Passing by

It was 1973. I was eighteen years old, and playing at being a hippy, though I worked for a living and didn’t take drugs, making me a bit of an oddball; an outsider in that clan, as well as every other clan I had brushed against away from the confines of my home.

Travelling was achieved by standing at the side of the road with my thumb extended. I liked to pretend I was a free spirit; ready to take off at a moment’s notice, because the sun was shining in a particular way, inviting me to explore new fronteers, but the reality was that I had to fit it into weekends and holidays, and even when I was in a position to go away I rarely felt like leaving my sewing machine, my fabrics and embroidery threads, my pencils, paper, paint, or my mother, for whom I had a fixation. These attachments kept me tied to my home, even preventing me from going into further education in Bristol, only about 100miles (160 kilometers) from where I lived.

However, I did take the odd trip into the unknown, and the following poem was scribbled down quickly, as I sat in the passenger seat of a lorry, somewhere on the motorway. I found it amongst a box of old photographs this afternoon, and it instantly brought back to me the emotions of that day, so long ago. Back then, it was easy to hitch a ride, and I met all sorts of interesting people. The day was hot and clear, and the sun had a look of youthfulness about it. I was returning home from a moderately disappointing stay with my boyfriend in Cambridge. He found my attitude to cannabis irritating, and I found his stoned, ill-thought out prattle irritating. We weren’t well-suited.

 I had been given a series of lifts, each one only taking me a short distance. All of the drivers felt like chatting, and when I alighted from each vehicle, I felt as if I was saying goodbye to a friend. I was a misfit with low self-esteem, and so lonely that I felt endlessly grateful to these people, but deep down, I knew they had no particular reason to want to know me better. I vacillated between euphoria and sorrow.

It appeared to me at that moment that all we ever do as human beings is cross each other’s paths, smiling and making empty promises as we recede into the distance.

My ideas have changed with the passing of the years.

Passing By

can we be normal, you and I?
sitting, talking, passing by
Look at the earth, look at the sky
time to live, hard to die
nudging, giggling, passing by
have to laugh, want to cry
have to, want to, need to try
laughing, shouting, passing by
time for truth, have to lie
sometimes low, always high
waving, speaking, passing by
people mutter, whisper, pry
my, oh my, oh my, oh my
seeing, being, passing by
passing, passing, passing by.

©Jane Paterson Basil

Long gone (2)

Long gone
those childhood summer days when gentle breezes swayed
when sweet, wilting hedgerow bouquets, picked without grace
were displayed beside a painted card on Mother’s Day

Long gone
the race across the fields, the fake-shooting cowboy games
the scratchy, ticklish search for eggs laid in the hay
the scuffed knees from tumbles that didn’t matter anyway

Long gone
those days when Autumn’s dampened gold decay
regaled the senses, bringing wildness to my play –
in mud-splashed jeans, I danced and kicked the leaves away

Long gone
the lilting music of my mother’s calm refrain
long gone her stroke upon my brow to say that I was safe
all vanished with the haven of innocent childhood days

Long gone
those impatiently awaited holidays from school
those lazy days when I believed my life would stretch unscathed
long gone the safety net, now faith in life has failed

©Jane Paterson Basil

Long Gone (1)

long
gone
those days
when we played
not counting the days
now we watch the the children play
and recall those days
when we played
those days
long
gone

This poem was written using the Fibonnacci Sequence.

©Jane Paterson Basil

Boobies

I was on a home decorating kick that summer. It was a weekday, and Paul and I had just walked home from school together. I liked this time of day, when there were just the two of us. Paul’s sister was at Secondary school, eight miles away, and returned home long after Paul. He took off his coat and we went into the living room. It had taken me almost a fortnight to strip the skirting board back to the wood, peel the horrible woodchip paper off the walls, fill the dips and cracks, and re-plaster in places. I’d re-pointed the stone fireplace, and washed it with a subtly shaded matt varnish, to tone down the brash colour of the stones. I’d custom-made shelves to fit into the recess under the window, and a unit to house the TV, video and such. I’d sewn new curtains and hand-beaded the hems. I was looking forward to finishing the job.

Paul glanced at the walls with a thoughtful expression.

“So, you’re going to paint it tomorrow?” he said.

“Yup. I’ll start as soon as I come back from taking you to school,” I replied.

“You should sign your name across the wall, then it will always be there, like a hidden secret,” he said.

He fumbled through his bag, pulled out a felt pen, and handed it to me. I smiled, and wrote my name across the bare plaster.

“Nice idea. Thanks for that,” I said.

He gave me a wicked look. “Can I write something?” he asked.

“Go for it.”

With that he wrote ‘BUM’ in large letters, beside the fireplace.

I took the pen and wrote ‘LADY BITS.”

He wrote ‘WANG.’

Not to be outdone, I wrote ‘BOOBIES.’

He wrote ‘BUTT CHEEKS.’

I wrote ‘WEE WEE.’

By this time we were laughing so much our writing was coming out wobbly.

When his dad and his sister turned up we were running out of words, and still giggling shamelessly. Mike sobered us up. He was furious.

“What are you doing? You can’t write words like that all over the walls! Get rid of it, NOW,” he raged.

“But I’m going to paint over it tomorrow,” I replied, reasonably.

“But people may see it!”

“What does it matter if they do? We’re just having fun, and the words aren’t actually obscene. And anyway, no-one’s coming to see us this evening, are they? ” I asked.

