Same technique.
Same technique. I borrowed this, there was little else left in the world, now I’ve gone this far along.
Same technique. Where I started was a place full of light. I borrowed this, the world seemed bereft. I’d been in it for so long. Stacks and showers and detritus.
Same technique. Not true, I could recall when it was different. Where I started was full of hope. I borrowed this when I came upon it, after years of trying to put love, emotion and dust in piles that made sense. I’d been doing this as long as I could. After a time remembering became something you forgot.
Same technique. Not true. Where I started was full of people who helped: Miller, Kerouac, Baudelaire, Apollinaire, Sartre, les poèts concrets, les poèts sonore, white negros, sliders, hipsters, hell breathers, visionaries, people we were not we would be, warned against, told not to, loved, ridden full of rockets, fire all the time, gouts, grease, gauges, gorgeous, gorgons, greatness, grip and god. The piles that made sense falling. I’d been doing this for as long as it took and you do it and they see you doing it and it’s done you do it they think that’s what it is. Pain and past you forget.
Same technique. True enough. The air full of space and light, one spot, out breath, reason arrived at without reasoning, places you pass, first bone broken, hard word, stolen, lied to, hated, cut, let down, smelted, betrayed, leaked. Where I started covered with fog and people digging it over looking for something so often that the looked among became emulsified, the sands of middle Egypt, the holy texts, Pali Cannon, Diamond Sutra, Nag Hammadi library, King James, the Apocrypha Discordia, The Book of Caverns, The Book of Gates, Cippus Perusinus, Rig Veda, Brahma Sutra, Vaikhanasa Samhitas, Hadith, The Eleven Angas, Mishna, The Twenty Eight Agamas, The Book of John the Baptizer, God Speaks, Isis Unveiled, The Royal Parchment Scroll of Black Supremacy, Guru Granth Sahib, Zhuangzi, The Yazidi Black Book, The Zend, for general use by the laity. Then the gauges gave out, the rockets turned into armchairs, grip became compromised by regulation, fear and loathing, creep, creep, creep. The piles that made sense falling fell. I’d been doing this for as long as anyone so they thought maybe I’d invented it. Then the others out there rising with their fresh eyes and their deaf ears. They said they were explorers of the past who hadn’t read the texts, past masters with no history, stealers. Like me. No.
Same technique. True things like wet sheets in the fog. The light all that’s left. Miller, Kerouac, Baudelaire, Apollinaire, Sartre and the ways they pointed all dust. I found a list of variables and made them spin. People digging still digging so there was hope, somehow, but I’d given that up. The spiritual path middle path great way tube of shine rail pinion rack rope pulley pull-up elevator high-rise risen riser on a column of fire out there but foxed and faded. Rusted staple. Read with eye glass. Scan and enlarge. Repixel. Nudge. The Book of and the Guru and the ones upset still making a noise. A world full of sound banging re-banging. What did you have to say? That it was good or that it will be good? Did you make that point and did anyone understand you? Cardiovascular causes, parasitic disease and infections, malignant neoplasms, cerebrovascular interventions, after that small beer, violence, alcohol, dope, all less than one percent. Henry Miller heart, Jack Kerouac Intestinal Haemorrhage, Charles Baudelaire stroke, Wilhelm Albert Vladimir Appollinaris Kostrowitzky influenza, Jean Paul Sartre too many cigarettes. The piles that made sense still making sense or coming through the skin enough to made the heart sing. Take this line for a walk, keep strolling running when you stop make it go up and down. No one bothers with what went before, say you do, don’t. Milk comes from tigers. Bread you find in the back lanes. Electricity leaks from the sockets. The wind blows because the wind blows. The people you speak to don’t listen. They don’t know what was or how they got here. They haven’t read anything. They think books gather and hide in the dust. They buy computers. They search and turn and scoop and catch. They know all the search techniques. Boolean logic. They gather and assemble. They thumbnail. They build data bases and data sets. They debug and distribute. They know the system and protect them. They use mirrors and clouds. They have the skills. They no longer make. They integrate. They randomise. They acquire. They loan. They discover. They back up.
© Peter Finch 2010
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Peter Finch lives in Cardiff and is a poet, critic, author and reviewer. In the 1960s and '70s he edited the literary magazine second aeon, exhibited visual poetry and later became well-known for his performance poetry. He is the Chief Executive of the Welsh Academi and the author of many poetry books, including Poems for Ghosts, Useful, Antibodies and a bi-lingual collection in English and Hungarian entitled Vizet-Water. His Selected Poems was published in 1987, Selected Later Poems in 2007 and his most recent collection - Zen Cymru - was released this year. His non-fiction books include the Real Cardiff series, for which he was awarded an Honorary Fellowhip of the Royal Society of Architects of Wales in 2007.
Peter Finch lives in Cardiff and is a poet, critic, author and reviewer. In the 1960s and '70s he edited the literary magazine second aeon, exhibited visual poetry and later became well-known for his performance poetry. He is the Chief Executive of the Welsh Academi and the author of many poetry books, including Poems for Ghosts, Useful, Antibodies and a bi-lingual collection in English and Hungarian entitled Vizet-Water. His Selected Poems was published in 1987, Selected Later Poems in 2007 and his most recent collection - Zen Cymru - was released this year. His non-fiction books include the Real Cardiff series, for which he was awarded an Honorary Fellowhip of the Royal Society of Architects of Wales in 2007.
