Time-lapse

footstep on a cloud of strange unknowing

a pause midair that falters in failed tread

cushioned push returns its pressure stillborn

freeze-frame moment captured in my head

a leap from soft to nothing by a tiptoe

bounce back from invisible though seen

enforced figments caught in time-lapse

qualitative queries in strange dreams

pondered pirouettes unseemly balanced

twirling thoughts on razor’s edge too honed

ethereal and uncontrolled they dip-dive

slow-motioned acts and visions – think I’m stoned. :/

 

My underexertion of the other day resulting in a sore neck has taken on pain of proportions rendering F#°*! useless as a means of coping. My kindly doctor has prescribed a muscle relaxant (that, according to my kids, some use as a means of ‘getting mellow’) and strong pain killers.

I am only fully appreciating that I may be a control freak because this lack of control is now doing my head in. The dreams are pretty good but I don’t usually need meds to induce strange dreams. My brain usually does that all by its lonesome.

I thought I’d post before I trip again unless you want the garbled version I did earlier and saved to draft. Even I don’t know what that one was about.

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Household Tips #3

Underexertion.

Sometimes known as Lazy Sod Syndrome. Or to others, Still On Vacation Virus.

Underexertion may manifest while supping coffee still abed doing a spot of writing. No pain was felt at this time but it’s difficult to say whether the addition of another pillow may have prevented neck strain. I may never know.

Signs of underexertion began when I toasted a couple of cinamonn and raisin bagels, lathered them with jam and strategically placed some homegrown strawberries and raspberries.

It may have been the cutting of those that did it. I think I used a stainless steel bread knife which was quite heavy and unnecessarily wieldy for the task. But it was handy and I didn’t want to exert myself by reaching to the knife rack. Why sully another tool when some bugger’s left one out on the work surface having not exerted themselves to return it to its home?

I felt a twinge then.

By the time I had carried my steaming mug, plate of goodies, kindle and cigs out to the garden to join my husband – I like to be armed with all accoutrements for comfort – the pain had started at the base of my skull. Feckin’ ouch!

Being a trooper of stalwart proportions I ignored it best I could, only allowing a slight ‘whatthefuck’ to escape my, as yet, unjammed lips.

Hubs was up a tree. Yes, it is chain saw time. Lobbing the tops of thirty foot conifers is pretty much an annual task – those craiters can sprout at some.

After dropping some fresh fruit on the patio from my overabundant bagels and cursing the loss of a particularly juicy strawberry the pain really began to hit.

Down the back of my neck and into my shoulders in an absurdly sweetly excruciating stretch or tension of muscle. Fuuuuck! 

Although my husband doesn’t always read my poetry, sometimes does and doesn’t get it, preferring instead others’ poems that I read to him occasionally (bastard!), he reads my pain very well, having attended all seven births of our offspring.

Not that this pain compared. But it was bloody sore all the same.

I don’t get a lot of pain. Well, other than the, ‘Do my legs really want to do another elevation?’, ‘Who needs stomach crunches, anyway, flab is fine?’ and ‘Why does this chair feel so much more difficult to get out of today than yesterday?’ type.

Those pains I can rationalise away.

Other pains I just feed and put to bed after entertaining for the day. I had them, got to do something with them.

My husband is not a swearing man. I do that for him. Along with a number of other things that have got nothing to do with this post. S’ok, usually involves cooking.

At my rather loud, ‘Fuuuck!’, that I think even wee Mrs. O’D possibly heard from behind her blinds, he ministered to my needs with some sort of deep heat spray he uses for buggered muscles when overexerting himself at running. I never need it. Running’s what water does.

It didn’t work. Although my eyes ran a bit.

Two ibuprofen, two paracetamol, a rather strange posturing on my bed, face down with my bum almost up in the air, helped. Kids thought it was hilarious. I don’t know where they get their black humour from.

I’m all better now. But I felt obliged to pass on this handy tip on the dangers of underexerting yourself. Better really just to get up and tackle what’s ahead face on. Not with your bum up in the air obviously. That’s just overdoing it.

 

20miley10

(source)

The above is obviously not a picture of me. Miley Cyrus and I have completely different hair styles. You google images for ‘bum up in the air’. Maybe not. Quite cheeky some of them.

Without A Kiss

May we still remember tender moments

Though shattered fragments lie like broken glass

Reflecting willful spent, patent torment,

Decried the future as denied the past.

Might there be a time when softer feelings

Arise to surface, no need to protect,

Shall there be a union, desired healing,

Hopeful, if undetected as of yet.

When the pride and pain have both subsided

Could neutral ground be found where meeting claims,

After we have shared and each confided,

Hearts and souls, truce sincere in all loves named.

Love there was and nothing can forsake this,

Though world of love betrayed without a kiss.

The Hollow

Let us go unto the hollow

where the well of deepest drink was dug before,

To sacred shaded hollow, carved from landscapes

told in tales from long ago of ever more.

Trust we in the hollow

whence abide relinquished dreams, past buried fates,

Restive shelter within hollow where,

with purpose, we will serve among frail wraiths,

Ghosts that haunt the hollow

seeking chances lost in pasts of empty tales

To drink again of dreams and fates,

sip nacre, dipped from hollowest of shells.

There in hollow shadows

we shall find the well again,

Unresisting, drown all sorrows

from the hollow of our pain.

