My mum remembers Joy ...

Yesterday was my mum's birthday - she's now eighty nine - 

I'll be ninety next year my mum says wonderingly - 

We'd driven from the airport under sad English skies - 

Before we went to the garden centre, my mum said do you remember your early memories?

She said I was five or six, and my grandmother, my mother's mother, came to stay - I was afraid of her because she was strict - 

My mum had just had Dot, but Dot had a twin - her name was Joy - 

I was asked to go into a high room, and there was a chest of drawers, and in one of the large drawers they had Joy - 

I couldn't see, so they lifted me up and I saw her inside - I can still see her face - her fine black hair over her forehead  - 

I touched her face and I said - oh, isn't she cold - 

Later we ate gammon and chips in the garden centre restaurant - Anne then bought my mum some lupins - 

15.22

Tuesday 31 March 2015

Havant 

The wall of drink ...

In the Coviran supermarket, just before the tills, there's a wall of drink - 

The scornful girls behind the tills swop scorching gossip - 

I gaze at the bottles - 

Who would dare to drink, I wondered, Ron Canuca?

16.45

Sunday March 29 2015

Coviran

San Miguel de Abona

Tenerife 

Bathing before bean stew ...

Last night, Anne made bean stew - she chopped up fiery crazy onions, sleek red peppers, tore apart a small arm of chorizo - 

We sat in the kitchen, gulping bumpers of  Molina Reserva - 

Dogs barked faintly in the vineyards they were guarding - 

The bean stew bubbled in a saucepan - 

I read a few gentle paragraphs of Richard Mabey's Nature Cure - 

I was sunburnt - my hair was still full of salt from the dazzling sea - 

Before I ate, I lolled in a deep bath - steam filled the high ceilinged bath room - 

I spoke to Anne about the day's adventures - 

The bath tub rested upon lion's paws - Anne sat nearby, wreathed in steam - 

19.30

Friday 27 March 2015

Eduardo's House

Tenerife

Darkness in the Calle Juan Bethancourt Alfonso ...

The Calle Juan Bethencourt Alfonso was in darkness by the time we left the bodega - 

I'd eaten cherne in a stone cellar - 

Three grizzled bravos were drinking in the courtyard - 

Wrought iron lamps cast pools of light - 

The silent houses kept their secrets - 

There was a waxing moon in the sky - 

A cypress tree was stirred by the wind - 

A television set shone inside a low ceilinged room - 

21.30

Thursday March 26 2015

Calle Juan Bethencourt Alfonso 

San Miguel

Tenerife

Kite surfers at El Medano Beach ...

I'm drinking a capucinno in a beach cafe - bright surfer pop is playing very loudly - 

Kite surfers are swooping over the dark sea - 

Sirens drape towels around their shapely bodies - 

I can hear the sound of waves breaking upon the sand - 

I can smell brandy in a cocktail - 

A boy in a wet suit walks across the beach - 

Bright sails whirl upwards into the pale shining sky - 

12.50

Wednesday 25 March 2015

Flashpoint

El Medano Beach

Tenerife

Sendero de La Fuente de Tamaide...

We sat, with our backs to the cool stone of the basin, on the floor of the ravine - I ate half a green apple - 

Water dripping from the wall of the ravine filled the basin - 

Above us was a zig zag of blue sky - 

A lizard ran across the path - I caught a glimpse of his eel like glistening body - 

Man high cacti cast strangely shaped shadows - 

The higher slopes of the ravine were terraced - ancient vines were like dark knotted limbs - 

All was silent, the air still, the clouds at last uncovering the sun - 

11.45

Thursday 26 March 2015

Path of La Fuente Tamaide

Tenerife Sur

Kite surfers at El Medano ...

I'm drinking a cappuccino in a beach cafe - bright surfer pop is playing very loudly - 

Kite surfers are swooping over the dark sea - 

Sirens drape towels around their shapely bodies -

I can hear the sound of the waves breaking upon the sand - 

I can smell brandy in a cocktail - 

A boy in a black wetsuit walks across the beach - 

Bright sails whirl upwards into the pale shining sky - 

12.00

Wednesday March 25 2015

Flashpoint

El Medano beach

Tenerife Sur

The walled garden of Eduardo's house

After breakfast this morning, we sat reading in the walled garden - 

Anne made coffee - we listened to bird song - carp slept in the dark water of their pool - 

The leaves of the banana trees brushed against terracotta roof tiles - 

A strange orange flower glowed amidst tangled greenery - 

Later, Anne lolled in her steamy bath - 

Thick walls enclosed our sanctuary - 

17.52

Tuesday 24 March 2015

Eduardo's house 

San Miguel de Abona 

Tenerife 

Clear Air Turbulence ...

Looking out of my window, I can see shining clouds - the sea is empty of ships - we are being shaken by turbulence - the wings are quivering silver blades - 

Anne looks up from her William

Boyd - 

I'm aware of the delicate curvature of the earth - 

We're told to keep our seat belts fastened -

We are all silent, trying hard not to imagine the unimaginable - 

The wind is coming from out of Africa the steward says - 

The captain apologizes for the lumps and bumps - 

13.27

Monday March 23 2015

Monarch Airlines jet

35 minutes from Tenerife Sur

 

Phoning my parents in the silver Golf ...

Driving past The World's End, I rang my mum - 

Hello hello she said - 

Tell her we'll be there by ten thirty Anne said - 

She changed gear, glancing into the rear view mirror - 

My dad picked up the phone in the lounge - hello hello he said - 

I heard their two voices, my mum's and my dad's, both speaking at once, both precious, both moving away from me, into shadows and memory -

9.14

Sunday March 22 2015

In the silver Golf

A31

near Verwood

The Superannuated Man ...

