Waking up this blog ....

Wow, one blog post at the very beginning of this year and .... well nothing since!!

But much has been happening including a number of hospital appointments and investigations, lots of stitching and some finished projects.  Oh, and I almost forgot, editing my novel and a place on the long list of a poetry competition, see https://www.therialto.co.uk/pages/2018/05/01/nature-poetry-competition-2018-results/.

And what, you may well ask, has promoted me to remember the blog and make a promise that I will try to write more posts. My answer in short notes is

- a discussion yesterday on Design for Stitching Course about Artist's Statements and social media for stitchers (that's me) but of course, others call themselves textile artists, quilt artists, fibre artists etc. etc.

- confirmation that I will be having stereotactic body radiotherapy very soon for two small but unwanted nodules in my lungs so I might have more 'sitting around' time for a while,

and
- well, it's always my intention to be here more regularly and to post bits and pieces that can't be easily shared on other social media.

To that end today here's a few pictures of completed and ongoing stitching projects and the long listed poem -and yes, it is itself long, but its also very thin so please read on.  The pictures await you ...

The Red Admiral in Thirteen Movements 

after Thirteen ways of looking at a Blackbird by Wallace Stevens 

1

At the edge of a Dorset cliff 

a man with binoculars

watches for migrating 

Red Admirals.

2

Crimson streaks edge

and divide the Red Admiral's

seventy mm wingspan.

3

One Red Admiral 

flying

south from the north.

4

At the man's feet 

two Red Admirals 

rest.

5

American scientists 

are making detectors

to fit the Red Admiral's thorax.

6

On the cliff path

Red Admirals drink nectar

from November blackberries.

7

Feeding Red Admirals 

are undisturbed by

interested people.

8

Why Admiral?

No-one knows.

9

Along the wings 

of the Red Admiral,

black and white frills.

10

For inflight warmth

Red Admirals develop

a hairy thorax.

11

Red Admirals rise above 

turbulence, or wait

until it has passed.

12

Orphan travellers,

the Red Admiral flies

alone.

13

From below, the man

watches the Red Admiral's

dark underwings.

Yes, I'm stitching fish or rather appliqué fish and then some bubble free motion quilting. There are 24 on the quilt so I'm planning to go slowly, maybe 1-2 each day  ... thats if the thread, the needle and my fingers behave well.

and here are the makings of a practice sample for a new project about walking the London Loop.

i have an idea about transferring the map on the TFL website to fabric, using confetti quilting. I just now that much trial and error is going to be involved.

So I have some unwanted fabric and net and oh  scissors to cut the lawn squares into confetti  ... result is below ... not sure I like the net but the technique is fine.

I'll be back ... not sure when!

A few days in a few pictures

Bonjour, its warm and sunny outside and some weeds need pulling, so this will be brief.

Finally, I'm set up to do some natural dyeing .... its a wonderfully slow process

Logwood, Persian berries and onion skins ... 

Solar dying with avocado skins  ... might be ready in July

I'm learning how strong the Logwood dye is even after several days 

I'm also doing more slow stitching, inspired by Hazel http://justtotheleftofthemoon.blogspot.fr  from Institches Creative Textile Courses http://www.institchestextilecourses.co.uk

... this is an old, rust spotted chair cover (provence unknown) and, with some hemp thread that has proved useless for anything else, I'm learning some new embroidery stitches from several great websites including http://www.embroidery.rocksea.org/stitch/

and relearning some old favourites ... only one stitch a day mind, and only one length of thread.

Finally, as I'm at home in France a photo of the new dog kennels and the lime and hemp bricks that will soon be the walls. 

Oh, and by the way last week the wonderful Reuben Woolly published one of my poems on I am not a Silent Poet.
Here's the link  https://iamnotasilentpoet.wordpress.com/?s=hammick   ... there are lots of other great poems there, so do visit the website and just in case the above link fails here's my poem.

Westminster, March 2017

The people who won't be going home today

are people like you and people like me.

This morning they checked their emails,

read another chapter of their book,

bought a coffee to go and, wrapped against

only the March wind, chose the pavement.

The people who ran towards the blood

are people like you and people like me.

This afternoon they took off their coats

to pillow an injured man's head,

blew their breath into a dying women,

put their palms across pulsing wounds.

All these people walked from the south

or the north, they were willing to cross over

and look east and west towards the other side,

the side with plenty of places for more bridges

if people like you and I make the space. 

Posting poems

Those of you who spend a little while with my blog know that, in the past, I've occasionally posted my poems on one of the header pages that is titled A Small Collection of Poems.

This explanation goes on for a bit so by way of light relief I'm posting photos of how the drop in temperature in the last few days has wrought its magic on our garden and the adjacent farmers track.

Just for a change, a winter leaf 

I love how the leaf skeleton is highlighted here 

Usually I kept back poems that I planned, one day, to send to magazines or perhaps and rather grandly, that might have been part of a pamphlet.  In doing this I was following poetry tradition and custom as poetry editors don't want a poem once its been published elsewhere and a personal blog counts in that respect.

Maybe a stitching pattern here

This year I plan to share my poems in a different way by publishing many more on this blog. Once a poem is on one of these general pages I'll add it to the Collection page and  look forward to your comments. I'd love for this to be a way for me to hear what you think, how the poem looked and sounded to you etc., etc.

