Just a wee heads-up that I will have a new book of poetry out soon. It will be printed in the same format as Listing, in what Proost describe as a ‘pocket liturgy’ size, which in practice means a lovely little book that can be carried in your pocket, which, dare I suggest, might work particularly well for this one…

…because it concerns itself with wild water. And there is nothing more poetic than watching water in wild places.

This book gathers together brand new poems along with some of my older writing into chapters entitled River, Ocean, Irrigate, Souls swimming and Flow together, and was partly inspired by our up and coming exhibition @ Tighnabruaich Gallery which begins at the end of March.

These excerpts from the introduction probably tells this story as well as anything might;

 

The imagery of moving water – rivers, streams, rolling waves – has long been employed by humans as a means of seeking to understand things beyond ourselves. In some parts of the world water is a much rarer commodity than it is where I live, on the western fringe of Europe, amongst the remains of the temperate rain forests. From ancient times we hear of sacred rivers, or shrines sited at springs and wells. In fact, many of these sites seem to have been adopted by the new religion of the Celts, to become holy wells or holy springs. Certainly, the ancient Hebrew texts inherited by the Celts were also full of the same imagery; streams of living water, water springing from rocks, God moving across the face of the waters, water turned to wine, the baptism of new believers and so on. Sometimes the water seems to be used to describe God, or an aspect of God, at other times it is used to describe life itself.

…

But the title of this collection – ‘Where the streams come from’ – suggests something else too; the idea of an origin; a beginning; an uprising; a source. This might be a matter of history – after all, we all live downstream of all that has ever been and upstream from all that is yet to be. It is also a question of science; the explosive expansion of the universe, the accretion of material into stars, orbited by planets, an accidental alchemy that leads to life and the unfolding evolution that flows forward towards us. For many it is a theological question- one that some promote above all others. God is our creator and the universe is his clockwork toy, slowly winding down to a time of his choosing.

…

For poets it is ultimately a spiritual question, one concerned with trying to see beyond the surface into the meanings that make everything come alive. Learning how to exist in the flow of all things, not merely to observe and record, or to define and measure, nor to decide between what is sacred and what profane. Not even to save. The flow I refer to is that which we sense in wild places. The flicker that we feel in the pits of our stomachs when an animal roars at a distance. The tears at sunset. The pang at the sight of geese flying away for winter. That sense of staring into moving water and wondering… if. Spirituality like this can arguably only ever be partially expressed and only then using the mediums of poetry and art.

More on release date etc later, but in the meantime, some more moving water;

I suppose we all grew up with comics. They were a guilty pleasure for me – for some reason my mother thought that they would addle my brain somehow so I used to read them in secret, borrowed from friends or picked up in those bargain bins they used to have in the news agents for pennies. Beano. Hotspur. All those ones with Spitfires and plucky tommies dodging bullets on the covers. As a student, my mate Mark had a thing for 2000AD, which both thrilled me and horrified me with its creative dystopian bleakness. Then I sort of stopped reading comics. They were for kids after alland my mum might have been right all along.

Something is changing though. The dominance of Marvel might be part of it, with the superhero genre taking centre stage. They are emphatically NOT my thing though, even the films that transcend the limitations of the superhero genre (bombastic conversation – ludicrous fight – bombastic conversation – ludicrous fight – repeat) to deliver something more nuanced and intelligent tend to leave me cold. And anyway, these films are live action now, despite all the CGI. No, something else is going on. The Graphic Novel is on the rise…

Forget comics. These are not disposable pieces of distraction. They are not even comic. They can be moving, inspiring and challenging in ways that all the best art really should be.

My window into this world is my mate Si Smith, who for years I have heard get excited about graphic novels and animated films that I had never heard of. I still mostly did not ‘get’ them, even if it was hard not to be caught up in his enthusiasm. I am too wedded to words perhaps. Also, the incredible craft needed to put together a whole story line in graphic form is hard to grasp for muggles life me.

Well, time to change all that.

A few months ago, I got my first read of this. 

It is brilliant. You should buy it. If it is a new art form to you, here is some advice; treat reading it almost like you would a spiritual discipline. Lectio Divina or something like that. I know, that sounds blasphemous right? Follow me on this though- I suggest reading it through once quite quickly. Then notice the sound track- read it through again, much more slowly, allowing the songs to filter in too (there is playlist on Spotify under the same name if you use this.) Of course, the story will have nagged at you as you were reading. Then it might be time to think about meaning. What is this story about? Why is the main character doing what he is doing? What is driving him? Perhaps too, you will come to ask, what is the relationship between this story and Lent? Next, allow individual images to speak to you. Expressions, moments of tender observation…

Or you could forget all that and just enjoy the creativity- which brings me to this. Si has been running a side blog that reveals something of the process of how a piece of work like this comes together. Check it out here.

