Traveller

(Cheryl Garner, 2013)

The seats are broken, nothing fits,

The angle of the light is wrong.

I wonder why the rain is dry,

I wonder why the words are wrong.

 

I left the station weeks ago,

Now float between two points, alone.

I feel the rail beneath my hands.

I taste the metal of the earth.

 

The sky has opened, slit its mouth,

And spilt its meaning on the dawn.

Its nether life has split my soul,

Down here between the buckled tracks.

 

I float between two points alone,

Between two worlds: there’s nothing more.

 

Journal Entry – 24/11/1998

what makes a journey worthwhile? Arriving at one’s intended destination, roughly on time? Well, that’s the last couple of seconds taken care of. But what of the journey? The whole Journey?

Of Ithaka…

Engagement… being in a time (not a place)… to live as a verb, to be and to do.

 

Photography by Cheryl Garner (2013)

Poetry by thecheesewolf (2013)

Train Journal by Gavin Jones (1998)

 

off switch

(Cheryl Garner, 2013)

He sat alone in carriage four

And felt the depths inside his world:

It fell away and left him hung,

Some music making pointless sounds.

 

He saw the train in hidden ways:

In colours, shapes and sorrow dreams.

He saw it as it really was:

A metal box bereft of tales.

 

The other people on the train

All tried their best to look so calm,.

He felt them panic all around:

They looked for something true to hold.

 

He closed his eyes, the music played:

Too much to take, he switched it off.

 

Journal Entry – 21/11/1998

Just closing my eyes and being at least honest to myself about my thoughts.

On the front of a newspaper: another loss of innocence. The person next to me is marking primary school classwork.

Maybe to escape, to break from the inwardness. To find new areas to write into, to run into (or from). This page has ceased to be an environment for ideas, for anyone. And who am I now? A presumed me? An overt me – the one they all know? To find a new voice which – by its very dishonesty gets closer to the truth. Can I write away the tension in my neck? Can I make the world in my image – or find instead a new world. I know I shouldn’t be afraid: all is all and always was.

 

Photography by Cheryl Garner (2013)

Poetry by thecheesewolf (2013)

Train Journal by Gavin Jones (1998)

 

 

 

The Things (Les Choses)

 

Video Poem: The Things (Les Choses).

Poetry by thecheesewolf (aka Gavin Jones), music by Joseph Kwasnik

Inspired by the writings of Georges Perec and Walter Benjamin, The Things (Les Choses) is a history of the everyday, of objects imbued with personal meanings and stories. The five poems together tell the tales of five objects which have formed part of my life (indeed part of me) for the last twenty or so years. The images were all filmed in my home on the Lancashire and Yorkshire border (in the North of England). The music, by Joseph Kwasnik, was recorded in the same room as the filming. In keeping with my other works, this poem looks at the central theme from a range of perspectives.

If you would like to read the poem, they are available at www.thecheesewolf.wordpress.com.

 

 

 

 

Suburban Sylph of Crying Owls is a video poem for thecheesewolf (aka Gavin Jones)’s poem of the same name. This video poem features the artwork of Carine Brosse.

 

For the written version of this video poem, follow the link:

www.thecheesewolf.wordpress.com

 

this video poem is copyright Gavin Jones 2013

For the Crossing is a video poem for thecheesewolf (aka Gavin Jones)’s poem, the written version of which can be found at:

www.thecheesewolf.wordpress.com

 

the video poem For the Crossing is copyright Gavin Jones 2013