#WADOD – Might-Have-Been Brexit Day: March 29th 2019

March 29, 2019 martyn crucefix autobiography, blogging, contemporary British poetry, creative writing, ecopoetry, Indian poetry, New British Poetry, poetry, political poetry, translation, writing all the bridges are down, American punk band, Brexit, Brexit poems, Brighton Women's football team, Can You Ever Forgive Me, Christchurch massacre, data sharing, Facebook, fake news, Gowbarrow, klezmer music, Mozambique, Pantone, scattering of ashes, social media, social media and politics, Speaking of Siva, student loans, the role of the State, tote bag, vacana poems, viral spread, Vitosha, Works and Days, Works and Days of Division

Works and Days of Division – 29 poems by Martyn Crucefix

Drawing on two disparate sources, this sequence of mongrel-bred poems has been written to respond to the historical moment in this most disunited kingdom. Hesiod’s Works and Days – probably the oldest poem in the Western canon – is a poem driven by a dispute between brothers. The so-called vacana poems originate in the bhakti religious protest movements in 10-12th century India. Through plain language, repetition and refrain, they offer praise to the god, Siva, though they also express personal anger, puzzlement, even despair. Dear reader – if you like what you find here, please share the poems as widely as you can (no copyright restrictions). Or follow this blog for future postings. Bridges need building.

Friday 29.03.2019

‘this morning round noon’

this morning round noon we scattered the ashes

likeclicklike my son Thom 21 today

and fifty grand in debt

likeshare I took her to see Can You Ever Forgive Me

a glorious start to the day likelikeshare

snorkelling with turtles I love the sort of sentence

that never seems to end sadly no-one thought

o return my psychic tote bag

my condolences on those occasions I speak about him

he will be nameless in her passing

great job [heart] you Brighton women

like Rishi snapped this one on his morning run

on the path over Gowbarrow

to gather in the market square likelikelikeshare

in the struggle share like-minded children

fell out of the sky O I adore this photograph

my father’s look and how I loved his hat

like a trumpet for whatever is redacted

likelike government existing to promote and protect

the ordinary happiness of its people

shareshare are you cool and gentle peppermint

like beautifully crystallised hibiscus flowers

I was struck by a car likeshare but I’m OK

I hit my shoulder and rolled with it

plus a dash of syrup shareshare the bridges are all

pills and blue sugarcane rum likesharelike

an American punk band from Nashville posting

abuse about a young Buddhist woman

refusing anaesthetic to shareshare

are you feeling blue [smileyfaceicon] likeshare

we chanced across a bar where folk song

and klezmer were playing

as in a mirror sharelikelikeshare as in a mirror

of the world like frost on the Vitosha mountain

I think the Pantone chart is one of my favourite things

Return to the first poem of the sequence

Read previous poem

#WADOD – Day 21: March 21st 2019

March 21, 2019March 22, 2019 martyn crucefix autobiography, blogging, contemporary British poetry, creative writing, ecopoetry, Indian poetry, New British Poetry, poetry, political poetry, religious poetry, Romantic poetry, translation, writing all the bridges are down, Brexit, Brexit poems, communication, epiphany, eroticism, Hesiod, illumination through reading, original participation, Owen Barfield, spiritual through nature, the ineffable, the unseen through the seen, touch, vacana poems, weeping, Works and Days, Works and Days of Division

Works and Days of Division – 29 poems by Martyn Crucefix

videoblocks-portrait-of-very-old-man-reading-a-book-sitting-at-the-desk_hr6hdtv0e_thumbnail-full01

Thursday 21.03.2019

‘when’

when

like a falling flower-print cotton dress

has dropped its round spoor

in the silence onto the bedroom floor

when

like the moment one who has been reading

instructions on propagation

understands and the room blooms with light

when

like an ascending sun-lit valley mist

has eaten its way through all appearances

to substitute its own luminous idea

when

like the salt-wetness breaking bounds in my eyes

in an original participation

I lean over and touch what is there

my hand passing through what I thought was there all along

when

in an instant it is clear all the bridges are down

how can I speak to anybody about that

Read next poem

Read previous poem

#WADOD – Day 20: March 20th 2019

March 20, 2019March 21, 2019 martyn crucefix autobiography, blogging, contemporary British poetry, creative writing, ecopoetry, Indian poetry, New British Poetry, poetry, political poetry, religious poetry, translation, writing 1000 days since Brexit vote, 1960, all the bridges are down, alyssum, autobiography, bedding annual, Bradford-upon-Avon, Brexit, Brexit poems, bridges, Care Home, dementia, epiphany, family relationships, family resemblance, family tree, grandfather, grandmother, inheritance, memory, my bones, Scrabble, the sun room, transformation, vacana poems, WinsleyRoad, Works and Days, Works and Days of Division

Works and Days of Division – 29 poems by Martyn Crucefix

Wednesday 20.03.2019

‘now my bones take on the white of alyssum’

now my bones take on the white of alyssum

my bones

those mossy cushions in a grandfather’s front garden

my bones

though he’s long been in his grave

his daughter revives him without knowing how

his bones

time and again his bones where she sits in the morning sun

in the sun room

where the giant Scrabble board is stowed

his bones beside the giant ivory-coloured letter tiles

she will score twelve with the name of a flower

his bones a white perfume

her bones

my bones

trying to become an unobtrusive white bedding annual

an accident in the stonework of a bridge

Read next poem

Read previous poem