It gives a glimpse onto the way that each image is constructed layer by layer. A lot of the images are from another piece of work, also brilliant, called Abide with me.

This is a very different piece of work, concerning itself with the ever present but often ignored issue of dementia. It is the story of one day, told from three different perspective, in three different zines. A man with dementia, his wife and their visiting son.

It is really great to celebrate the success of a friend, but this is no puff piece. Don’t take my word for it, get hold of these things for yourself. Allow them to open up a new world for you. You won’t regret it.

Economics has sold us a story of gloom over the last decade or so. Experts in the field (who seem to have been very poor at both predicting the scale of the crash, or learning from it, according to their own students) have mostly given us the language of austerity, of scarcity, of what we can not afford. What little hope that could be offered was measured in miserly predictions of growth, or increases in people working insecure low-paid jobs.

There is no ‘Magic Money Tree’, according to Theresa May- at least not for those of us who are in the most need. Quantitive Easing (QE) which might be regarded as the very definition of a magic money tree, only bears fruit for those who can reach the very top.

A few months ago, I began a conversation with an economics professor that I hope to continue. I asked him what hope economics can offer us- as in where are the inspiring stories, the people who see differently within the field? What alternatives are being proposed? In the end though, the conversation tended to revolve around doing more of the same, only doing it better. Perhaps my naivety might have left me hoping for some kind of magic bullet, some kind of break-through brilliance that could turn the dreadful elitist and unsustainable inequalities of our current system upside down and ‘let the grand correction commence.’ Anyway, I was left disappointed.

But the conversation is only just beginning. There are of course many other economic perspectives that directly contradict what is happening within our economy at present, and not just from the old binary divisions proposing a Marxist analysis, or a return to the Keynsian hegemony of the fifties.

Interestingly, one of the ideas that has occupied my thinking for a couple of years now is Localism. Then, over the last couple of days, I have heard it discussed both on the radio, and in a rather fascinating article in the Guardian (more of this later.)

By Localism, I mean simply this;

• Strengthening and developing local community resources, markets and networks
• Pushing back globalised corporations, and loosing their grip on government
• Finding local solutions to local problems wherever possible
• Contracting out/employing local businesses and skills wherever possible
• Valuing small over distant conglomerates
• Investing money in local projects
• Using localised banking and credit unions
• Encourage local cashless exchanges
• Encourage co-operatives and small community development projects.
• Grow food locally wherever possible
• Make things locally wherever possible

Why?

Well, the economic benefits are startling. Then there are the environmental benefits. Then there are the potential benefits to local democratic processes. Perhaps most importantly, localism speaks to our humanity in a way that globalisation can not. It allow us to focus on human-scale connection within known community, not on bloody ‘brand loyalty’. It reminds us that we are not just consumers, we are also neighbours who are responsible for one another and in charge of our own collective destiny.

But don’t take my word for it- check out the article here by Aditya Chakrabortty, which describes developments in Preston, Lancashire (of all places), somewhere I know well, having lived there or thereabouts for most of my early to mid adulthood.

Here are a few quotes for those of you who are too busy to read the whole thing;

…the city council no longer plays that game. Instead it has adopted a guerrilla localism. It keeps its money as close to home as possible so that, amid historically drastic cuts, the amount spent locally has gone up. Where other authorities privatise, Preston grows its own businesses. It even creates worker-owned co-operatives…

 

…calculations in 2013 showed that a mere fraction – one quid for each £20 spent – stayed in Preston. Much of the rest was going to building firms headquartered in London, say, or to global catering companies.

Years before PFI builder Carillion keeled over and the rest of the country realised the importance of which particular private firms take public money, Preston had already begun fretting about where its pounds were going. “There was all this money in the community and it was leaking out,” says Brown. The Federation of Small Businesses has published research by CLES showing that for every pound spent with a small or medium-sized firm, 63p is respent locally. That drops to 40p for every pound given to a large or multinational company….

Decades of hollowing out and of contracts going to big companies elsewhere means Preston doesn’t have much of a local economy left. There is no shoal of eager contenders clamouring for each new job. Some firms simply aren’t used to applying for big contracts, so need coaxing. In other cases, Community Gateway asks bidders to detail how they will employ locally, provide training, and partner with other local businesses.

In 2015, Lancashire county council put a contract to provide school meals out to tender. That was impossibly large for local firms, so officers broke it into bite-size chunks. There was a tender to provide yoghurt, others for sandwich fillings, eggs, cheese, milk, and so on. One contract was split into nine different lots. It meant officials actually shaping a market to fit their society – and it worked. Local suppliers using Lancashire farmers won every contract and provided an estimated £2m boost to the county.

