The Likeness is Applied to the Canvas
SYNOPSIS
A collection of previously uncollected poems plus a series of thirteen poems written loosely around the creation of art.
BACKGROUND
The poems are diverse in terms of structure, style, and subject matter.
I worked as a scientific editor for many years. Three poems arise from this period (Beginning Writing with No Thought of the Whole, Editing, and Sharpening a Blunt Pencil). Somewhat unusual subjects for poetry.
I suppose I hold ‘dual nationality’ having both a scientific and artistic background. We think of these subjects as different entities. In fact, this is a construct of our own making. Creative thought is equally important to both.
SAMPLE VIDEOS
SAMPLE POEMS
Rembrandt
Saskia is dead, and in her passing
the fragility of life is laid bare.
Endured again, the rigour of mourning,
the disappointments, misfortunes, we share.
No mirror so harsh as that held by death
in which few dare look; still fewer study.
With what artist’s eye did you scour its depth?
What reflection seek? What image copy?
Though pain and sorrow may mature the brush,
add shade and substance to its armoury,
to trade love, contentment, for genius
who would fix that price or pay willingly?
Derby
Sunday. The bare-arsed cheek of it.
Stranded at some barren siding.
The dead travel faster than British Rail.
Speaker coughs an idle lying
yarn about this and that. Outside,
a disused beck. Two boys sit fishing
with a net. Which reminds me,
they say if you take two tadpoles,
wrap them in cloth, keep each wet,
they grow into frogs with three legs.
There’s a reason for it, apparently.
Everything’s connected, cause – effect.
We will be forty minutes late into Derby.
Guy for the airport starts to sweat.
Croissant buttered with a plastic knife.
The mystery deepens. No coffee yet.
Brief History of Desire
In the depths
taste is an afterthought,
a late delivery of sense
you can live without.
It is in the mystery
of these things
we lose ourselves.
Wine of a moment,
bare room,
loss of space
between lips and hips.
It is in the day
of the event
we catch our breath. Cull sanity
from rubble.
Lead the guilty body home.
Meeting Place
The ghost of a breath
shrouds a window. Remnant of a breath
tips into drops. Day rises
as a morning sun, bold with summer, calls.
Soon it will be too late. Tourists will arrive
unexpected as deserts. Innocent people
with secret names
will stand on walls, light fires,
shout about children in loud voices.
A car will shrug its shoulders,
cough, splutter,
stretch over a fragment of road
an arm pulled by invisible strings
drawn across frosted glass.
It will travel
like a snail into the distance.