I do like a sauna and I've been enjoying the new crop of seaside saunas that have popped up in the south west. I was sat in the Blackpool Sands sauna the other week and began to write this in my head.
The pop up sauna
is all varnished pine and dry heat
in truth it is a big barrel
laid on its side
near the tideline
I’m sat sweating inside
I look out the porthole
on what could be a moonscape
I think about Yuri
and Valentina
who circled the earth
in capsules the size
of a large washing machine
just to be the first
So the poem mentionsYuriGagarin, as many of my poems do. Valentina Tereshkova was the first woman in space and I saw her actual capsule in the Cosmonaut Exhibition in London. It was very small. I've not much to say about the poem. It's a bit too new to make sense of. Watch this space.
I leave you with a song about a spaceman by Bob and Carol Pegg.
I don't know why I read old science fiction, most of the novels do not stand the passage of time. Perhaps I am drawn to the idea that the future envisaged by the author is our past. For example, I recently read one set in 1989, twenty years on from when it had been written. It read like a shopping list of the hopes of 1959. This poem reviews a different book, and discretion prevents me from naming the author.
Book Review
the novel he wrote that summer [1967]
was powered by a single idea
fleshed out with scenes from his life
[again]
as usual the future resembled yesterday
and women were confined to walk on parts
cut out characters of no importance
the casual sexism he took for granted
was the most alien aspect of the tale
but the publisher astutely realised
putting Science Fiction Classic
on the reprint’s cover was all that was
needed
to sucker fools like me
I had dithered about buying it, having read other books by the author, I should have listened to myself.
Thanks yet again to the Secret Poets for helping me sort this poem into some sort of order. You can read the first version here.
Star Smashers of the Universe
She
was a character fleeing her book. An
afterthought added when the author had read a survey of successful
fiction.
But
the device
he had lazily sketched to aid
his hero and newly female sidekick,
out
of the corner he’d written
them into on page 61, had far more potential than he could ever
comprehend...
He
had saddled her with a scientific frame of mind because the survey
maintained all female protagonists should have hard science
backgrounds and buck the patriarchal norm.
By
page 83 she had perfected the device, figured out how to make her
exit.
The
first and only edition of Star Smashers of the Universe was almost
pulped when the publishers discovered a migraine inducing pattern of
letters on page 84, on
reflection they decided the reader would think it cutting edge, the
hero having been drugged with a powerful alien hallucinogenic in the
previous paragraph. And
so the books were shipped across the country to an underwhelmed
reading public.
Free
of the author’s limited imagination, she set the controls for
Cassiopeia, the
hero, on the other hand, spent the rest of the story talking to
himself, not that anyone commented on it.
I
only saw her once,
in a graphic I was flicking through, a full page frame of a drinking
den on a space habitat, all 70s big NASA engineering, she
walked from one side of the bar to
the other, winked at me and was
lost among the merry makers.
There are many changes. The overall poem is tighter and I feel reads much better than it did. The poem shall now go away for a few months before I look at it again. Hopefully then I shall see the flaws more clearly. There is a danger of overworking a poem. It is always best to let it be for a month or two.
A great title for this post. Very unpoetry. Very genre. Very pulp.
I talk a lot about how poems write themselves. I was thinking that the idea of a poem writing itself must sound impenetrable or like none sense to anyone who has not experienced the words falling into place effortlessly. It doesn't happen often but recently I have been having a run of such events. This post's poem lived as the opening line buzzing around my head for about a week before I felt that I could write it down. In that time I think my subconscious had done the hard work of knitting various ideas and locations into a poem. I am not claiming, and I hope I never have, that no revision is required, because that would not be true. 99.9% of my work has required revision and deliberation. That's what the job is about. Revision and reflection.
Star Smashers of the Universe
She
was a character fleeing her book, maintained she was an afterthought
added when the author had read a survey of successful fiction and
realised he needed a strong female sidekick to cover all possible
demographics.
He had saddled her with a scientific frame of mind because the survey maintained all female protagonists should have hard science backgrounds and buck the patriarchal norm to make them more appealing.
The machine he had lazily sketched to get his hero and newly female
sidekick out
of the corner he’d painted them into on page 61 had far more
potential than he could ever comprehend...
But by
page 83 she had perfected the device and figured out how to make her
exit.