Preston is trying to do localism on a big scale. But what does it look like on a small scale? I am on the verge of becoming involved in something called the South Cowal Community Development Company. We are looking at various plans for investing in our small community. Buying the local shop perhaps and making it a hub for all sorts of other activities. Developing renewable energy sources and investing the income locally. Who knows where it will go? But it will be above all things, local.

I built a chicken pen/coop a few months ago, and we have been waiting ever since for the arrival of some hens. We have always welcomed the chance to re-home some birds who might not have had the best start in life- in fact, they may never have seen the sky or scratched at real earth.

In this case, we have 10 birds from Homes4hens.  Their birds are all about 13 months old, and despite being just at the start of their active lives, would have been slaughtered, because their first intensive laying period will tail off for a while at this age. They will have all been caged- and if you think that caged hens are a great improvement on the old ‘battery’ farmed ones, you should come and take a look at our poor birds, partially feathered and exhausted as they are.

Still, some food, some rest and some fresh air will work wonders and they will soon be fit, fully feathered and laying again. In fact, we expect to have more eggs than we need, despite the fact that, as vegetarians, eggs are a big part of our diet. If the hens are as productive as we hope there will be a few at the end of our drive for sale if you are passing!

When you first get chickens, it is wise to leave them shut up for a few days to get used to their new surroundings, but today, despite the mixed winter weather that included snow, rain and sunshine, they were so keen to be outside we did not have the heart to leave them in the dark. They emerged slowly, like pit ponies unused to daylight. Like the walking wounded onto hospital grounds. It was a delight to see…

I have been working on some new poems that will form part of the fast approaching ‘Where the Streams Come From’ exhibition, which opens at Tighnabruach Gallery at the end of March.

Those of you who write poetry may agree with me that poems are never really ‘finished’. It is hard to let them go. Even years later, I will read something that I have written and wince, wanting to change it. Eventually all you can do is to set it aside and write something else. This is all the more true when a poem does not come easily, almost as if the flow of water has been blocked upstream and we poke at the flow with a stick in an attempt to unblock it.

So here is some work-in-progress. Still not quite flowing as freely as this;

Will the river run forever?

Will the river run forever?

Will it keep on tumbling down this cliff?

Will it keep on sparkling with the splash of light and life?

Will it dance to the scale of fin and fish,

Or will the music it makes

Fall silent?

Will the river run forever?

Will it carry the boat that carries me?

Will the flow go past these fields I know

And twist and turn to new places?

Or am I just a fool, floundering

In a stagnant pool?

Will the river run forever?

Will it keep carving these old rocks?

Will it keep on carrying them as suspended sediment,

Spew them through the open-mouth of an estuary

Fan them across the ocean floor,

Or will it fail?

Will the river run forever?

Will it irrigate? Will it recreate the flow

Of life in me? Will it roll through this world like laughter?

Will it quench the thirst of a thousand tongues,

Or will it dry, like the salt tears of a woman

Done now with weeping?

Sorry for such naked commercialism, but we are having a clear out of some stock, via a flash sale on our Facebook page.

Go on, grab yourself a bargain! We can post most things…

I have been doing a lot of walking recently. New year exercise resolutions and all of that. Not today though. We were due to be having a social day today, visiting friends, but against the forecast, it has been snowing hard all morning, sealing us (and the car) inside the house.

We should be out walking. Or building a snow man. Or sledging down slopes. Adventuring into the snow covered wild places hereabouts.

But instead, we are having a snow day.

Sitting watching the world as it is blanketed in beauty. All those dark browns and greys replaced by pure white.

Writing lazy poems;

Snow day

 I should be shovelling, but here we sit,

Watching the world turn white.

Warmed by each other, our

Fingers entwined around mugs of tea.

Bread is rising in the kitchen

And I hope it snows

Forever.

Here is the view- from the window of course. It’s cold out there…

I thought some of you might like to see this;

I post this with no sense of triumph, despite my previously stated concerns over the last ten years.

Thanks to a recent intervention by the father of the late Stephen Lawrence, the national spotlight was once more on the rock and this time, local opinion was shaken and the tide began to turn. One night, someone covered the rock with a different kind of graffiti.

The rock is a mess, but some of us might still regard it as an improvement on what was there before. It might surprise you to know that I am not one of these, for this reason;

The rock has been decorated with blackface imagery for over one hundred years. There have been numerous attempts to complain about this, each time the complainant was repulsed by local opinion, by local ‘historians’. Political representatives (not the current ones I hasten to add!) have publicly defended the rock as not racist and called for previous (less colourful) defacers of the blackface images to be pursued as vandals. It has also been repainted several times, arguably with images even closer to the golliwog of youthful memory. Perhaps it might yet be repainted again, but for now, it has gone.

