330 words

I have recently sent up some of my short creative writing pieces to the blog 330 words and they have published all 4 pieces which has delighted me no end! Regular readers of this blog will maybe have already read these pieces from about 18 months -2 years ago and those of you linked to me on Facebook will have had these links before.

On 330words site:
1) The Manchester Riots http://330words.wordpress.com/2011/09/15/william-west-the-manchester-riots/ posted September 15th 2011;
2) Xavier http://330words.wordpress.com/2011/12/15/xavier-written-by-william-west/ posted December 15th 2011;
3) The glass shatters http://330words.wordpress.com/2012/01/19/the-glass-shatters-written-by-william-west/ posted January 19th 2011;
4) Martha, http://330words.wordpress.com/2012/02/16/martha-written-by-william-west/ posted 16th February 2012

Neil Tennant poem

Neil Tennant poem

What have I done to deserve this?
What have I done to deserve this?
What have I done to deserve this?
What have I done to deserve this?
What have I done to deserve this?

You were always on my mind
You were always on my mind
You were always on my mind
You were always on my mind
Nowhere else though

Poem: A gap in the book shelf of my life

A gap in the book shelf of my life

They’ve left your books in my room
A bit of you that can be forever mine

It’s thin pickings with just your initials on some volumes
Though one of them says Durham Xmas 87

The books have a strange and sweet smell
Which puzzles me

I can hang onto these volumes
As long as I like

But you are gone
And there is a gap in the book shelf of my life

I envy Catholics/Q

I envy Catholics, indeed all kind of Christians, indeed all kind of people of faith, indeed also Freudians, person-centred therapists, socialists and communists. They all have a clearly stated faith and even if they have tensions around it they still belong. Me after 20 years I am bit of a lapsed Quaker (and Quakers struggle with the idea of whether they are Christians anyway!). I’m vaguely humanistic with a spiritual bent, I’ve been a Guardian reading liberal since I was 13 and I am still proud of the Guardian – think phone hacking for a start but I am ashamed by what Liberal Democrats are doing in government – not that I have ever been a party member. And I can’t do class properly even though I am middle class my origins are on class borderlands and my accent is not right and I don’t come from the right part of England. I guess I have inherited being an awkward sod from my dad though that seems a bit bone headed at times. So here I am missing my friend Chris and wondering what life and death are all about and remembering the last time I visited my spiritual director Q.

- Hi Q!
- Hi Boss (Q will insist on calling me this!)
- Q I envy Catholics….They have some clear things to believe in, clear things to hang on to, even though their faith is sometimes thin or challenged like Mary’s is just now
- Hmm
- I have so little to hang onto beyond my experiences and I feel so fragmented at times
- Hmm
- Oh Q your’re Hmmming me!
- Yes
- I just wish I could feel more whole more of the time
- When do you feel this wholeness?
- Sometimes at Quaker Meetings, usually in the silence, some times elsewhere. And sometimes when I feel really connected and close to someone… often it’s quite emotional… I struggle with emotion sometimes I feel too many tears too much of the time. It’s all getting a bit much…. Last time I felt this way back in 1982 I had a neat story to explain, opening up on my 3rd eye….. I don’t have a story this time just the tears.
- Is that really so bad?
- (Big sigh) No I guess, I just sure as hell would like to know here it was all leading to
- You would?
- Yeah as long as it was a good story
- Consider Christmas
- (Big sigh) more tears and same old story perverted by consumption
- But the story?
- I know it’s about hope, new birth, belonging. The other day I had an image of my daughter when I first held her in my arms, she was a few minutes old and her mum was in need of some attention from the midwife so I held her and talked to her (sobbing) and she felt like a bit of heaven to me (more tears)
PAUSE
- When it is like that nothing else matters one bit, not one bit.
- Yes!
- So you want me to hold on to that?
- Is there anything better in all creation?
- No.

Early morning mist over the Meadows

Early Morning mist over the Meadows


Early morning mist over the Meadows
The sun doesn’t shine through
And I’m thinking of you
Again

No longer wondering why
The bright star that was you
Has burnt out
We all think it was too early
But what is, is

I sense you everywhere
At home
At work
In the Meadows

And nowhere
And there is nothing I can do
Time takes us all

And easy talk of resurrection
Melts away
Like ice
As the sun shines through

So what is left?
‘Keep buggering on*’ is not enough

But I’ll put my trust
In the often unspoken love
And the little things we share
And if that doesn’t last - nothing else will

(* Winston Churchill's phrase for how he dealt with what he called the 'black dog' of depression)

Moved by Bach

Last night with my music teacher, Rebecca, she had scored the music we had created together from my singing of one of my poems ‘Where are you?’ Rebecca sang it and accompanied herself on piano. I was amazed and dead impressed it seemed ages since I had written the poem and first sung it. All I need now is to persuade my daughter to sing it and we can record it for Youtube. It is a lament and sounds quite Celtic.

It was time for me to begin to learn a new tune on the piano. Rebecca suggested J. S. Bach prelude No 1 and as ever played it through for me. I was moved to tears. It is like having your own concert. ‘Where did music that come from’ I wondered.

Then it was time for me to begin to learn to play. Oh it was pure magic, it sounded so good. I think Rebecca was adding some petal work but it sounded so good. It is a beautiful piano she has. I just wept and wept. I could not believe such beauty could come through me. ‘I don’t do beauty’ I told her between sobs.

You might think this is soft, soppy, naff but it is me. I could help it but I don’t want to.

Crossing borders - poem

Crossing borders

It’s nineteen sixty nine
And I’m still a teenager
Walking down Deansgate
Excited by my life in the big city
My new girl friend is on my arm
(Just like on the Bob Dylan album cover)
She’s an anarchist and Jewish and pretty
And we are head over heels in love
Like John and Yoko.

Suddenly she flees
Into a shop doorway
And hides away
‘What are you doing?’
‘Friend of the family –
I can’t be seen with you.’
‘Fuck but I’m a good guy.’
‘It doesn’t matter
You are not Jewish.’

And the trouble starts
Word gets out
And it messes up
Her elder sister’s arrange marriage.

She moves in with me
Into a tiny bedsit
But we are too young
To live alone and unsupported
And she misses home
And our love fades
And she moves on
And I feel like my life’s over.

But time passes
And the trees in Alexander Park
Lift my spirits
And I move on

I last see her in nineteen seventy two
And she’s not right
Living at home
She says ‘It’s OK.’
But I look at her face
And I know it’s not.