Only Sometimes In Dreams

For many of us, the mental anguish came first; the sliding scale of madness on an undiagnosed spectrum. I had thought it was only me. Not until the The Glazing did the truth begin to reveal itself in the concordant pain of all the others. We all began to awaken then, struggling from a dreamed consciousness, wisps of the ethereal floating out and mingling all the components of perceived reality. Pixels of knowing merged and began to take shape, the emergent visuals clearer before opened eyes. Hazy awareness fought to rise amid the desire to sleep on in blissful ignorance where haunting occurred only sometimes in dreams. But only sometimes.

Sensory Treasure

I whisper in your heart

to hear your hurting,

I kiss your tears

to taste away your fears,

touch your hands,

absorbing all your feelings,

snuggle close, scenting

pain-filled, broken years.

You gaze into my eyes

to know I’m seeing

all within your soul

you can’t convey.

In sharing all our senses,

flowered open,

love and understanding

feel a way.

I know your soul

by breathing in your essence,

believing all

my senses may reveal,

caring for you whole,

nothing concealed,

and treasure all the scars

I help to heal.

Fey Tale

Ennobled rank

by virtue of affliction,

Self-condemnation masks

the pooling tears.

His challenge cup

once poisoned by a dragon,

Tormented by its torching;

burning sears.

 

Intrinsic to his quest

there lives a code,

No law may break his bones;

his strength engendered.

On steed of worth,

his face full-painted woad,

Armoured heart encrusted;

gems to render.

 

Immortal risk too far

he dare not try,

Though wounds of flesh

may bleed until the end.

Scarred soul he saves,

 thus he will not lie;

This, his one and truest,

loyal friend.

 

Alter-egoed grip

upon the reins,

Steadfast in irons,

soldered to his feet.

Another hero’s heel

in wounded pain

Adjunct to failing trial,

none to meet.

 

Through storms and mountain glens

he wends his way,

Howling tempest smothers

heartfelt cry.

No joy on earth to wish

his heart to stay,

All hope gone,

anguished wish to die.

 

Softest breathing kelpie

heard his pleas,

Veiled as creature

tempting to his fate.

Brought errant knight

upon his knees

Submerged his soul,

became his life-long mate.

 

Whisper when you travel

in the fey lands.

In winds and breaths of air

each curse is heard,

Capricious creatures cover

more than Highlands,

Their charm to hear

each pent-up, heartfelt word.

Humbled By The Wind

A really lovely day today was somewhat spoiled when I hit the deck like the proverbial ton of bricks.

One of those gorgeous, gloriously sunny, windy days that twirls your skirt and lashes hair around. One of those days where you get a bit high with the nursery kids and play tig and chases till you’re breathless with laughter. Quite good when the three and four year olds can’t catch you! One of those days when running about like an eejit seems like the best fun you can have.

But that’s not when I fell.

I reserved that for the afternoon session when the same blustery day enticed me outside with an older crew to do orienteering. Why waste the sunshine, eh?

Last minute instructions to them as they stood on the stairwell and I stood halfway in and halfway out of the building was when it happened.

I had secured the heavy exterior door in its prop to allow us back in the building after they exhausted themselves chasing clues and answering questions. That’s when it happened.

A fantastic gust of wind caught the door, pulled it from its fastening and….everything moved into slow motion… but in a quick second flash……decked! I couldn’t do a damn thing to stop it. Landed with no grace whatsoever.

The kids, god bless ’em, rushed to my aid and shouted, ‘Are you OK, Mrs Hurley?’ I sort of lay there in a heap of dress and handbag going, ‘No. Not really, no.’

One of them had dashed for help and, before I could say, ‘What a red neck!’, there were two members of staff coming to my aid.

By this time I was on my feet and checking out my injuries.

No damage done to my tights. Well, there’s a relief. But a bloody big bleeding graze beneath. A gash on my hand. And a rather strange pain in my shoulder that is really more behind my right breast. Are there muscles there? I can’t remember. Or maybe they can’t remember.

I think I was in shock from getting battered through the air because I seem to remember one of the kids asking if we were still going to be doing orienteering. Might have been my imagination. They wouldn’t be so heartless, would they?

Well, we did anyway. I limped around while they ran amok like banshees in the great North wind. ( I have no idea which direction it was coming from. But I like the sound of that.)

Now I know it’s said that pride goes before a fall. But what about afterwards? And why did the wind feel it necessary to have a go at me? These are the questions and musings that enter a befuddled brain knocked sideways by the power of nature.

I got sympathy from hubby when I came home. A hot bath and a hauf. My own kids informed me that they would have laughed if they had been the kids involved. I don’t know what some parents are raising. I really don’t.

And I don’t have any plasters for my knee. 😦

 

 

Without Visage

reflections on an inner world

silvered glass without visage

slithers cut to piercing

dipped in crimson’d life

oceans of the stuff

congealing around our feet

sticky red tar

leaving a fading trail

as we walk away

in many directions

Hunted

fakir flaunts his power and releases

demons, drawing to souls where light has dwelt.

pleas of mercy, screams, no one appeases.

compassion none, despite the souls who knelt.

victims all to stalker on his prowling,

no hiding place, no basement refuge near.

cerebral pain, nerves to jangle, howling,

bitten wounds on worm’d flesh assault appear.

hunted down, unmasked, a scented quarry,

conceptual hounds bay their callous cries.

nowhere on earth prey may pray or worry;

supplication sought, revealed sordid lies.

medicinal, no sugar coated pill,

mouth, ears, eyes now wide open; hunted still.