Last Things

Except for the poem "Israel" (published on this blog) I haven't written any poetry since 2010 - poetic silence from a combination of Bury workload, more exciting creative possibilities, and the sense that I had reached a point where to write was to repeat myself. When Jayne Dyer and Wayne Warren started work on their exhibition in the Bury Sculpture Centre, they asked initially for an essay for the catalogue, but then changed their 'demands' to a poem. I said OK but didn't actually think it was likely to materialise. 
It was only when I walked into the gallery and saw the installation forming that I realised that I had to respond poetically, as the extraordinary balanced moment of beauty is beyond description or explanation being relevant. So I wrote: 

Last Things

forward

past last things,

minus one, it is all happening too fast as iff propagation delay echoes shicho

Like now: and I cannot keep up capacitance

I am bicontinuous counting interarrival time

I am picked off trying to count backward minus one

a false antecedent and a false consequent, a nowhere and an everywhere

the lamps are going out

The catalogue (designed with John Rooney) - also beautifully produced - is available now from the Bury Art Museum shop.