Yippee, no more hours in the poetry office, more hours to enjoy the writing and rewriting and for reading and commenting on the poems posted on the sharing poems Facebook closed page I'm part of following the 52 project.   Its a  decision that feels a very good one to have made as a new year begins.

Answers in the comments secant please ... 

A slow walk today with my wonderful new camera (thank you, James) and some useful hints from Paul about how to keep still while pressing the shutter resulted in these and many other photos that I hope will be valuable for my new Inspiration to Stitch sketchbook.


Then we all had a fast walk with the dogs, off road, in and out of the sunshine, tracking the changes underfoot between the shady and sunlit verges.


Finally, here is today's poem (not that there will necessarily be one tomorrow). This is draft two, draft one was longer and I have some very good poets friends to thank for pointing out the repetition and the value of this particular poem being short.

 In fog

there are fewer lines to follow,

no place else where

other people live.

The smell of fog is full

of your own breath and

your ears hear you and you.

After a while the blanket

becomes a parcel and people

live in a pared down world.

And to close a glimpse of a scattering of seed stitches ...  a needle, thread and slow fingers   

Post Poetry Festival time

So that means not much time and new poetry books to read, draft poems to work on, ideas to sift, and images to ponder on,

like

how can I stop that photo moving as I type (it just did),

how wonderful peeling paint can be,

and the question that I asked myself all weekend   ... is there a long lost letter in that box?










As you can see in this second photo I found many examples of twinned materials around and about The Richard Jefferies Museum, the main poetry festival venue this year.
Do go see this wonderful small museum, unsurprisingly its between two roundabouts in Swindon, more details here http://richardjefferiesmuseum.blogspot.co.uk

and the water, on a sunny Sunday morning, with the birds, dog walkers, babies in prams. A blessing to be so close to fit in a walk before the third poetry workshop and my poetry reading slot.















It was a surprise to be asked to read, a nice surprise, and thanks to mobile IT I found a poem.

It was also a surprise to see the Tent fill and fill with people, well, mainly some very good poets, for the main event - a reading by two very esteemed poets Mona Arshi https://www.monaarshi.com and Todd Swift http://toddswift.blogspot.co.uk.








I chose to read a poem called One Afternoon at Teatime  which was recently published online by Pulse. It was great opportunity to publicise Pulse's work. Here's a recent poem they published http://pulsevoices.org/index.php/archive/poems/872-someone-loved-her-too#comments

 I've copied  One Afternoon at Teatime  below, but do please read it online at http://pulsevoices.org/index.php/archive/poems/801-one-afternoon-at-teatime and read the comments  ... as C. S Lewis said we read to know we are not alone.

One Afternoon at Teatime

Arthur stops close to where we sit waiting
for the person you call the activities lady
to serve us drinks and biscuits.
He moves his wheelchair with slippered feet,
so we become another group.
You introduce me, This is my sister,
I nod to Arthur and watch his mouth form words
that seem reluctant to reach me, hang
in the air unsteady, diminished.

He continues to speak, I continue to nod,
I think he's asking about my name,
you seem to understand, or do you guess?
I'm trying to work out if there's a knack
I've yet to grasp, a way to hear
the hush and lisp of his voice, because
all the time you've been here, where
you don't want to be, after all these months
Arthur is the first person you've introduced me to.

We choose our biscuits, I drink tea, you have coffee
Arthur has half milk, half coffee and continues to speak.
I think he's talking about his family, two daughters, a son,
I'm unsure so I ask is he watching the rugby?
No, his game is football and there's something
about a golden goal. I say what position did you play
and hear, clearly, outside left.
Something rights itself inside me.

Posting poems ... comments welcome

Wisteria

I breath in your spring musk

from amethyst bracelets, clockwise

branches, a trunk thick with age.

Vinca major

Your bursts of purple spread their surprise

through the garden: your winding twine

finds places I've yet to discover.

Asparagus

January, I bathe you in hen-house straw

April, I pick your green shooting stars,

roast for ten, take them soft to my lips.

Men who called my Dad Jack

If our phone rang after six it was always the Works for Dad,

if it rang before seven I could go with him, she’ll stay in the car,

he’d yell, slamming the door on Mum’s worry bead phrase:

John, whatever you do, don’t let her get in the way.

I never stayed in the car, I went where the heat of the kiln

reached my face, waiting until my skin stretched to a crackle,

my eyes grew gritty, my lips were cooked before retreating

to where the grindy groan of metal on metal was a lullaby.

I squatted under the Office stairs out of the way of the footprints

made by hard hatted men in unlaced boots with hands and faces

like Mr and Mrs Baker’s in Happy Families, men who’d lived

in the village all their lives, had local wives,  Cement Company

men who’d took Dad’s instructions and showed him the rocks

where Paua clung, the beaches where Flounder could be caught

with a nail and stick, lent him nets so we had our portions of whitebait

at Company picnics we shared with them and their Kiwi families.

A poem in which I think of things that have woken me up

first train

rain

cold air

cyclist's voices

noisy brakes

burnt toast

infant cry

toddler yell

child's scream

cockerel

magpie

sparrows

bad dream

wind

waves

kisses

opening door

closing door

door bell

snores

silence

sunlight

your last breath