The
first and only edition of Star Smashers of the Universe was almost
pulped when the publishers discovered a migraine inducing pattern of
letters on page 84.
On
reflection they decided the reader would think it cutting edge, the
hero having been drugged with a powerful alien hallucinogenic in the
previous paragraph
and
so the books were shipped across the country to an underwhelmed
reading public.
Free
of the author’s limited imagination, she set the controls for
infinity
the hero, on the other hand, spent the rest
of the story talking to himself, not
that it mattered.
I
met her out near Cassiopeia in a graphic I was flicking through, a
full page frame of a drinking den on a space habitat, all 70s big
NASA
engineering,
She
walked from one side of the bar to the other, winked at me and was
lost among the merry makers.
I like the idea of the character taking control and leaving a bad novel and wandering through different books. I'm not sure the poem is complete. Watch this space for rewrites.
I think its got to be The Byrds. here's Mr Spaceman live [with Gene Clarke back in the band].
I had to include this version of 8 Miles High from 1970-superb.
Today's poem arose from a writing exercise. I took a blank piece of paper and wrote whatever words came into my head until I had filled it. No stopping, no thinking about the contents and no criticism. I just wrote. Then I read it and wondered if there was a poem lurking in there. This came slowly out.
the silence of the great extinction
settled
on the shoulders of the survivors
stalling
all thoughts of celebration
as
if for the first time
they
clearly saw all that had been lost
as
if for the first time
so
set to work
shipping
in from beyond the stars
mechanical
birds to jewel their skies
and
fill a niche long vacated
by
sinew and bone
feather
and wing
see
how their propellers idle
as
the thermal spirals then ever higher
to
spectrograph heaven with their metal tongues
I got the idea of mechanical birds to jewel the skies and the propellers from the writing, the rest evolved over a couple of weeks and many revisions.
Another poem about space this post. I think it came from watching too many cheap science fiction tv series. You know the kind, where every planet looks like earth.
They land on a new planet,
step
out into a forest reminiscent of Canada,
because
that’s the cheapest location
for
American television series,
those
epics shot on a budget.
Space
travellers never offer
an
explanation for this carbon copy of earth.
No
vague reference to some pan-galactic seeding
by
a god-like forerunner species,
that
accounts for the parallel evolution
and
absence of anaphylactic shock inducing
nasty
little microbes,
that
you would probably encounter on a world
teaming
with its own take on life.
No,
it’s just a convenient other planet,
ready
to be plundered.
I read at Torquay's Stanza Extravaganza on Tuesday evening. It was a lovely venue and standing room only. I read some poems I had not tried out in public before and one needed re-jigging. You can read the original here.
Poem for C
Given
the economies
of
supermarket squash
and
the cheapest of vodkas,
it
had always been
how
much could he drink,
in
the shortest amount of time,
to
keep ahead of blacking out,
to
avoid the grey dawns
when
monochromatic
migraine
imitating aftermaths
immobilised
him in a space
where
he could do nothing
but
relive it all over again.
I
met him in the fragile truce of sobriety
he
called it his
jigsaw days.
He
placed his pieces
into
shapes that just might work,
into
patterns that had eluded him on the drink.
Some
events, he confided, never end,
so
you have to find different ways of getting on with it.
It was difficult to read in its previous form. Sometimes you only discover this when you are performing. I've been listening to Corrina Repp a lot recently, but I've already posted her superb album here. Anne Briggs has also been on the turntable this week. I've just found this snippet of a BBC4 series Folk Britannia.
English folk music doesn't get much better. You can watch the series on Youtube. Here's part one.
Thank you for your patience in waiting for this poem to unfold. I have been prompted to present it over three posts from the feedback I have received when I have read the entire poem. Vainly I wanted the individual pieces of the poem to be considered for what they are. This fifth [and final] part concerns the fallout from the event. Some people were, I have read, were committed for their own safety, having had some mental disturbance prompted by the effects of the solar flare. I read of one young woman who had suffered some sort of breakdown and been committed to the local sanitarium. Apparently a young doctor had managed "to cure" her through conversation. I imagine some form of analysis before Freud.
Perceptive
beyond the age in which he lived,
the
doctor at the asylum simply talked with her,
and
traced the misconceptions that had led to her commitment:
an
overly religious childhood,
the
phenomena occurring on a Sunday,
an
obvious connection.