"From a poor man, poor in time, I was suddenly lifted up into a vast revenue"

This summer, I've decided, I'll read Charles Lamb's Essays of Elia - 

I've only skimmed so far the pages of my pristine Everyman - I bought it in 1976 - 

Jukeboxes were playing The Killing of Georgie in louche Brighton pubs - Annick had just gone back to France - 

The second hand bookshop was not far from the station - lurid paperbacks smouldered - late Rushkins were inscribed with strange signatures - 

The first essay I'll read will be The Superannuated Man - 

Perhaps I'll read it sooner, in Eduardo's house - 

16.49

Saturday 21 March 2015

The Old School House

East Stoke

Dorset 

Pyjamarama and the past ...

Driving the wounded red beast, I listened to Roxy Music's Pyjamarama - 

I was driving through gentle Wareham, past the almshouses - 

I turned up the volume as high as I dared - 

I remembered listening to this song when I was twenty one - 

I'd spent the evening with a slim girl in a high ceilinged room - there was a kitchen full of bottles - 

One night, I'd swum in the moonlit pool - 

Phil Manzerana's feverish saxophone was just as I'd heard it, in that different world - 

In the rear view mirror, for a few seconds, I saw my younger face - 

The Cross

Wareham

11.30

Friday 20 March 2015

Mist upon the ridgeway ...

This week I watched Ava DuVernay's Selma - I perched upon my seat of quirky springs - I forgot that I was in gentle Wareham - 

I was face to face with state troopers upon Petus Bridge - I smelt the scent of white flowers upon a casket - 

I remembered Coretta's words yesterday about the fog of death - 

We were walking the ridgeway, under a cloudless shining sky -

Anne had just had just heard about Bob - 

We'd gone dressed as pirates to his party - 

I looked out towards the sea - death wasn't a fog, I thought - it was a shining bluish mist - I could see figures moving inside it - 

I wondered how long it would take for this mist to cover the bright land, to hide the withy beds, to lap the stone circle - 

South Dorset Ridgeway 

Above Portisham

12.00

Wednesday 18 March 2015

Walking like Jep Gambardella by the silky sea ...

I walked like Jep Gambardella across the sand - a shining mist hung over the silky sea - small waves washed over razor shells - filmy clouds moved across the pale blue sky -

The tide was exceptionally low, revealing gleaming runways of ridged sand - 

We saw three riders in white horses moving through the dunes - 

Gorse bushes were bejewelled with yellow flowers - 

Startled geese flew low over the waves - a lurcher bounded through the shallows -

We sat for a while by the beach huts - we heard the quiet voice of the sea -  

I buttoned up my invisible silk jacket - I carried on walking with my hands clasped behind my back - 

 

14.00

18 March 2015

Middle Beach

Studland 

Isle of Purbeck

The placid china head ...

That'll be eight the silver fox grinned - 

I gazed at his silk scarf, his blue jacket, the collarless shirt - 

I imagined this raffish antiques dealer putting a monkey on Diva Dancer in the Saint Leger or Northumberland Plate - 

We lolled upon worn sofas, eating toasted banana bread - 

Earlier, we followed a golden thread through a labyrinth of antiques - 

I'd admired a pristine bowler, nesting upon a hat stand - a Punjabi sideboard was a faded jewel of richly decorated wood - brave Fupi was menaced by ravening crocodiles - a ouija table invited spirits - a shapely mannequin smiled a 1970s smile - 

I sipped my Americano - around us, families celebrated Mother's Day - 

I thought about the phrenology bust I'd seen, placed next to some glistening vases - 

What thoughts, I wondered, were slowly flickering inside that placid head?

16.00

Sunday 15 March 2015

Cafe

Dortchester Curiousity Centre

Dortchester

The bookshop in Puddletown ...

The bookshop in Puddletown was no artful Waterstones - a narrow door, well hidden, opened upon a labyrinth of foxed volumes - 

Penny and I were happy to explore the dark bookcases - we both devoured books as a pike would minnows - 

I lingered by a bright reef of first edition G A Hentys - I picked up Under Drake's Flag - a boy stood upon the deck of a sailing ship, a rapier in his slender hand - 

A locked glass bookcase contained mysterious folios - 

We lost all sense of time amongst the gentle volumes - 

I thought of all the book shops I'd visited - perhaps, in a dream, I would revisit them - 

I would wear a cloak of fragrant pages, torn from Newgate Calendars - there would be piano music, Gnossiennes - I would walk barefoot upon rich carpets - 

The Antique Map & Bookshop

Puddletown

Dorset

12.30

March 13 2015

The words of past sermons whirred above our heads like dusty moths ...

In the church of Saint Mary the Virgin, we sat in the box pews before a triple decker pulpit - the words of past sermons whirred above our heads like dusty moths - 

An ape in a stained glass window held up a small hand mirror - the ape had a slender hands and feet, grey fur like feathers - 

A memorial remembered James Edmund Brymer who was accidentally drowned whilst bathing at Hythe on the 23rd of June 1863, aged 24 years - 

A glass case displayed some bullets removed from the church door when it was cleaned and restored - each bullet looked like the black swollen egg of some strange insect - 

11.40

March 13 2015

St Mary The Virgin

Puddletown

Dorset

The chained ape ...

In the South Chapel, we came across pale figures, resting in their marble - they lay upon their backs, clasping their hands in prayer - their faces were smooth masks - their long bodies had been bleached by time - 

An chained ape crouched by an armoured foot - it gazed up at me with heavy lidded eyes - 

I imagined the ape, still tethered by its fine linked chain, suddenly moving, opening its strange full lipped mouth - 

For one moment I thought I heard the chain rattle, heard some words spoken in a silky voice - 

12.00

March 13 2015

The South Chapel

St Mary's Church

Puddletown