Many years ago I learned
about draughter's painters
who needed outlines
and painter's painters,
who merged colours.
It was good I appreciated both styles.
I am losing definitions
and inhabit a Titian garden.
As luck would have it
my memory requires words
to reconstruct an image.
When I now look at my walnut tree
it is composed of contours and colour
and long years of memory.
I have discovered how to have a good day: have a hideous day first.
Last Wednesday, my catheter blocked and the bladder with it. I can't have the catheter changed unless I am on the bed and I had no- one here who knew how to put me there so I spent the day feeling sick and feverish; I foetalised even worse than usual, and I am already 36cm shorter than I used to be, which gave me a very sore neck and headache. It was a perfectly horrible day.
So, Thursday felt marvellous; although, actually, it was no better than the Tuesday or Monday or the weeks stretching back behind me. And it was such a change to have had an illness that could get better instead of knowing that how I am today is the best I can be. For example, the nurse today acknowledged that the pressure point on my bum, which has been described as an iceberg, will not get better. All their energy is going into making sure it doesn't infect and the skin around it doesn't break.
Unfortunately, Wednesday was such a horrid day, I am in no hurry to have a second one like it, so I will have to wait a long time until I have another good day.
Silence and time are the yin and yang
of poetry: inward stillness
and the creative urge.
It may take days, weeks or even months
for ideas to collide in my mind
forging new combinations.
I may seem to be just sitting,
but it's the pregnancy of waiting.
A stillborn poem is no good,
premature is possible, provided
I can give it outer time
to compensate for the missing inner time.
What is needed is longish spells
without distractions.
Time and silence.
