After work I smoke to switch off
I need that release so at Morrisons
say to my mate Watch This and jump
into trolley bouncy with cardboard,
nick from Pick ‘n’Mix, who misses a Jelly Tiger,
me and mate do Madness walk
down shopping aisles
followed by security,
till we get to sweets aisle
and munch it all.
Maybe buy some Johnnies
and while shop lass not looking
pocket pack chewing gum.
Switched On, nah effort, no effort, Switched Off.
At bus stop 6 playing cards played 3 of Diamonds, Queen of Diamonds face up. Empty coke can: a bus on the cards
Bus stop other side from morning Ace of Hearts 7 of Diamonds 5 of Spades 6 9 of Diamonds face up. Afternoons hand
Hill top Mrs Wood, grocers, coming down street cemeteries avenue hill bottom where pit used to be a lush forest.
In siling down bus is a big kid in wellies a splash laugh in every pothole puddle, hurriedly shops import goods
Slanted rain rolls down slanted roof slanted street each angle geometric downpour wet arithmetic blatant flashes
Estate Agents white box A4 copier paper door stop charity shop rush takes green leather sofa armchair out of rain
‘value’ ‘bonus’ ‘Low, Low Prices’ big on bright blue next to ‘On Offer’ ‘To Let” boarded, flagged market forces
Pale blue sweatered woman bent at right angles pushes her brown tartan square four wheel shopping trolley up hill
Greenery now over spoilheap less work less danger canal no longer used all leisure, industry moved into headsets
Young man in flak jacket grey snapback struggles to attach long fishing rod rest and shopping to bikes handlebars
Bright cool blue sky cafe puts out green plastic chairs stacked like plastic cups bakers window 4 loaves 2 burnt
Invisible Town Pavement: is laid level over history,
Over cobble, over broken vase,
lost money,
Stare into workman’s dig
to see what is lost
Stare into jigger picked
high vis recall
Sweated out the dried carapace
squashed ancient trees
pressured into coal
Pavements are pages to be read. Each page a history inscribed marked cracked weathered. Every street a chapter, town a novel
Pavements are continually rewritten. New images, new characters added, others moved on. You are a character on a pavement.
Sometimes pavements need translating as they may trip up the unwary. Obstacles such as archaic language pedantic terms await
Language changes as gusts change. Words lean into gust, hold their meaning until the earths breath changes direction
A way of looking moved on. Clack and phut of wooden shuttle, shuttled off. Wire Making pulled out, nail making hammered off
A new way of looking, perhaps a new industry growing into itself. Perhaps call centre headset on revised coat of arms
All is driven intravenously. Plug our veins in to provide fuel for mechanical engines. Plug veins into computers, TVs.
Fresh raw materials melted in crucible
Working average 16 hours a day Temperature extremes
A chair of five blokes include first gaffer sat in his chair
Second gatherer takes glass gather on his blowing iron out
white heat furnace hole
Gather becomes gob
Glass gob rolled on marver smooth iron or stone slab roll removes air bubbles passed to third a blower either free blows or blows into mould bottle body shape
Fourth bloke attaches pontil an Iron bar onto bottle base uses wetter off a soaked strip of wood applies a drop of water snaps glass off blowing iron
soft glass on pontil Passed to gaffer Gaffer keeps bottle turning on his chairs flat arms stops glass collapse
Gaffer trims, finishes neck adds string rim adds any seal
Fifth assistant boy Inserts iron rod in bottle mouth
Gaffer applies flash of water snaps off pontil that leaves pontil mark on bottle base.
Finished bottle taken to lehr for annealing
Boys dip end blowing irons and pontils in water tank remove moils waste glass
working ends of irons placed in furnace gathering hole heat up for next gather.
Bosses expected team produce 150 bottles an hour.
glass bottles furnace fumes made black glass colour
Heraldic glass blower
To understand and be understood
To comprehend and be comprehensible
I tried to speak clearly when young and my mother would say ‘Stop shouting!’
Outside of my home I would try to speak out of my grave shyness. People would say ‘Speak up. Your mumbling.’ I have acquired over the years, so listeners have advised me, a volume in my speaking voice that rises and falls, peaks and dips at unexpected moments but sounds perfectly level to me in my head. It is perfectly level to my hearing.
Over the years I have made a conscious effort towards clarity in my speech and writing. Scared of being misunderstood I went into myself through books, hoping my absorption in them would give me greater clarity when talking/writing to/with other people.
I have performed my writing on stage, on radio and was a creative writing teacher of adults for eight years. The last eleven years I have worked in a call centre on the phones where clear communication, correct pronunciation, and plain explanation is vital. Over the years I have acquired a mild form of OCD that expresses itself in a need that things make sense, clear order, instruction and process.
I hope you may empathise with this situation, and that this article can be clearly understood. When I request comments about my work, it is not out of egotism, a need for confirmation. I am asking ‘Am I comprehensible?’
without second glance grass, rushed passed to reach a car. Regularly mown. White feather bone between brown blades twitches
Industrial Estate herbaceous plot client/employee pleasant, cans caught by 2 shrubs. No flowers, yellow provided by weed.
Invisible Garden: car park grass, daisies tiny suns, yellow splashes among sunburnt brown, new green, tab ends, grass explores beyond border
Fresh cut wheat like first bread dust bakery in a field. Childhood dash through sharp cut stalks flail ankles blood pain. French bread joie
Mechanically scythed corn, harvested into grey plastic bags, vegetarian sausage rolls spread evenly over short fields.
People act in permanent urgent enquiry. Events, others must be analysed, dissected, discussed. Eyes wide taking it all in.
Where there is no rest. All is doing, action. No one sleeps, no comfortable places. There is hard work and harder. All sweat.
Sweet smells are abhorred. Only rank, decaying substance must adorn necks, wrists, showers/baths. Stink is good, pong better
Has been found dead, its outline in the street. Another town/city has taken its identity. It has been absorbed into growing
Attends its own funeral/baptism. Respectfully dressed. Remembers blanket over its face, then around its young form.
Catches glimpses of itself in other places, same street pattern, same shops and wonders whom is copying whom.
Where everything is one size bigger, or smaller than you need it to be. Clothes hang, pinch, portions bloat/starve.
When you need to be quick, there’s always a queue one person who takes ages, your shoe breaks, you spill a drink, something
Items are only sold in twos or threes when you only want one, or its BOGOF when you want one at half price.
The idea of a shop is unknown. People know which items they own are equal value to others. Know others by word of mouth.
Amidst the carnage of Peace, War continues as if nothing has happened. Remembrance of Peace in War, War in Peace.
Quiet light in trees canopy. Quiet light warms pavement stone walls graves. Quiet light falls as this hand falls
Facts are plain.
During afternoon Sanctuary Wood taken over by 1/5th Lincolns Royal Fusiliers. fourth company remained at battalion headquarters inside the wood itself.
1.30 p.m. several high calibre shells fired into S.W. corner of wood, one falling directly into newly occupied trench 7. This trench contained machine-gun post,. Two men killed instantly, Privates Tom Burtwhistle from Scunthorpe and 18-year-old drummer Harold Laurence from Aswell Street in Louth. Both men now commemorated on the Menin Gate memorial to missing Ypres.
Both men recorded as casualties in the 1/5th Lincolns War Diary
The wood was not a sanctuary
The Wombwell Rainbow 