Among the Trees

I went for a walk the other evening which took me to the edge of my late stepfather David's old farm, to the plantation which we always thought of as 'David's plantation', because he and his father planted it. By the time I came to know him – over thirty years ago, now – the trees had grown to be quite tall. Both his and my mother's ashes were scattered not far away from there.

It's years since I wandered through it: it's all fenced off and the wrought iron gate that used to open into it is now inaccessible and overgrown. I had to find another way in. I found a sturdy piece of fence by the beck which flows through it, climbed it, forded the beck and climbed up the far bank, up among the trees. At that end the trees are all ash: David and his father had planted them with a view to harvesting them for timber. They're all still there though: they've outlived them both and they're now at least twice the size as I remember them. I made my way among them, through the undergrowth. Looking around, I was seized by a strange feeling. It's one I've felt before, several times, since my stepfather died. In the past, it was a fleeting feeling that took me by surprise when I was out in the fields, if I came across a hole in the hedge fixed with old pieces of wood, or, sometimes, a ruin of a dry-stone barn. I could never find the right words for it and I still can't. The strange ways of the subconscious. When it came over me in the plantation that evening, though, it was anything but fleeting: it was with me all the time, confirming my suspicion that it always was about David and about loss – and not only about David, but also the passing of an era in my life.

Broken Glass

  “Kenneth,” said Mrs. Mackie, once the two boys had finished their drinks. “Why don’t you go and show Josh the beach?” This phrase stuck in Josh’s mind, as it struck him as an odd thing to say. He’d seen the beach. Kenneth, showing no visible sign of enthusiasm, got up and did as he was told.

The two of them walked along the shore for a while, looking to see if anything interesting had been washed up (if it had, Josh couldn’t remember). There was a shapeless carcass some yards away, on the sand. It was hard to see, what with the sunlight shining on the water behind it. A flock of seagulls were milling round it. Kenneth picked up a stick and sent it spinning through the air towards it. Josh thought it was wrong – he’d been brought up not to do that kind of thing – but he didn’t say anything. If Kenneth was happy throwing sticks at birds, there was no telling what he might happily do to him. The birds swirled out of the way before returning to the carcass.

On the way back, Kenneth picked up a bigger stick and started swinging it to and fro, knocking pebbles and lumps of kelp out of the way as he did so. “I’m only doing this because my mother told me to, you know,” he said.

The next day, Kenneth came round to call for him. After the day before, Josh was surprised and not that pleased to see him. He wasn’t sure Kenneth was someone he wanted to spend time with, but he didn’t really know how to say ‘no’ and anyway, before he could say anything, his mother, seeing things – as she saw it – panning out the way she hoped they would, had shooed him enthusiastically out of the house.

An excerpt from a short story, Broken Glass (a nine minute read). You can read it here, at Spillwords Press.

The Retreat

You can read my short story, The Retreat, here, at International Times (IT). A soul-searching billionaire heads to the seaside to take stock of his life. It's a five minute read (there's lots of other stuff to read in IT, too!). Artwork by Rupert Loydell.

Fluxus

This week's International Times is a Fluxus special bumper issue. For anyone reading this who doesn't know, Fluxus was an interdisciplinary experimental art movement in the 1960s and 1970s (for more, watch Giles Whitehead's film. How to Become a Fluxus Artist, or read Rupert Loydell's review, The Impossible and the Improptu). There's work by Yoko Ono and John Cage, including a Death Metal cover of Cage's 4'33". And do pay a visit to Simon Collings' unmissable Air Museum.

And - nothing particularly to do with Fluxus - I've got a poem, Islander, in there, too, somewhere.

https://internationaltimes.it/

Arboretum for the Hunted

Fred D'Aguiar, for those who don't know, was one of the leading writers – along with Linton Kwesi Johnson, Bejamin Zephaniah and David Dabydeen – giving voice to marginalised groups in Britain in the 1980s. As the blurb on the back of his recent pamphlet, Arboretum for the Hunted says,  'what is striking about about this chapbook is how much keeps him dreaming, even in places and situations where many imaginations would stumble and falter in the face of ... relentless violence.' You can read my review of the book here, at Stride Magazine.

Reports from the Deep End

Reports from the Deep End is a collection of short stories inspired by the work of J.G. Ballard. Although he's famous for his visions of urban dystopia (his name has even morphed into the adjective 'Ballardian'), there's so much more to him than that. For example, as a science fiction writer, instead of writing stories about outer space, he turned, instead, to the 'inner space' of the human mind, blurring the distinction between SF and literary fiction. Then there's the exotic locations and the non-specific, slightly surreal aura of colonialism you sometimes get, that no doubt springs from his childhood experiences of Shangai and living in a Japanese internment camp during the Second World War. 

There are over thirty stories in the collection, which includes work by Will Self, Iain Sinclair and Michael Moorcock (who contributes a new Jerry Cornelius story). You can read my review of the book here, in International Times.

Wound is the Origin of Wonder

The poems in Maya C Popa's book, Wound is the Origin of Wonder, ask big questions: what can we learn about ourselves from the religious systems  and mythologies we created in the past? (Whether they're believable or not isn't the point here - Popa is looking for patterns and archetypes). What's the world like when we're not looking at it? What would it be like to be inside someone elses head? It's risky territory. Poets must 'go in fear of abstractions', as Ezra Pound put it. But then all artists who create successful art take risks. Does Maya C Popa pull it off and, if so, how? Yes, she does - but it's just that here and there, I found myself wondering. Then again, one thing I learned from reading the book was that the joy is in the wondering. You can read my full review of it here at Stride Magazine.