“No, but, but” he blustered, “someone may look through our window!”

I looked out of the window, at the quiet country road beyond our front garden. Nobody would be able to see the writing on the wall from outside, and he knew it.

Mike walked out of the room. I took the pen from Paul’s hand, and wrote “NIPPLES” beneath the window in tiny letters.

Three days later I finished the painting, and fixed the shelves to the wall beneath the window. I put the new TV unit in the corner of the room and hung the curtains. The colour scheme was a triumph, with swathes of deep red and navy blue, a background of natural wood and cinnamon, and spots of soft gold in the beadwork and the cushions to add highlights.

Every so often when Paul and I were alone in the room, Paul would point at the wall, and as if he was reading the word through the paint, he’d say “boobies,” and smile, making me chuckle. My chuckle would start him laughing, and in no time at all we we’d both be grasping our sides, guffawing like fools.

©Jane Paterson Basil

Miss Haversham’s mirror

Image from Wikipedia
Digitally re-worked by Jane P. Basil

I am the reflection in
Miss Haversham’s cobwebbed mirror.
fly-flecked, dust slicked,
a sepia image:
blurred and indistinct,
a slipping vision of the distant
promises and wishes
of yesteryear

The clock
ticks enexorably
clicking towards tomorrow,
flinging each lost second to the wind,
while in fizzling disbelief I feed
the dim impossibility of half belief;
picturing my seamless beginning,
flicking through childhood memories,
trying to rinse my mind
of life’s iniquities,
and my ills.

I fix my gaze
towards the distant hills,
and I trust there must be a way
to cancel time and negate the pain;
to reverse the scraping needle of time,
and revert to the days
when the world
was mine.

Written for Blogging 101 Poetry Day 2

“Time for prompt #2 — Reflections, courtesy of the formidable @mkucsera. I can’t wait to see what you come up with for this one.”

©Jane Paterson Basil

 

Full house

Writing 101: Day 5.

Today we are asked to select a tweet and write a post inspired by it. I have chosen:
https://twitter.com/ohheygreat/status/612688575310606336

Once, she was small and innocently alone. As she grew, they moved in, singly, at intervals, wafting the intimate fragrance of their existance. They never aged. Many years passed before she noticed them.

She asked no questions. There was just the freshness of each budding experience. She absorbed, but didn’t recognise the changes. On wild days she inhaled sunshine, ate up the wide grassy tracks with her feet; her eye on today’s exciting target, tomorrow invisible, the previous day less than a memory. Thrilled with her athletic skills, she sometimes felt as if she could fly.

In school, other children milled in distant circles. Bewildered by their otherness, she stared at the sky and dreamed herself different. With her first unseen shadow behind her, she smiled and pictured a future.

Now ageing, she sits by a west-facing window and watches the sun set. Thinly veiled women and children jostle, banging into her, craving rebirth. Each has her little circle of familiars.

She feels pulled in different directions. Briefly she embraces a three year old tot who is making a cake, beating it with a little battery-run mixer. She murmers soothing words to a young woman with a black eye, who limps towards her, needing to be heard. She speaks fondly to a mother with similar features, who cradles a baby.

She tries to ignore the woman with the friendly face who is timidly waving from the corner, concealing her secret misery while she patiently listens to a teenager’s anxst.

Turning back to the window, she spies the boy, leaning against a tree, staring directly into her eyes. He is always there, imploring to be let in, and she finally realises that he is not a boy after all, just a girl who wants to be free.

She is tired. She needs to put her past to bed.

©Jane Paterson Basil

Adonis with a rueful smile

When, at night
I curl to welcome sleep
behind wrinkling lids I see you
my Adonis with a rueful smile
flicking your head
an anarchic lock of flopping blonde hair
flies back to reveal eyes of steely blue
giving you a momentarily clear view
before the golden curtain falls again

and although
for many years I haven’t seen your face
the distance between those days and these
shrinks each evening at the setting of the sun
as again in disbelieved innocence
we whisper our forbidden love

you still remain and always will
my Adonis with a rueful smile
who with voice of wild silk
eases me sweetly into sleep

©Jane Paterson Basil

Time’s seasoned grip

a moment
a single instant
immortalised by
the camera’s
click

a single instant
spirited
from
time’s
seasoned grip

a perfect instant
in print
glorified
by silver trim

I question time
“is the thrill of
that instant
an accessible
presence
within
the image?”

she eyes me
a sly smile
playing
on closed
silent lips

I press on
“if I wipe away
the built-up
slick of grime
and shame
does it lie
beneath
for me to
reclaim?”

time
shakes her head
in disdain
“too late”
she says
“I always
win the game”

©Jane Paterson Basil

The photo

that moment

immortalised by
the click
of a camera

hungry time
masticates
but she cannot
eradicate
that perfect
moment

if with tears
I wipe away
the cloying
slick of time
will I find
the bliss
which hides
behind our
glossy smiles,
awaiting
resurrection?

time
shakes her head in disdain
as the sodden image smears
revealing only loss

“too late,” she says
“I always win the game.”

© Jane Paterson Basil

Index

in the contents
section of my
conscious mind
his name is
boldly indexed
in indelible ink
the calming hue
of a summer sky

when I approach
the book falls open
on his chapter
its ageing spine
sharply creased
by familiarity

© Jane Paterson Basil