Her
personal weight of guilt took longer to unravel,
but
it was a common enough story:
the
pressure of the over attentive lodger,
her
chronic need to please,
a
lonely Saturday before the phenomena.
He
talked her back to a place in this world.
Phew! That's it. Hope it makes sense and that you enjoyed it. Normal service will be resumed next post. Until then here is the sublime Annabelle Chvostek. Annabelle how about a tour of England? Please?
This post is a continuation of the last post. I have been writing about the 1859 solar flare. It is sometimes known as the Carrington Event, after the astronomer who observed the sun flare. Last post I shared the first two parts of the poem. Here are the next two. The first concerns those people in America [where the effects were experienced most acutely as it was night time]. The event took place on a Sunday and many people interpreted it from a religious perspective thinking it was the end of the world. The second poem is more fanciful. I had read that the telegraph system was powered by the solar flare. Someone discovered that if the batteries were disconnected from the telegraphic equipment it would still work. I wondered what if the Sun had wanted to speak to us and its words had been picked up by a telegraph operator and discarded.
3.
Cut
to midnight America:
Drawn
out of doors
to
stare at the false dawn light sky,
to
wait for a miracle,
unsure
if they really wanted one,
then
going back to bed
the
morning is Monday.
Apart
from the worried ones,
the
ones that drank in the park until it didn't matter any more.
The
ones who woke at first light baptised in dew.
4.
Beneath
the power of the sun,
even
the telegraph system went down
but
there was this one operator,
having
figured out the battery had to be disconnected,
that
the solar storm would power the wire,
who
listened to the letters chatter
as
the key talked unaided.
He
was a remorseful man and
the
reproving words of love from the sun
amplified
the burden he carried.
Halfway
through the message he stopped writing,
tore
the paper, put it in the waste bin.
No
one ever knew.
I shall post the fifth part next time. Here is more Arthur Lee and Love.
I've been working on a rather long poem for some time now. It came about after I read about The Great Solar Storm of 1859. I'd first heard of it in passing a number of years ago and when I came across a more detailed reference it led me to research the topic more thoroughly, which in turn led me to want to write about it. There are a number of reasons why the storm is significant. It was the first time a solar flare had been observed and its effects charted. Also because of the telegraph the effects of the storm could be followed across the globe [specifically Europe and America]. It was a global event. Thirdly it was of such a magnitude that if it happened today we would be in trouble as it would knock out satellites and cause havoc with our electronic equipment.
Here are the first two sections of the poem:
The
Solar Storm of 1859 in Five Acts
1.
The
sun had been alone since creation,
ignored
by the local stars,
who
outshone it, bigger, brighter, better.
Gotten
above ourselves, the sun reflected,
only
it never reflected, it blazed, it burned
it
turned hydrogen to helium,
shouting
its light to an indifferent galaxy.
And
its children disappointed.
Some
had rings, that was true,
and
most had managed to have moons of their own,
but
that third one, the almost binary,
seemed
intent on throwing away
any
advantages the Cinderella zone had bestowed.
So
the sun flared and the sun spat,
a
ball of plasma tumbling through space
and
the earth took it square on the jaw.
2.
At
this point I invent an imaginary ancestor
to
people a cottage in Cheadle,
to
walk out that night and look up
at
the shimmering green blanket
of
the Northern Lights that far south.
I was after achieving different voices for each part of the poem. This is why the first section is light and I hope humorous. In the second section I wanted to show how far south the Northern Lights came due to the solar flare. Once I started reading about the event I wanted to convey some of its magnitude to the reader. The Cinderella Zone is the distance from a sun that offers the best opportunities for life to evolve. The earth and its large moon could almost be a binary planet.
I leave you with Arthur Lee and the last incarnation of Love.
Superb stuff. Forever changes is one of my all time favourite lps. I think I'm on my third copy, having worn the other two out. Until next time and the rest of this poem.
Wonderful news this post- Oscar Sparrow is back! Visionary, editor, and publisher poet, Oscar Sparrow returns to the fray to fashion words into his own unique take on the world. He has a new venture The Virtual Cafe, you can also visit on Instagram. More hopefully from the talented Mr. Sparrow soon.
I would like to thank The Secret Poets for their sterling support in helping shape All Yesterday's Tomorrows. You can read the first draft here. I cannot stress the importance of having quality constructive feedback. Thanks chaps.
