TASCAM DR-05

precious to you

someday soon

Fire in the ash of mind
as you walk by the hospital.
Leaves on the wet pavement.
Trees are dripping.

The green
of that traffic light
invisibly hurts.
Cars whip by,
lorries terrorize.
All the rush and roar
you are not part of.

You cross,
and make it.

In the café,
take your crack-lined 
mug
to the window seat,
rub a hole in the glass,
see a face
you used
to work with.

dark day afternoon

St Wulstan’s

This nature reserve was once 
an infirmary for American soldiers,
then a TB sanatorium in the fifties,
finally a psychiatric unit
from sixty-one until asylum was reckoned
a room in a tower block.

Here is a walk called Matron Walk; 
old trees and paths, and woods fenced off.
They hold dangerous substances 
these woods. We are warned.

No ghosts of battle-scarred GI’s
crouch behind hedges.
No blood-coughing robe-wearers
hunch upon the crumbling benches.
No moon-faced lunatics
knot fingers of despair 
at the verdict of the heights.

We throw coins into a frail stream. 
Wish, privately.

The conservationists let piles of timber rot naturally,
encouraging frogs, toads, snakes, beetles, and beneficial types of fungi.

To our relief, there are no remnants of Nissen huts,
no distant thrum of the shock machine.
No reek of unwashed gowns to linger in our hair.
Chewing gum and nylons are not to be had.

A Weimaraner poodle chases air, bounds at vacancy,
faithful to its own game. 

No ghosts but us.

And one day, when people have spare hearts,
and can live three centuries, if unlucky, 
no one will know we came here,
on a day they used to call Thursday,
so long, long ago.

St Wulstan's

Early one morning in May I set out,
And nobody I knew was about.
I'm bound away for ever,
Away somewhere, away for ever.

There was no wind to trouble the weathercocks.
I had burnt my letters and darned my socks.

No one knew I was going away,
I thought myself I should come back some day.

I heard the brook through the town gardens run.
O sweet was the mud turned to dust by the sun.

A gate banged in a fence and banged in my head.
'A fine morning, sir', a shepherd said.

I could not return from my liberty,
To my youth and my love and my misery.

The past is the only dead thing that smells sweet,
The only sweet thing that is not also fleet.
I'm bound away for ever,
Away somewhere, away for ever.

Early one Morning  - by Edward Thomas

dearest deer

i haven't seen you in some days

seems so long since you're away

come back

come back

my deer


you lent some magic to my eyes

were you an angel in disguise

come back 

come back

my deer


in the centre of your field

one look at you and i was healed

no predator could catch your grace

or cloud the sunlight on your face


at the dusk and at the dawn

i search for you and find you gone

come back

oh just once 

my deer


i never touched your golden hide

i watched you stepping from inside

come back

appear

my deer

beneath the skies the summer set

you are the one I won't regret 

unto the spinney soft you ran

oh what becomes of deer or man


into the night you drift like dream

I see you drinking from a stream

my deer

my deer

my dearest deer

my deer

oh, my deer

my dearest deer (rpt and fade)


*

dearest deer

Angel Song / Don't be afraid 

d  c g  d

you're in 
enemy territory
whenever you step
out that door

you've been
fighting an enemy
that no one else
ever saw

f g   f  g

don't be afraid     
angels protect you

in the night in the day
angels are with you

g  d c g d

can't you feel their soul light in your hair   
and the blue cloak of protection
manifest the/a gold bright in your stare
and the white rose of invocation  of  (c)    invocation    (g) invocation

under
the Tor of Avalon
lies a king
sleeping still

you wonder
where it's flowing from
this breath
beneath a hill

don't be afraid
the Goddess protects you
from the land beyond the grave
the great mother resurrects you

can't you feel her soul light in your eyes
and touch her green gown of redemption
manifest the clear heart of the wise
as you walk a deer path to ascension   (c)  to ascension    

g d c d     
you are ascended   you are ascended    you are ascended  
and all is mended

*

(went a bit loud and too near the mic of dictaphone in places, I think - ah, well)

angel song / don't be afraid

My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains
         My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk,
Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains
         One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk:
'Tis not through envy of thy happy lot,
         But being too happy in thine happiness,—
                That thou, light-winged Dryad of the trees
                        In some melodious plot
         Of beechen green, and shadows numberless,
                Singest of summer in full-throated ease.