It would be the natural thing for those of us who live here to want to hide this history, and pretend it never happened, but no matter what happens to this rock, it’s history remains. Whether we chose to acknowledge our history, it still forms us.

Therefore, glad that I am that we have reached a moment when we are confronted with this history, there is a danger that we sanitise it rather than use it to inform. It is easier to try forget than to engage with what we were, particularly when that involves a measure of healthy shame.

So, I want to give my voice to a call to place an information board on the sea front. I invite others to join me in this call. I would even go as far as to suggest some content;

• Say what we know about the rock, how long it was painted, how we have disagreed about the meaning
• Talk about the prevalence of blackface images around the world, how it was spread by popular culture, through ‘entertainment’ that made a display of a harmful stereotype, even though most people did so with little awareness of the damage done.
• Describe how the word ‘Jim Crow’ was used, and what laws it gave name to in the USA
• Remind us of the legacy of slavery and its bastard cousin, ‘indentured labour’ in the wealth of this area. How slave ownership was greatest amongst Scottish people, home and abroad. How sugar, tobacco and cotton were directly traded into the Clyde, resulting in wealth and prosperity that gave birth to the holiday destination called Dunoon
• Remember the race wars that happened in the town during the time the American base was in the Holy Loch
• Finally, it must give space to people whose life was affected directly by these things. Contact the Jim Crow museum, or the Stephen Lawrence Charitable Trust.

Because although the tide might have turned, it is only a few hours until it turns again, and who knows what those waters might bring…

Things change.

Just over a year ago, I stopped my day job. I had been given an amazing opportunity to develop a life that embraced creativity, to focus of writing and developing a business called seatree.

We had no idea whether we could make it work – we still have kids in university and no matter how much veg you grow, life ain’t free – but so far so very good.

I am still writing. I am involved in some fantastic projects. Amazingly, we are getting by; each month that we sell enough ceramics, driftwood and poetry feels like a new blessing. It is the new almost-normal.

Lest I become too self-congratulatory, I should remind myself that this is not really about me at all. Michaela works so very hard. Also, we are ever more appreciative of those who we travel with. The networks of trust we build are vital, because creative businesses are fragile, as are we.

It is less about paddling, more about allowing the water to carry us…

So, it is with great excitement that I am able to say that seatree have been invited by the lovely Tighnabruach gallery to put on an exhibition. Yesterday we met with Ros and Neil from the gallery, sharing with them our half formed ideas and fully realised doubts and fears, because this will be out very first venture into putting on our very own exhibition.

It will be entitled Where the streams come from and will combine poetry and ceramics. It will run at TIG gallery from the 31st of March until the 22nd of April. (Which doesn’t give us long!)

Some of you may recognise the title from here. An old project that nagged at me.

I wrote my first poem for the exhibition the other day. Here it is…

I am

I am bird, I am wind

I am scaled, I am skinned

I am soil, I am stone

I am flesh, I am bone

I am ebb, I am flow

I am stream, I am snow

I am all of these things

And I am nothing

I am love, I am light

I am morning, I am night

I am atom, I am star

I am close, I am far

I am start, I am end

I am stranger, I am friend

I am all of these things

And I am nothing

I am silence, I am song

I am right, I am wrong

I am sea, I am shore

I am less, I am more

I am young, I am old

I am iron, I am gold

I am all of these things

And I am nothing

So friends, another year arrives. May it be good to you.

Yesterday, before the gathering of friends for music and chat, Michaela and I had a couple of hours to ourselves. The house was tidy and goodness wafted in from the kitchen so we sat and listened to music. And we wept. Only those of you who are blessed/cursed by that certain vulnerability of the soul will understand how this was a good thing, a beautiful thing; sitting with the woman/man that you love and weeping together to songs that break you open.

As the year turns, I find myself reflecting on the direction of the things I write here. I am conscious of my attempts at ‘worthiness’- a desperate pull inside me towards justice making, in my limited way. But sometimes you just need something to get you through the winter.

So, this is where I am heading for a while. Looking for signs of grace in the unfolding not-quite darkness. Poems. Songs. Pictures. Pieces of art.

Friends, worry not. I have not become the unwilling body-host to an optimistic alien. It is unlikely that I will be reaching for anything from the Abba back catalogue. After all sometimes it is good to weep.

What gets me through the winter are those moments of beauty where we are taken beyond ourselves into something deeper. We are not removed from what we are, but we catch glimpses of our truer selves. We do not escape our circumstances, but see that they contain more than we thought possible.

So, come with me if you will. Your company will be welcome.

Here are some of the songs we listed to yesterday;