Deseeded Vol. 2

Edited by Degna Stone

Deseeded Vol. 2

TIME

time [tīm] (n) a concept based on experience of sequence and change

Acknowledgements

The Chronomentrophobe’s Date appeared in the anthology Marginalia (Jerwood/Arvon, 2011)

One of Those Places was first published in Envoi (issue 154, October 2009)

and in Glass Characters (Red Squirrel, November 2011)

Time-travel was previously published (in a slightly different version titled Long Distances) in Chroma (Autumn 2009)

All rights reserved.

All writers have exerted their moral rights in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.

Cover: Detail from Untitled by Daniel Stone

Contents The Joke Elly Nobbs 1 The Chronomentrophobe’s Date Stevie Ronnie 2 The Healer Emer Gillespie 3 Time Poetry Jack 4 Colonel Slingsby-Smythe Informs His Wife of the Breakdown of their Self-winding Timepiece & Prepares Her to Face the Dire Consequences with Fortitude Andrew Sclater 5 The Watch Amina Marix Evans 6 Lonely Woman Michael Hann 7 Trapped Matthias Wienroth 8 Listen and Wait Mandy Maxwell 9 //STARBUCKS/MEMORY:2041// Michael McHugh 10 One of Those Places (The Pass of Llanberis) Bob Beagrie 11 After You Told Me Valerie Morton 12 Time-travel Anna Kisby 13 Biogs 15

1

The Joke You put on a mop-top like Mo's – we agree you’ll play goofy in tonight’s slap-stick performance. Just like Groucho, I light a Cuban cigar eager to deliver my witty one-liners while you patiently don silly clown suits, the butt of my sly jokes, my long suffering fall guy – who'll always cry uncle. But the whole thing falls flat because I gag on the smoke then the timing's so off – I end up playing the fool and the straight man for you. Elly Nobbs

2

The Chronomentrophobe’s Date

She said the last time she’d waited this long

was when her grandfather’s hands

made shadow rabbits and birds

as her mother chain-smoked menthols

and dialed the telephone number

of Mark, that hackney carriage driver

whose face was as flat as a mantelpiece,

whose shoulders knew how to flail a strap.

Hold on a minute, he says, my only means

of telling the time are by clocking the sky

or stopping strangers on the pavement

and even then it’s a second-hand report.

Please stay and sit beneath the sundial,

the present is rocked when you are here.

Stevie Ronnie

3

The Healer Twenty years here. Four storeys and a Dutch gabled roof, garden to the rear And a park beyond. That man, buried improbably inside The stairs, whose blood pooled and Leaked into the cupboard of drying Clothes, is dust now. For years I kept the front door closed – Grew lilies in pots to hide the smell. Sometimes, still, I hear him sigh. Emer Gillespie

4

Time I’ve caged each minute of that day, placed each one behind bars. I’ve scattered them over the hollows left in the long grass where she lay, into the dips left by shoulders, spine and hips. Minutes engorged on passion or lust are larger, brighter, heavier – the cross-hatch of bars swollen and studded with pomegranate seeds. They have become portable. Luminous. Minute minutes, where all that happened was the passage of empty time are shrunk to rice grains that slip through my fingers. They gather where the dents are deepest. The day ran out. Poetry Jack

5

Colonel Slingsby-Smythe Informs His Wife of the Breakdown of Their Self-Winding Timepiece & Prepares Her to Face the Dire Consequences with Fortitude Dear– this is a shock! Our clock has stuck at ten to eight. The hand of fate will have us wait forever for dinner– Andrew Sclater

6

The Watch This is the watch I watched him wear The watch I watched slowly shrink his arm The watch I watched becoming too heavy to bear Til time stood still And was ignored And I watched my heart as I watched him lay aside the watch And lay time aside And breathing After my father passed away I inherited his watch. I wear it every day. Time passes silently. The watch neither ticks nor tocks. My father is but a moment away.

Amina Marix Evans

7

Lonely Woman Kites and laughter in flight, Leashed dogs, families, lovers. The sky tethered to summers end As the trees begin to turn And flowers return to soil. At the centre, the lonely woman. Her face lined by the seasons, Eyes hollow, not seeking As she waits, maybe weighing, How she has come to this place, This moment, unanswered. As the wind rises to a chill, Leaves sing of decay's churn, Stuttering and falling on strollers Who shed their working week In nature weak and tamed. At the centre, the lonely woman. Though her eyes linger cold, Behind is a flicker of fire, Of youth gutted by token words Spoken between dull walls As pints sink into smoke. The day flows slowly into the end. The walkers leaving the cut green, The trees and fountain who endure, Shedding bark and rust freely, Silently fixed without complaint. At the centre, the lonely woman. She remains, maybe waiting, Remembering the past days, Not alone but in stillness. No more alone than the green, An anchor, for the lonely walker. Michael Hann

8

Trapped As the folds of experience fall asleep Beneath the white-green stems of youth And in San Sebastian’s arms you try To determine whether maze or labyrinth Keep you, let the tutor’s fullness, Let yourself, reflect both kinds of beauty. You are paid tuition according to your lessons Tending your obsessions of care and intimacy The soulless tasked to touch souls The neophytes trying to break through The needing giving theirs to keep So that the hole becomes whole. Consummate your last trepidation Do not resist the zeal unsprung With arrows’ flight mending Yet another lesson for the stairs Recommence the engagement Behind the door but novices now. Matthias Wienroth