All
Yesterday's Tomorrows
Karl
drives a sky blue zephyr zodiac,
big
and bold with wings like rocket fins,
on
the hunt for flying saucers.
The
urgency of Giant
Steps
spurs us up to Dartmoor,
driving
toward A
Love Supreme,
with
dreams of Adamski scout ships,
as
cool as Coltrane.
We
are on the moor, riffing off our dreams,
to
see the earth from space,
chat
with an alien, out there on a tor.
Or
a cigar shaped mothership above us,
that
would interrupt all electric fields.
Which
of us though really believes?
Night
descends.
A
clear, starry sky,
no
strange lights,
we
see no saucers.
Inside
the car, mid note the music stops.
Cassette
tape ribbons in my hands,
then
it's the death of jazz.
All
the silent way home.
So what's different? Two lines have been removed, others have been moved about and the poem is the stronger for it.
When
he had fallen off that wall,
and
his eggshell fractured,
shattering
into who knew how many pieces,
the
soldiers made the mistake of looking inside his head.
An
army psychiatrist was hastily summoned, then a second.
They
conferred while privates jigsawed fragments of the shell.
Ministers
met to compare alternatives,
naturally
the King, who was bank rolling the rescue mission,
was
told in private, in hushed tones.
Suddenly
everyone in the loop realised
why
he had given Alice all that attention.
They
were agreed, there was only one solution.
So
a water cannon was called forth from the barracks,
and
the streets were swept clean of Humpty Dumpty.
I'm not sure the ending there yet with this one. I see it as a more of a performance piece and I think it needs to be spoken a couple of times before it gets there.
Here is a too brief clip of John Martyn and Danny Thompson.
And here's more John Martyn, the superb BBC4 documentary.
The idea for this post's poem came from a Ray Bradbury short story, Kaleidoscope. It is about a group of astronauts falling towards a planet following the destruction of their spacecraft.
Poem
[with
thanks to Ray Bradbury for Kaleidoscope]
tumbling
to
the point
where
it is the world
that
appears to turn
take
in the textures
I
threshold
from
the knitted black of space
ionospheric
I
fall
storms
await me
Layout is everything for certain poems. I wrote this one in a workshop and originally it was squeezed into about seven lines. By altering the spacing I think I have let the poem breathe. It is always worthwhile playing about with shape and spacing as well as stanza length. I leave you with Anna Ternheim.
I have been engaged in a project with a local art class. They have drawn/painted pictures based on my poetry and along with the wondrous poets of Juncture 25 I have been responding by writing poems based on their art work. It has the potential to be a long project. This post's poem is a [very] rough draft from this project. There are a number of themes running through the poem. It is loosely based on a memory from my student days. Also I was rereading an old 1960's science fiction book recently, All The Colours of Darkness by Lloyd Biggle Jr. which was set in the then future, the 1908's, which, of course, is our past. The world was more like the 1950's than the 80's. It was fun to revisit the book though. It set me thinking about all those past tomorrows that never came about. This in turn led me to remember Karl's old Zephyr Zodiac, not quite as cool as the big American cars with fins, but as near as the Britain got in the pre-Beatles early sober sixties. I was also reminded of our shared passion for John Coltrane. The titles of two of his most famous lps are woven into the poem.
All
Yesterday's Tomorrows
Karl
drove drove a sky blue zephyr zodiac,
built
before seat belt laws,
so
big and bold with wings like rocket fins.
The
urgency of Giant Steps spurs us up to Dartmoor,
driving
toward A Love Supreme,
on
the hunt for flying saucers,
with
dreams of Adamski scout ships,
as
cool as Coltrane is on this cassette.
We
are on the moor, riffing off our dreams,
to
see the earth from space,
chat
with an alien, out there on a tor.
Or
a cigar shaped mothership above us,
that
would dampen all electric fields,
cause
this battleship to halt.
Which
of us though really believes?
Night
descends. A clear, starry sky,
no
strange lights,
we
see no saucers.
Inside
the car, mid note the music stops.
Tape
ribbons in my hands,
then
it's the death of jazz.
All
the silent way home
we
try to avoid blaming Trane
for
its murder.
There is a perspective that the move towards free jazz killed it as a contemporary art form. I am not sure but thought it was an interesting way to end the poem. I must leave you with the man himself from 1966.
