... An ancient repost from September 2004.

THE WRITER AND HIS ENVIRONMENT


1. ENVIRONMENT

Atmospheric Pressure:

Surrounded by language,
my lungs inhale gaseous thought
and breath out words,
spoken and unsaid.

Seeping through pores in my skin
liquid idea perspires,
quickening my pulse to an exhilarated race
as read cells energise my blood.

Incessant invasive and pervasive tide,
droplets of consciousness fall
on the fine, sandy soil of my being;
they re-emerge charged as linguistic rivulets
searching homewards for the sea.


2. WRITER

I am a Writer:

Confused or enlightened,
my eyes do not hear too well;
my ears do not always see right;
my mind speaks only half-truth
and my lips do not think straight.

Concrete words sometimes throw a curved ball:
I hear the inaudible sound of breaking glass -
a pane in someone's greenhouse soul.

Petalled thoughts at other times produce feathered flowers,
a ribbon of rainbow silk handkerchiefs
or an Alice White Rabbit
as if by magic from a heart's top hat.


3. RESULT

Our collective consciousness connects,
amasses, dissipates;
it ebbs and flows,
comes and goes.

But we give and receive like rings
without beginning or end,
and in our marriage bed
I do not know which one of us is which,
where one stops or the other begins:
aware only of being umbilically attached
and wholly conjoined.

We are essentially One
and passionately in love
with Language:


The Writer And His Environment