Orphans

 As something a of a lockdown project, I've been trawling through old journals and transcribing them, with a little tinkering*. A journal is a pretty messy thing, half-ideas, fragments of lines, sketches of ideas. I've always used them as a jumping off point, and a way of keeping in rhythm, but too often I become distracted by an idea, and what was sketched out, or half-drawn, or floated as an idea remains just that, forgotten, as I charge off after the next shiny which, this time, will be the one I can truly stick to.

A recurring theme of these intermittent posts is the equally intermittent nature of my writing. Never prolific, the time consuming way I earn a living pushes even my best of intentions further into the margins, evidenced by the way that the journal I'm currently typing out began in 2019 and still has a few blank pages left at the back (in my defence I often work straight onto the computer, but it's still fairly paltry).

What's good about the exercise, though, is the discovery of what I often think of as orphans. The journal gives you licence to goof about, it's a more immediate and personal practice than typing. I always suspect that when typing you've already got half an eye on publication. The less professional, more immediate world of the writing journal is fertile ground for the creation of texts which, in all honesty, wouldn't have survived the computer's more rigorous standards. daft jokes to yourself, silly flights of fancy, the precis of a novel which would never work as a book, but reads quite well as a hundred word idea . These are the ones which don't really fit with your normal practice, which don't really belong anywhere, the sort of poems, or texts, which are unlikely to find a home anywhere other than in-house

Well, this is my house. And so here are a couple of my orphans, rescued from the obscurity of the half-forgotten journal, because I might as well as not:

Sketches from the glorious new dawn  (2/10/12)

 

Seasonality for all

A sourdough in every home

 

(clashed banners engage

A river-rally, think dappled sunlight)

 

Full Union rights for superheroes

for talking animals and cars

 

One woman. Two votes

One robot alien. Ten votes.

Pan-Universal suffrage

 

10% less refraction

Taxidermy breaks

Moving forward together

While glued

 

Fun nation under God

The nice God, though

 

Moving crablike together

Reclaiming our ancestral birthing grounds

 

Placards for all!

In the event 

 

Of an event

Deny all knowledge

Refuse credentials

Delay acknowledgement

Check papers

Re-check

Re-file, head back

 

Ask what constitutes

An event

Ask if this applies

Qualifies, fulfils

Criteria -as events

Go, is it going?

 

Is it an event in a

And of being an event is

It eventuating, actualising

Has the event realised

It is in fact

An event has it checked

Its own credentials?

Its risk assessments?

Its fire policy?

Qualifications, residential

Or otherwise? Have the

Forms been filled

Have they been checked

By a teacher a rector

A sea captain a First Minister

A PPS an attacking

Left back minor

European royalty a

Leader writer or other

Person of responsibility

This or

Is it acceptable spare for

For events has there

Been precedent a

Chain of events the

Historical factor needs

Factoring in the ring

Of truth needs ponying

Up is this in truth

An event for the family

Or merely portions thereof

Catered? Self-catered?

Full board? Half board?

Quite bored?

Fret not, we’ll take donations after 

or set a test, we're as yet undecided

*alert readers will note that I did something similar a few years ago and called them "Rescued Poems". Which just goes to show that there's no such thing as a new idea, or at least that it's a shame to let a good old idea go to waste. This is slightly different though, honest!