Thursday October 9th 2003 was National Poetry Day, and as part of it, Julia and a number of other poets were given the command to "Go Somewhere Small and Write a Poem about It." In her weblog, she describes how "I cycled up to the West End, thinking I would visit an Asian Sari shop. However, no one wanted to talk to me up there. I think they thought I was a spy. So I ended up in the stuffed birds section of the Hancock Museum, feeling sad about how so many birds are nearly extinct, and writing a poem called The Lost Birds of England."
What you can read below is the original version of the poem. Subsequently, Julia redrafted it, very fittingly making it smaller. There's another web page with the revised version, and yet another page with the two versions side-by-side.
I started out too large, a flapping shape
On a bicycle, wide eared, over zealous,
With the day a grey shaken blanket,
Leaves rolling around turning spokes,
The walkways hot with nervy students,
afraid of the tall doors of knowledge.
I'm pedalling and wheeling, on the pavement,
I'm singing in the tunnels, I'm a screech.
Feel the tight little muscles in my shins,
The way my fingers grip the handlebars.
I'm in flight. I'm flying out west.
Up I go past the mouthy dental school.
Lost a wisdom tooth there in 84.
I'm scooting on up to Spital Tongues,
Up and over, then sweet Nun's Moor,
Stanton Street, where men stand round cars
Watching, like I'm galloping down their highway,
To the sound of Bangra thrumming from the radio.
Too big, too big. Scare the pigeons.
I push open the door of Pasha Fabrics,
A corner world, of rolls of silk and glitter
Shantung, embroidered crepe, slidy blues.
A grey coated man leans over the counter
"It's chilly now," he says "winter coming."
"True!" I shout "did you know I am a poet?
I'm large and I kind of like your shop!"
"No," he says "I know nothing. I'm not talking."
He sinks down lower, he peeps, he glowers.
So that's that. It begins. I get the message.
I'm too loud. I'll never find the underneath.
I go tripping into Sweetmeats of Fenham,
A place of bursts, twists, cakes made of jewels
Baklava, sugar balls, gold and crimson,
I buy a bright blue square of coconut,
I nibble it, it makes me tipsy.
I see a tiny bride and groom holding hands
At the top of a high rise cake.
I'm smaller now, my ears are trembling.
I go and shiver outside Bev's fruit and veg
Who once gave me a hamper for my baby,
But Bev is gone, and in her stead three white men
Sit lazily amongst pomegranates, pumpkins.
Now I'm back on the bike and I'm gliding
Down Tamworth Road, to Philip Street.
There's a café, with God on the menu,
With a sign says Come In And Make Friends
So I do, but I don't. They give me tea.
They give me sugar on a silvery spoon.
Two men watch me stir, watch me thinking,
Watch me watching, watch me look at geraniums.
Watch me listening to the radio crooning
I'm sitting On the Dock of the Bay.
Then they point to the clock above the counter
Say "It's time to close. Time for you to go."
Avoid hypothermia says the poster,
And I slip out, trying to be smaller,
Still too big, still too bulky, still unwieldy.
I'm tired as an American purple Gallinule
After an international flight.
I know this because I read it on a label,
After hours of deflating, sucking in.
I thought smaller, imagined dinosaurs were dogs,
I decreased my scale. I got rid of the bike.
It's a secret where I am. I've learnt quietness.
Learnt to wriggle out of sight, to camouflage.
And stuffed birds are really very friendly.
They look at you with cocked enquiring heads
And let you share their plastic worms, and nests.
They provide you with the details of their births,
Their habitats, the tragedy of their loss.
I'm pally with the Scops owl and the warbler,
The blue-cheeked bee eater's nuzzling my hair,
I'm with the little lost birds of England,
And they are truly small, and so am I.
Like the dotterel, you won't often see me,
You might hear me whistle by, but by the time
You've pulled out your National Trust binoculars
I will have disappeared, I will have gone.
But I'm not really lost, I'm in the dark,
With a pen, noting visitors, observing sorrow,
In the small corners of our dusty city.
Here's a poem, let it fly up like a bird.
Copyright © 2003, Julia Darling
On other pages: How To Behave With The Ill, Inside Out, National Poetry Day 2004, Sudden Blossoms, The Manifesto For Tyneside Upon England, The Great British Public Attachments Cold Calling The Writer's Choice, Personal Belongings, The Last Post and Posties Doughnuts like Fanny's and Eating the Elephant.
 |
Created by Julia Darling and Cornwell Internet. |
Last updated on 20 November 2003 by Roger Cornwell.
|