Violeta’s sweeping up the windy sand the sea
has left behind. She sees the dried and frail feathers
of what once had flown on seagull wings,
and now at rest, is thinking:
In my pseudo stasis, I have no purpose,
my birdful thoughts are beakless now,
but a splash of SA30 motor oil and I’d be
scrabbling on the beach.
In my youth, I glued a world together
with double sided tape. If I know myself,
I thought, I will know enough.
~/~
You and me, we found commiseration
and gave up nothing, we wrapped ourselves
in suffocation, spume and spindrift,
sparkling breathless bubbles of amnesia.
All I’ve done is calculate, but every spreadsheet
has a final row, with importune additions
and subtractions.
A paroxysmal re-evaluation was the pretext
for my colorless montage, my fantasy escape
from solipsistic flywheels and orbital mechanics
to a less concentric solar system, where
lost planets hunt the lamprey in the ashen glow,
and where your heliosphere is a shredded dream,
a wordless mote, an atom in the cosmic flow.
You can take the bottled air, the sunblock,
and the congruence of triangles.
I’m afraid I’ve lost the catalog of Sundays.
When the rain has ended, and your two-tone pastel car
has left me, the children of the oceans will
submerge the final secrets.
The roaring gods of Hesikos and their ordinary
anodynes will be left behind—
sand-blown hieroglyphics carved
and read by fingertips.
about
narrative thread from fênix 6: the first night of the ultraviolet forever
Angus McVicar (1954) Return to the Lost Planet, Burke, London.
artwork
a less concentric solar system (part above). Made by VEE, the visual evolution engine.
more
a project with Guy Morgan, artist extraordinaire (insta), is taxiing on the runway
Awesome stuff!
Glad you enjoyed. It’s based on my life. Haha, nope. Alright, some parts.
I have never read the Lost Planet series. Maybe I should finally.
I really love the art, Steve! And your collaboration sounds interesting, to say the least! Thanks for introducing him to the uneducated, eg me 😁
Another amazing, intriguing, mind bendy piece! (With those chuckle moments I love.)
Angus MacVicar made an appearance because yesterday, when I wanted a lost planet, I remembered it and searched the bookshelves. I flicked through and “borrowed” a bit. They are classics, admittedly, but I probably don’t recommend reading them.
For the last 30 years or so, I haven’t really made use of anything I was taught, maybe a bit of quantum mechanics for poetry. 😸 I suppose that education (which I’m sure you have) gives you general skills and then you can learn by yourself. Thank you, Vanessa.
I like to think I have general skills…which vary from day to day as I have a terrible memory lol.
And you are very welcome!
I’m new to your blog and I like your work. But the vocabulary seems advanced for 1954.
Thank you, glad you enjoyed. I apologise, I was a bit telegraphic with the “about.” I was thinking about lost planets last Saturday, and I knew I had the MacVicar book on my bookshelves. I found it and borrowed a few ideas. For example, Hesikos is the name of a planet in the book.
Wow, to the nth.
Glad you enjoyed mathematically, Randy.
heeheeheeheehee!!!!
Another beautiful poem and artwork, Steve.
“In my youth, I glued a world together with double sided tape. If I know myself, I thought, I will know enough.” yes, I too thought, I will know enough.
Thank you, Sobhana. I suppose thatwe are a kind of reflection of the world, made by the world. In any case, I think we can only know so much of ourselves: introspection means there is still some part of us doing the looking.
Excellent. And the art work is amazing as well.
Thank you, glad you liked. The computer-generated artwork is a bit different: can’t say what it is, an alien reality perhaps.
Maybe it’s a display of the unknown…. 🙂
This is so different from the writing we see generally. A breath of fresh air.
Thank you, glad you enjoyed.
Visual words and, well, visuals. I’m dessert-deprived right now so anything that contains a drop of brown looks like something sweet to eat. How I enjoy your imaginative placement of words. I can show so many examples but since I like to roam out in space, and have an aversion to eels, I especially like ” a less concentric solar system, where lost planets hunt the lamprey in the ashen glow,” Thanks for another great one, Steve!
My pleasure, and thank you, Clarissa. The computer art did come out a bit cakely, I noticed that.
The eels are out there in deep space, trust me. 😸 I was certain when I wrote it. Maybe I read it in some long forgotten science-fiction novel, it’s hard to know.
Thank for another evocative piece, Steve, with eco – dystopian undertones (for me anyway). My favourite part is
“You and me, we found commiseration
and gave up nothing, we wrapped ourselves
in suffocation, spume and spindrift,
sparkling breathless bubbles of amnesia.”
I looked at your artwork in the online gallery. All wonderful. What size are the pictures and are they framed?
My pleasure, Nikita. It’s not just you (in relation to the end of our world): it’s so fixed in my psyche that it comes out in most everything I write, and as time goes on, it seems more probable.
WIth “You and me,..” perhaps a bit of personal reality coming in there. 😸 Glad you like the artxio stuff. If you click on an image they have a neat thing which shows detail as you move the mouse, and if you scroll right down you can see the sizes and other information. These works are not framed because of postage (the idea of the site is to sell worldwide).
You just never disappoint. Amazing as always.
Thank you Rhapsody. The writing and artwork helps to keep me sane (more or less).
Beautifully elegiac.
Thank you, Paul. It is probably better not to look too closely at the past. That way one can continue to make the same mistakes. 😸
Existential angst permeates this piece (or perhaps I’m projecting.) 😉
Wrapping oneself “in suffocation, spume and spindrift” sounds stifling… no thanks.
Mind-altering, fascinating writing as always, Steve.
Thanks, Magarisa. I don’t know about you projecting, but for a number of reasons, it was— let’s say —not a relaxed time for me when I wrote this piece and I think that has come across. I’ve noticed that anxiety and fear in the mind have a tendency to spread from one area to another, until one feels like one is suffocating. Thank goodness for Merlot. 😸
Hope you’re feeling less stressed now, Steve.
Thanks Magarisa. Something finishes and something else starts. That’s life, and really, I have nothing to complain about.
I have not read anything from the Lost Planet series, and from your “recommendation” I probably will not. Interesting take on the seagull – SA30 motor oil? Really?
The Lost Planet books are YA, and kind of quaint these days I guess. SA30 is the best choice, but at a pinch, WD-40 will do the job. It works with most things. 😸
WD -40 is my fall back for things that won’t unscrew, works well on the inanimate at least.
“You and me, we found commiseration
and gave up nothing, we wrapped ourselves
in suffocation, spume and spindrift,
sparkling breathless bubbles of amnesia.”
I love these bits Of (possibly) autobiography inserted in the humour and imagery. This is beautifully written, deserves to be read out loud!
Me too with WD-40. The only problem I have is with the scent, so hard to get rid of.
Might be a little something autobiographical there. Haha (hides). From my perspective, it feels like I try to escape to the furthest reaches of the universe, but wind up writing the same things over and over. Perhaps it’s because wherever you go in your mind, you take yourself along. Thank you very much for your kind words, Jim.