's a sight we won't have to see.
Also crossing fingers for your new book. Heard a wonderful performance of "The Dolls" and thought of you...your words vibrating with images. And so it's off & running yet another year. And borrowing from "The Dolls", I say "Dirty Mustardheads" to anyone in the way!
You might not have meant it that way, but what a great metaphor! If everyone stripped naked of all the pretenses and masks they wear... it would be mighty chilly, and how the winds would blow, but lots of time feeling starts with pain... and after that the world would be quite a beautiful place.
P.S. Autumn is my favorite season.
Khaya
Ahhh..my fav season for sure! but brrrr..as a human i don't want to be dropping off cold n dead :)) ..but come to think of it, it could be an excuse for a new start...
of a newly green wardrobe :)
Loved the idea!
Everything ages, doesn't it?
Thanks also for your question at my site re influences on me. I'll have to think about that a little more. Although I have a couple of anthologies and a volume of Percy Bysshe Shelley, on a day to day basis I am probably struck just as much by reading the poets that I link to on my site. Often, they trigger new thoughts and demonstrate interesting ways to use non-traditional forms, which prompts me to think about language in new ways. But, as for "classic" poets, I really do like Yeats, Shelley, Christina Rosetti, William Blake, and Lord Tennyson.
Thanks again for the interest! : )
i find autumn beautiful and i think your poem is brillant
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