The Five Senses Explored

I close my fist around the object but pieces of it escape between my fingers and dangle and sway and hang down, pulled by gravity toward the ground. I try and scoop them back into my palm and bunch it up into a ball so it fits snug and tight but the snakelike pieces; long and thin and bitty are alive and move back down. The coldness begins to disappear and, reptile like, it absorbs my body heat and grows warmer beneath my touch. Attached to a long chain are round flat shapes, paper thin and smooth beneath my fingertips, like shards of glass worn soft from the ocean's waves and washed ashore anew. I fiddle and touch and explore these lovely confetti shapes and their music rings out loud and tinkling, jangling, clanking bell like sounds tumbling out and over each other; jostling to be heard. Their smell is thick and pungent in the air, becoming stronger as the metal warms in my hands- a musty, salty fragrance, with overtures of sweet. Throws up memories of copper coins smelt on my fingertips; a grazed knee from childhood as a drop of red blood oozes out and trickles down my leg.
I lay it down and spread it out in front of me, untangling it's many legs and leaving it exposed upon the wooden top. A necklace, in flinty gold, patchy and dulled with dirt. Unclasped and straight, the metal petals twist over and under, tangled in the chain. And here and there, watery light hits the metal and a kaleidoscope of gold catches light.

Rusty!

Well, have had a bit of a hiatus from working, as you can see! You could say I had taken a little break from reality for the past couple of weeks; been busy festival-ing, and London-ing and lots of other things that equal 'not much work done at all'! However, am back now, if feeling a little bit rusty, but ready and raring to go. So the poems, 'Bearded Pigs' and 'Richmond Park' are composed from notes that I took when out and about visiting Dad in London. This trip coincided well with where I was at in my course work- I was to record a landscape scene, and observe a live animal; so both of these were achievable in London. BP came from notes taken at a trip to London Zoo (very handy!) and RP is pretty obvious really- a nice stroll in one of London's loveliest open spaces. I am surprised that I chose these notes to make a landscape poem actually, as I rather thought I would enjoy describing a more urban scene, but in the end, my notes on Richmond Park just drew me in creatively more than any of my other descriptive passages. Am pleased with how they have turned out, I didn't actually spend that long working on them- only a couple of redrafts and tweaking. I don't know if this is because I am getting better at poetry writing or just that it was the way in which I structured my original notes, but whatever it is, I'm not complaining!