I'm decently proud of this piece. Now I'm giving myself twelve hours off. Yay cider!


Reached down a long drive, the campus of Trent Park lies some distance from Oakwood station, and a long tube-ride further from the metropolis of London, of which surrounding Enfield is a distant part. Part of Middlesex Polytechnic, now Middlesex University, since 1973, it comprises a scatter of low buildings around the hub of a tall Edwardian mansion house. Students wander between red-brick blocks enigmatically named Bevan and Sassoon on their way to and from classes in music, drama, and creative writing with media studies.

( Journeying to Trent Park... )

sun laps at us; we drown
trailing lazy hands over flick'ring grass
to look up is to go blind
damascene, silent
blossom teems and falls on us
these trees we have no words for
are collapsing on us now
hung with crystal
and crying without sound.

...

Spring is here and it's bloody lovely. Just applied to the University of Iceland. Off to see Wicked now!

Out of this World: Science Fiction but not as you know it

Out of this World: Science Fiction but not as you know it (20 May – 25 September 2011)
is the British Library’s first exhibition to explore science fiction through literature, film, illustration and sound. It will challenge visitors’ perceptions of the genre by uncovering gems of the Library’s collections from the earliest science fiction manuscripts to the latest best-selling novels. www.bl.uk/sciencefiction

Events

The accompanying events programme will feature some of the great science fiction writers of recent decades including: China Miéville (20 May); Iain M Banks (31 May); David Lodge and Stephen Baxter (8 June); Audrey Niffenegger (10 June); Michael Moorcock, Brian Aldiss (21 June) and others to be announced soon.


Just passing on info about this. (Hint-hint, it looks ace and I'm going).

I haven't done a meme in years, but this one is fab. Via anotherusedpage.

* Post ten of any pictures currently on your hard drive that you think are self-expressive.

* No captions. It must be like we're speaking with images and we have to interpret your visual language just like we have to interpret your words.

* They must ALREADY be on your hard drive - no googling or flickr! They have to have been saved to your folders sometime in the past. They must be something you've saved there because it resonated with you for some reason.

* You do NOT have to answer any questions about any of your pictures if you don't want to. You can make them as mysterious as you like. Or you can explain them away as much as you want to.

( large images )

If you don't want to have to pay for a US tourist visa, qualify for the visa waiver program, & have any chance of travelling to the US in the next couple of years, it's well worth spending five minutes with your passport to sign up: http://bit.ly/pBHdT

via jinxremoving :)

~ poetry, in draft rough as wire

love is oppression enacted on the flesh
bound by words & held by time
a song is sung
love is oppression enacted on the flesh
in half light nothing ever stood so clear
low sad song from
love is oppression enacted on the flesh
the same song, always
sung from a high place
love is oppression enacted on the flesh
lost down the wrong path
under skies of grey
love is tender like a bruise and open like a wound
sung from a high window
in a house of boards
love is oppression enacted on the flesh
sung and again
until all cages swing open
touch is oppression enacted on the flesh
until flesh and grass are one
until flesh and grass are not
love is oppression enacted on the self


(kind of depressing, no? not going to perform this, I think, but I kind of like it anyway.)

So, the Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister has finally been scheduled, for May 31st, at 9pm on BBC2. It's awesome and you should watch it, and ( here is why )

I managed to post this before the urge to gut and re-write completely took over. Go me!

"dive for dreams" by E.E. Cummings

dive for dreams
or a slogan may topple you
(trees are their roots
and wind is wind)
trust your heart
if the seas catch fire
(and live by love
though the stars walk backward)
honour the past
but welcome the future
(and dance your death
away at the wedding)
never mind a world
with its villains or heroes
(for good likes girls
and tomorrow and the earth)
in spite of everything
which breathes and moves, since Doom
(with white longest hands
neating each crease)
will smooth entirely our minds
-before leaving my room
i turn, and (stooping
through the morning) kiss
this pillow, dear
where our heads lived and were.

silently if, out of not knowable

silently if, out of not knowable
night's utmost nothing,wanders a little guess
(only which is this world)more my life does
not leap than with the mystery your smile
sings or if(spiralling as luminous
they climb oblivion)voices who are dreams,
less into heaven certainly earth swims
than each my deeper death becomes your kiss
losing through you what seemed myself,i find
selves unimaginably mine;beyond
sorrow's own joys and hoping's very fears
yours is the light by which my spirit's born:
yours is the darkness of my soul's return
-you are my sun,my moon,and all my stars

I wrote another poem! I actually worked on this one over a few days. Whether it was worth it, well... you be the judge!

if form relates to function
does thought conform to style?
why cummerbund by scansion
not playful for a while?

the eligiac, the ancient ode
the bard in automatic rhyme
the avant-garde & de-la-mode
why 'tis tradition choosing time

if whimsy is for children small
and verse for long eternity
I'll dress in antic black and call
my fun all post-modernity.

oh poet, why so serious?
it's really quite mysterious.