O, for a draught of vintage! that hath been
         Cool'd a long age in the deep-delved earth,
Tasting of Flora and the country green,
         Dance, and Provençal song, and sunburnt mirth!
O for a beaker full of the warm South,
         Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene,
                With beaded bubbles winking at the brim,
                        And purple-stained mouth;
         That I might drink, and leave the world unseen,
                And with thee fade away into the forest dim:

Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget
         What thou among the leaves hast never known,
The weariness, the fever, and the fret
         Here, where men sit and hear each other groan;
Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs,
         Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies;
                Where but to think is to be full of sorrow
                        And leaden-eyed despairs,
         Where Beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes,
                Or new Love pine at them beyond to-morrow.

Away! away! for I will fly to thee,
         Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards,
But on the viewless wings of Poesy,
         Though the dull brain perplexes and retards:
Already with thee! tender is the night,
         And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne,
                Cluster'd around by all her starry Fays;
                        But here there is no light,
         Save what from heaven is with the breezes blown
                Through verdurous glooms and winding mossy ways.

I cannot see what flowers are at my feet,
         Nor what soft incense hangs upon the boughs,
But, in embalmed darkness, guess each sweet
         Wherewith the seasonable month endows
The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild;
         White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine;
                Fast fading violets cover'd up in leaves;
                        And mid-May's eldest child,
         The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine,
                The murmurous haunt of flies on summer eves.

Darkling I listen; and, for many a time
         I have been half in love with easeful Death,
Call'd him soft names in many a mused rhyme,
         To take into the air my quiet breath;
                Now more than ever seems it rich to die,
         To cease upon the midnight with no pain,
                While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad
                        In such an ecstasy!
         Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vain—
                   To thy high requiem become a sod.

(NB could not put the final two stanzas here due to limit on characters in description)  

painting - Keats listening to a Nightingale - by Joseph Severn

Ode to a Nightingale   -   by John Keats

break us or make us  (an extemporised song)

simple love  (capo 3)

been lookin out my window  lookin out my window for so long  am7   g  
sitting in the shadow    sitting in the shadow  of a song     am7  g
dont try to cheer me up  c  d  g em
im happy when im lonely  am7 c   d
bring on by your simple love     c  d  g  em
and we'll talk about tomorrow    am7  c   d (low)

the years have been flying,  days have been dying   they're gone
so many lost to us, and those who live through us, undone
heading for some further shore
no silver will we need there
It's simple love we may adore
such gold light of our sorrow

simple love  (song fragment)

out of rope

C I miss the sun
Am don’t know where he’s gone
F but not as much as I G7 miss you

C I stay indoors
Am pace these floors
F Forgot what it is to G7 kiss you

Em I know time is F running out
Em don’t know what this F song’s about
except G7 growing old
dm7 growing G cold x2

C There’s less time ahead
than Em what’s gone before. 
F What will we do 
with the G7 years left in store?

C Use them or lose them, 
Em that’s what they say. 
F Keep on breathing
till G7 that judgement day 

C And I don’t want F hope
C I won’t F despair
C am out of F rope
but I don’t G7 care

for these C changing F times
the C digital F stew
I C read the F signs 
to get a G7 clue

Em Just another empty F weekend. 
Em Nothing to do but F sleep. 
Em These dark and F wintry days. 
Em How slowly, how mercilessly they F creep. 

Fmaj7 I can’t make the day G anew; Am
Am has it all run out at G last?
Fmaj7 All is silent in this G listless Am room.
Am I live with shadows of the G past.
Of the past  F G

(repeat ‘there’s less time ahead’ section + add)
No, I don’t want hope / I won’t despair
am out of rope / but I don’t care /
I just don’t F (G bass) care. (E shape one fret up, soft)

out of rope

g Waiting for the bathroom to bm heat up
c so I can have a g spruce.

g Sitting at this table in the bm main room
in my c jumper the colour of which is g puce.

It’s d Saturday night in an c English g village
and c no buses am7 run this d late

g It’s Saturday c night, and g I’ve been em7 meditating
on the c state of my am7 life c
and the am7 state d of the g state

saturday night in an english village

am here for you 

(includes a mash-up from Ephesians 6:12 in second verse)


(g) let the peace come 
(c) that passes under (g) standing
(c) beyond the need of (g) striving
(d) (c) oh, let the peace (g) come.

(g) let the rain fall 
(c) upon the desert (g) aching
(c) on hearts forever (g) breaking
(d) (c) oh, let the sweet rain (g) fall

(em) I’ve been waiting to (d) tell you
(em) that we have finally (d) made it (c) through

(em) I’ve been longing to (d) love you
(em) in the way that you (d) need me (c) to. 

