The letter

Dear Laura,

I’ll start this letter with the usual ‘how are you?’ Maybe it’s a stupid thing to ask because you can’t immediately reply, and how you are changes from day to day, but it’s the kind of rhetorical tradition associated with letters through the ages and I felt the need to continue the trend. So, how are you?

Hope everything’s good in your corner of the world, and, incidentally, I hope your sister got to Portugal. When I read about her passport problem I didn’t hold much hope for her – the way the passport process is at the moment! Oh and thanks very much for the letter, it was a nice surprise because, while I always thought you would write to me at some time – you’re a girl of your word, after all – I didn’t expect contact so soon. I thought an up and coming, forward thinking young businesswoman as yourself would be up to her ears in lucrative ventures and opportunities, and so too busy to write to some lazy arse writer. Anyway I’m glad you did write.

While I think about it, how are you finding your friends back home? What I mean is that I’ve been away from here for six years and I return to an altered landscape. I haven’t really kept in touch with people here and so now I’m finding life difficult and more than a little boring. I guess I went away to start a new life and now it’s difficult to pick up the old one where it left off. Anyway, I hope it’s easier for you.

I joined up with some people we met in India, just last week. It was a nice evening, yet strange to not have you there. Robert (small and Jewish) came along and we picked up our drinking where we left off in Mumbai. Carl is still considering whether to move to Australia or not, while his brother Owen hasn’t managed to find any work yet! He has interviews “lined up”, apparently, but we’ve heard that before.

Actually, Owen brought along his long-standing (and long-suffering) girlfriend, Caitlin with him to the restaurant. To think what he got up to while he was away. I don’t understand how he doesn’t even feel guilty about it, I mean Caitlin is a lovely girl and must really love him. Oh well…

That ought to be enough for now. I hope you’ll write back. I’m away to Scotland at the beginning of next month so I’ll send you a postcard and perhaps some shortbread. In the meantime, stay happy and having fun.

With love,

Patrick.

Hedgehog

Leaves rustle and bushes twitch,
Tell-tale signs, nocturnal stranger.
Black and moist, the snout comes first,
Sniffs the air and looks for danger.
Slinky spines stand on end –
Ground shaking, people waking –
So hurry home, buried deep,
Day is broken, it’s time to sleep.

Abstract #5

Minds and minds beget shadows churning shadows, churning shadows…
Through vales and glades the light shows grave amongst the thistles,
All souls will visit, pointing out errors and sad songs of the throstles.
So succumb to the wake, and follow the flow to the ocean,
Giving of all that you have and all you once were,
You’ll earn your reward and believe life’s colours forever
Without distance and time or darkness, just light in your eyes,
Bringing minds and minds and shadows churning shadows on the way.

Abstract #4

Months before he saw the light, he heard it, speaking strange words, pouring them down some dangling gossamer thread into his ear.
It spoke in verse about his mind, the journeys it had made and the greater distances it had yet to travel.
Rather than being afraid, he found the voices oddly comforting. He was a lonely man, he was a weary man; the voices soothed him. He thought, if this is ‘going mad’ then this is surely the best way to get there. No screaming angry conversations warring in the brain, but a pleasant other, reciting poetry and soothing away the pain.
He did not see the light until seven weeks after he’d first heard the voice. At first he was just aware of a trickle, a tiny beam that seemed to be bouncing in the top left corner of the room, right at the edge of his worsening field of vision. It seemed to jump across from wall to ceiling, joyously skipping between surfaces as the voice spoke gently and purposefully, mirroring the rhythms of the speech.
The man was able to ignore the growing light though, passing it off as a result of his crumbling eye-sight, or as a common hallucination associated with the curvature of the eye.
Each night though, it grew larger and it gained some depth and distinct form. When the voice came to him again, on the third day of the ninth week of the phenomenon, he turned his head from his television and faced the thing.
Strange and shimmering it floated, translucent, like some arcane jellyfish, wispy and stretching, small arms of light constantly moving, reaching out, perhaps reaching for him. In its centre was its glowing heart, and from this pulsing emblem came the voice, beating with the same meter as the voice; light and sound aligned.
Each day, the thing grew larger; the voice, even calmer; its tentacles, closer to the man’s face. “One day soon,” said the voice, “my fingers will enter your eyes.”

Abstract #3

He was very far from darkness then, light poured and rushed into his mind, but if light is all you can see, are you any better than blind?
Slowly though, colours appeared. And then they became shapes. The shapes were moving, an achingly gradual movement across the white desert. It was impossible to be sure if they moved towards him or he towards them, but a conveyor had seemingly been set in motion and an eventual meeting of shapes and mind had been set into inevitable motion.
The scene flowed on, gripped by a glacial entropy and soon his consciousness could make out legs and heads and arms, and the colours were in fact the bright colours of summer clothing.
Some of these figures walked side-by-side, others alone. Some appeared adult while others, mere children. He strained to recognise them, but he couldn’t quite reach into the depths of memory to recall them, couldn’t quite see their faces.
And then the entire scene froze. A small boy in red shorts had halted before him and everything else paused. The boy raised his head slowly and seemed to regard this man entirely, though it was impossible to discern if the child had eyes to see.
With a grave, creaking, eternal shake of the boy’s head the scene began to reverse, much more swiftly now, yet solemnly, until the colours and shapes disappeared over some scant horizon and out of view.
Just white remained. Just light.

Abstract #2

And for the second time that night he saw the light coming.
He was blinded, apart, but he was aware of a warmth and then it slowly drove across his mind; the light, crawling like a caterpillar or digging like a worm through the air.
Soon a terrific wind blew up, and he felt his hair rippling, fronds on end, shock and awe. Still the light drew its messages in the room.
The man wondered if he was screaming, he couldn't tell, but he knew his mouth was open wide and the gale was ripping into his front room. It felt like he was standing, horizontally, outstretched from the edge of a cliff – the void rushing and billowing warm gusts and currents of air thick with the taste of ash.
And then the strange sulphurous air was replaced by a lilting calm. He felt like a velvet cloak had been draped over his entire body and the colour filling his eyes changed to a ragged shade of peace.
The light continued to waltz slowly around, but he was ready now and he began to shut his eyes to the music of the beam, slowly succumbing to the beat, grabbing onto the entrails of light and pulling on them, following them home.

Abstract #1

Shadows and shadows beget minds turning minds, turning minds...
There are kings in the meadows and hearts find songs along the way,
Yet sleep with eddies that swirl and then change, sucking them down.
So flounder on the river, believing whatever you find,
Charring the lustrous glow of untarnished souls,
You’ll see that colours rust into love and seep into life
And even sully the bloody glow of the morning light
With shadows and shadows and minds turning minds on the way.