Soba and Tatami

Leaf 332 – Looking Back

 

Takahashi Hiroaki - Country House at Negishi (c.1936)

Revisiting a restaurant, alas – in my mind only (see, Leaf 41).

 

 

Warm scent

of soba and tatami

under thatch.

 

 

 

Paint Pots

Leaf 331 – Art Inspired

 

Rudy Burckhardt - Jackson Pollock holding a can of paint (1950)

A late addition to my previous poems on Jackson Pollock (see, Leaf 134 & Leaf 135).

 

 

Pots, paint

and brushes –

mixing a mind.

 

 

 

Constructing the Quays

Leaf 330 – Art Inspired

 

Norman Garstin - A View of Mount's Bay with the North Pier (c.1920)
Penlee House Gallery & Museum

This poem was inspired by Norman Garstin’s painting of the building of the north quay of Newlyn harbour in Cornwall. As a child, I spent all my summers in Newlyn, and so the harbour was a place I knew well – a haven in so many senses of the word.

 

 

Two arms –

enfolding calm

waters within.

 

 

 

Newlyn, Cornwall (c.1906) National Maritime Museum

All These Worlds

Leaf 329 – Art Inspired

 

Eimei Machida - When We Arrive at the Jupiter ... (2003)

As with Leaf 111, this is another poem inspired by the work of science fiction writer, Arthur C. Clarke. I’ve written in greater depth about my fascination for Clarke’s scientifically optimistic and oddly mystical visions of the far future on my other blog, along with my first, slightly hair-raising reading of ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ (1968) during the first Coronavirus lockdown of 2020 (see here). I’ve since read all the other books in the series as well. I think the following haiku/senryu, which was actually prompted by seeing Eimei Machida’ s print, ‘When We Arrive at the Jupiter ...’  (2003), perhaps manages to go some way towards distilling that enormous and ultimately unfathomable sense of possibility which comes with a profound and prolonged contemplation of astronomy.

 

 

All these worlds

are yours –

[watching the cursor wink …]

 

 

2OO1 Image Source Credit: IMDb

Ordnance Survey

Leaf 328 – Looking Back

 

This linked sequence of verses is a meditation on maps, partly inspired by a geography field trip to the Chiltern Hills, which I went on while I was at school. Maps have always fascinated me. We are very lucky in the UK to have very good maps of the country, provided by the unceasing work of the Ordnance Survey, who have been mapping the landscape since the late 1700s.

 

 

ORDNANCE SURVEY

 

Following a fingerpost –

ascending the path

to Ivinghoe Beacon.

 

Tracing coloured lines,

along contours and

converging coordinates.

 

Folding in on itself –

trig’ points and squares

translating landscape.

 

Making sense

of maps and minds,

charting our course.

 

Glancing up in awe

– compassing the

view’s high vantage.

 

 

 

Westminster Chimes

Leaf 327 – Looking Back

 

Paul Rafferty - Big Ben After Rain (Portland Gallery)

For two years, between 2021 and 2023, I lived just around the corner from Westminster Abbey and the Houses of Parliament. It was an eventful time to be living there – with the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee; the Queen’s funeral; the King’s Coronation; plus, a quick succession of Prime Ministers, hurriedly coming and then, just as quickly going. During that time too, after a period of silence which had lasted several years, the restoration of Big Ben was finally completed.

 

 

Mirroring the pavement’s

wet sheen –

Westminster chimes.

 

 

 

Book Browsing

Leaf 326 – Looking Back

 

During my undergraduate days, I used to haunt the Thames riverside with a close friend of mine. And many years later, I lived in the same locale, hence for me it’s a place of many happy memories.

 

 

Briefly back to ’95 –

browsing the

Southbank bouquinistes.

 

 

 

Photograph Credit: lxscrow963 (Flickr)