9

Listen and Wait you can stall for time you can crawl for a while into the black slip through the cracks, listen and wait you can bend on the rim feel bones under skin spit blood from the gut sick til it hurts slump to the floor flick the lock on the door listen and wait to hear the sound of things stay the same the sickening sound of nothing’s changed faces fall away when they say your name, listen and wait to tongues tied in disguise to hide the lies they pretend to tell the truth you know that’s when they’ve more to hide you may be tough but not shatter proof words ball up in your mouth a fist in the face when you let them out sometimes a whisper is louder than a shout listen and wait Mandy Maxwell

10

//STARBUCKS/MEMORY:2041// //there was this priff midtwenty? lookers propped top of his head dowsing through a “mobile” scrolling a spreadsheet (remember?) dremming with a ghost priff/ alto surface: maximo serious treve regging the role on oppo treve’s script serious treve jabbing at her screen receiver treve quiet writing down the sayings in a paper book/ striders passing the window(!) intent(!!)/ inside coffees and [panonis?] - but the noise!/ how could?/ all walked in and walked out: believe/ one two smiled at the assistants: no nervers: no manonics: pity/ marins on a crest: tener/ abas recouvre polem// Michael McHugh

11

One of Those Places (The Pass of Llanberis) These mountains huddle, sharing songs of water, wind, packed snow, old wrongs and time; such 'Time' that my head spins as I try to focus on the road's tight winds. Even so, I have to pull over every half mile, and climb out of my Rover to stand awhile, let my eyes roll across the knotted textures; the partial truths of seminars and lectures dissolve in deep purples, this grey, that green of crag upon crag leading from ridge to seam to precarious bolder to lonely twisted tree, the odd, rogue patch of mist running free through gorges and moss-soft hollows, nimble as a lamb that instinctively follows its mother through a gap in a dry stone wall seeking shelter as the rain begins to fall. There's no need to go climbing to commune with these giants, already I hear their tune ringing so deep I could cry, without restraint like some ragged, manic, stigmata'd, saint. Just cry, and maybe pick a choice rock strewn on the slopes to hurl it, screaming, at the moon. Bob Beagrie

12

After you told me the morning stayed where it was - tilting on the edge of summer. The day didn't notice but hurried on towards its own twelve o'clock finale - as if nothing tumultuous had happened to throw it off balance, flip it on its back like a beetle waving its legs fruitlessly into nothing - hoping that somehow it would turn itself back to before. Valerie Morton

13

Time-travel Hungover, in winter, walking by the Hudson River, New York thick with snow, the pavements buried on which Hassidim, Poles, Mexicans, Sicilians, Finns go, the Greenpoint diner closed, (yesterday a waitress sang My Way, refilling my good coffee, putting me inside a movie), my buckled leather boots below, (extortionate, really, on your first city salary), your pretzel cheeks fleshy, your salt eyes happy, (that night a party in a loft apartment, there was even a poet in a beret, one single iron bed in the vast room, Prospect Park on view. How many scenes can I inhabit?), miles go by, there is no other way home. A man digging out his car holds up one hand, calls out Hello. From this distance of years I GoogleEarth from London SW2 to you, fall into Brooklyn, feel the ground closing in. There, the loft, the river. There, the long-ago snow. Anna Kisby

14

15

The Writers Elly Nobbs is a poet who lives in Prince Edward Island, Canada. Stevie Ronnie is a freelance writer, artist, tutor, researcher and digital consultant. His debut collection The Thing To Do When You Are Not In Love is available from Red Squirrel Press. Emer Gillespie is a novelist, scriptwriter and poet and finds that all three feed one another. Brought up in Ireland, she lives and works in London. The Invisible Eye, her first collection, is published by Pindrop Press in October 2012. Poetry Jack has performed at festivals including Glastonbury, Bath Literature Festival and Durham Book Festival. She won Master Slammers: the Professionals in 2010 and her first collection of poetry is due to be published in February 2013. Hiberno-Celtic-Norse Andrew Sclater was a range of things but is now involved with motorcycles, dry stone walls, interesting people and poems. Amina Marix Evans is a poet, broadcaster and founder of Borderline Books. Michael Hann is a Teesside based writer; journalist and musician, who as part of the King Ink Collective has produced a number of multimedia spoken word shows. His first EP is out on the Tiny Lights label, under the name Rejections. Matthias Weinroth is a researcher by day and a poet by night. He lives in Edinburgh and enjoys science-art. His photography is eclectic at photomao. Mandy Maxwell is a Glasgow poet living in the North East. She came to Newcastle to study for two years and fell in love with the city. Michael McHugh has worked on TV documentaries, international development and community projects. He has written adult and children's poetry, poetry reviews and short stories, including one broadcast on BBC Radio. Bob Beagrie lives in Middlesbrough, works as a freelance writer, won the Biscuit Poetry Prize in 2002 and was awarded a Time to Write Award in 2003. His latest collection is called Glass Characters (Red Squirrel Press, Nov 2011) Valerie Morton was runner up in the Essex Poetry Festival competition 2011. She has just finished an OU degree and runs a Creative Writing course for people recovering from mental health illness. Anna Kisby lives in Brighton and works as an archivist. Her poetry has been published in magazines including Mslexia, Orbis, Poetry News, Seam and South Bank Poetry. She was winner of the New Writer poetry competition 2011.

Deseeded Take a look at this Werner Herzog film http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8e7QfvKwP1Y or think about the phrase 'Even a stopped clock gives the right time twice a day' or the film it comes from (Withnail and I) which is set during the dying days of the 1960s or ‘One of the few good things about modern times…’ or something else... Workshop 1 Workshop 2 Workshop 3 Workshop 4

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