Reluctantly

I thought I might try close reading
Close reading of my own work
Just to be sure of the cognisance
Both for myself, and also for others

Although it is not strictly true
To say that I thought of this unaided
No, actually it was after a critique
Another sense, or meaning of success

Also, and this was of my own doing
There were typographical mistakes
And my back to front isms
Did not always ring true (pun intended)

Anyways I listened to David Whyte
Who I have heard many times
And I realised how often he uses repetition
Today’s words are yesterday’s words and so on

Then I turned the oven on
Almost exactly as instructed
(In preparation for cooking the turkey)
Thereby proving that my memory still works

Yet soon I was back to writing
Writing about close reading
Which I have done with others works
But never before with my own

Is this a glorified form of editing
I ask myself, two times actually
Still I do not start, some force holds me back
I will call it: The unknowing of the unknown

Available at Amazon

Christopher's Collected Works

Confirmations

I’ve posted to you
I’ve posted to I
I’ve posted to everyone

I searched for you
I searched for I
I found you and I in everyone

I looked for the flow
Was I, or was I not
Already in there

I read the messages
I watched the videos
I was enjoying simply being

There is desire
There is longing
Yes, it is true, there is everything

And now the singer sings
There is going to be a big one
And who am I to argue

Available at Amazon

Christopher's Collected Works

Working Back

And so I ask you to write your life story
Instead of asking that I write my story

And I ask you to be clearer with your poetry
While not saying
That I should steer clear of ambiguity

Yet, when asked who is the you that I write of
I am at first reluctant to say, but eventually I say

The you is many people throughout my life
The you is also I
That is I in its many incarnations

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Christopher's Collected Works

Allocations

I have brought my focus
I have brought my concentration
I have brought my coffee
I have brought my mince pies and biscuits

I pay full attention
To taste the fruit in my biscuit
Similarly, to the coffee
In which I dunk my biscuit

I think about the Swami
Also the Gita
But most of all
About the words of Patanjali

Who said something to the effect
That my new project
Would breathe life into me
And so it seems to be
As I devour my second biscuit

On the side table
There is an empty can
Of caffeine-free Diet Coke
Which was one of yesterday’s projects

As was also writing a love poem
In a book which I cannot now see
Yet I can believe in it
For it contained focus
Concentration, and attention

That is for all of the while of its writing
There was an awareness of moments
There was a feeling of emotions
For how else could it be written

Now I have to tell you that I distracted myself
So it is time to return
To the coffee
To the mince pies and biscuits

Available at Amazon

Christopher's Collected Works

Defender

I take pleasure
Doing what some, or many others
Would see as a waste of time

My spirits are uplifted
By the images of Tumblr
Or the short quotations on Twitter

Of course I do agree
That this is not a full engagement with society
Not at least in the old sense of the words

Yet, if after a year or more of communal posting
Someone, who you have never met
And whose real name you do not know

Wishes you
A merry Christmas Christopher
Isn’t that a good thing

And so I do return to the well
As often as  to my meditation
Even more so on some days

Take yesterday for instance
A dark, dull, wet December day in my locality
But, on the web
White sands, blue skies, inspiring words

The activity is also a means of avoidance
I let the news (which I’m told is mostly bad)
Pass me by
I do bypass my physiotherapy exercises
Reasonably often

I am doing that right now
By talking out in defence of social media
As I might easily have talked
Of other means of escape

But come summer I will walk in the meadows
I will find beaches to stroll upon
And I will take photographs

Pictures to post to my followers
All images entitled never a day…
I might even post a photograph of this poem

Available at Amazon

Christopher's Collected Works