(am7) am here for (g) you
(repeat spoken)



we don’t wrestle 
against flesh and blood that’s ours
but principalities and powers
oh, yeah, the darkness of this world

in every high place
the spiritually wicked
the iniquity of rulers
oh, yeah, the darkness of this world


I’ve been waiting to tell you
that we have finally made it through

I’ve been longing to love you
in the way that you need me to. 

am here for you
(repeat spoken)



in this garden
stillness falls upon us
nothing here could wrong us
oh, mm, the mystery of your eyes

flows the fountain
under light from heaven
the moon a silver crescent
oh, mm, a kiss that never dies
I’ve been waiting to tell you
that we have finally made it through

I’ve been longing to hold you
in the way that you taught me to.

am here for you.

am here for you.

am here for you.

am here for you

adieu adieu

(em) back to balance 
a gate in the (c) day

(em) Ten of Swords
at the end of a (c) play

(g) (the) purpose of the (c) cross
(g) (the) pain of our (c) Lord

(g) I don’t know what I’m (c) doing 
or not (bm) doing, of (am7) course

(f) how to get back – (g) back to where? back to where?
(f) how to get back – (g) back to where

thy (c) plaintive (g) anthem (f) fades
(c) adieu (g) adieu (f) adieu
in (c) those next (g) valley (f) glades 
and (c) you and (g) you and (f) you

love to drift
through the clouds

far above
the worlds below

(the) blood of the lamb
(the) promise of the seed 

I don’t know what I’m thinking 
or not thinking, indeed

how to get back – back to where? back to where?
how to get back – back to where

thy plaintive anthem fades
adieu adieu adieu
in those next valley-glades 
and you and you and you

clock the seconds 
afore they go

reconnect 
to the flow

tender is the night 
on a winding mossy way

in love with easeful death 
yet still wanting to stay
how to get back – back to where? back to where?
how to get back – back to where

thy plaintive anthem fades
adieu adieu adieu
in those next valley glades 
and you and you and you

split the heart
of the tree

divided self 
one, two, three

(the) nightingale’s repose 
her last song on the air 

I don’t know why I’m sensing 
but not seeing the rose 

how to get back – back to where? back to where?
how to get back – back to where

thy plaintive anthem fades
adieu adieu adieu
in those next valley glades 
and you and you and you (et vous et vous et vous)

(fade out on adieu adieu adieu x 3)

NB
(uses some lines and variation of lines from Keats's Ode to a Nightingale: 'thy plaintive anthem fades'/ 'adieu adieu'/ 'next valley glades' / 'tender is the night' / 'winding mossy way' / 'in love with easeful death')

adieu adieu

Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike;
Eat I must, and sleep I will, — and would that night were here!
But ah! — to lie awake and hear the slow hours strike!
Would that it were day again! — with twilight near!

Love has gone and left me and I don't know what to do;
This or that or what you will is all the same to me;
But all the things that I begin I leave before I'm through, —
There's little use in anything as far as I can see.

Love has gone and left me, — and the neighbors knock and borrow,
And life goes on forever like the gnawing of a mouse, —
And to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow
There's this little street and this little house.

Ashes of Life -  by Edna St. Vincent Millay

I had a dream three walls stood up wherein a raven bird
Against the walls did beat himself and was this not absurd?

For sun and rain beat in that cell that had its fourth wall free
And daily blew the summer shower and the rain came presently

And the pretty summer time and all the winter too
That foolish bird did beat himself till he was black and blue.

Rouse up, rouse up, my raven bird, fly by the open wall
You make a prison of a place that is not one at all.

I took my raven by the hand, Oh come, I said, my Raven,
And I will take you by the hand and you shall fly to heaven.

But oh he sobbed and oh he sighed and in a fit he lay
Until two fellow ravens came and stood outside to say:

You wretched bird, conceited lump
You well deserve to pine and thump.

See, now a wonder, mark it well
My bird rears up in angry spell,

Oh do I then? he says and careless flies
O'er flattened wall at once to heaven’s skies,

And in my dream I watched him go
And I was glad, I loved him so,

Yet when I woke my eyes were wet
To think Love had not freed my pet,

Anger it was that won him hence
As only Anger taught him sense.

Often my tears fall in a shower
Because of Anger’s freeing power.

Anger's Freeing Power - by Stevie Smith

You are no longer young,
Nor are you very old.
There are homes where those belong.
You know you do not fit
When you observe the cold
Stares of those who sit

In bath-chairs or the park
(A stick, then, at their side)
Or find yourself in the dark
And see the lovers who,
In love and in their stride,
Don't even notice you.

This is a time to begin
Your life. It could be new.
The sheer not fitting in
With the old who envy you
And the young who want to win,
Not knowing false from true,

Means you have liberty
Denied to their extremes.
At last now you can be
What the old cannot recall
And the young long for in dreams,
Yet still include them all.

watermelon tourmaline

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