One line is all it took

Candle holder (detail)

It seems that the nearer to my goal I get the harder it gets. With just under seven weeks to go before I end my one-a-day-for-a-year poetry challenge, the blank page taunts me. Some days I am throwing words together to get something down.

This morning, however, I was reading about David Jones, artist, in the book Unquiet Landscape by Christopher Neve and one line shot out at me, something Jones had said about a place he stayed in, and I used that line to form a poem.

Isn't it great how the imagination clicks into place? I savour moments like these. Where would I be without them? I quickly dashed off a poem using each verse to describe different elements and their affect on the person (not Jones, particularly, but someone).

I have (apparently like Simon Armatage, so I read), been writing rather a lot of poems about Covid 19, but it is easy to get bogged down with them. I was, before that, bogged down with climate change poetry. It seems that a lot of my poetry this year has been about what has been going on in the world, so it is nice when something else breaks through. I write a lot about nature, the elements, and then there are those I call rather 'off the wall' poems, or a little risque, or indeed the ethereal. I also return to subjects I have written about before as if I am not happy with what I have previously said, and by covering it again I might just get to what I really mean.

I think most creative people do this returning to things. I have written about this before - artists certainly do it. We become obsessed with one particular subject, or several subjects, as if we really need to pin it down. I'm not sure we ever do, but we keep on trying.

Well, having written my poem of the day I now have many hours to fill while staying home. So far, my plans haven't quite worked because the weather has been so beautiful. I have a bench outside the kitchen door (featured a lot in this blog!). It's a suntrap and I have been spending a couple of hours or so there each day reading. I have to make the most of it because the weather is due to turn colder by the weekend. However, I have signed up for an online course, Introduction to Geology with OpenLearn. I have had a fascination for it going back to school days and watching volcanoes on an educational film in the classroom. My science is zilch, much like my maths, but my interest hasn't waned. My favourite fossil is the Trilobite, should you be interested, and tectonic plates fascinate me. So, there you go. I've just completed the first week of four. on that course. Where will all these lead, I wonder? Maybe to some new poems!

Living differently but still writing

Sunrise - taken through my lounge window over what I call the prison
(actually the back of Currys/PCWorld store!)

Now I have all this time on my hands I've had no excuse not to sort my poems out. Today has been productive and I have submitted poems to two pamphlet competitions. I made some last minute changes and edits (as you do) and now it is in the lap of the gods...of judges in this case.

I spent yesterday taking a few pictures in the garden, holding the spade and doing little else as my hubby and one of my sons planted out the seed potatoes. Well, I did do a bit of cutting back and pulling weeds. One has to show willing.

Shopping has become a nightmare and there is not a loo roll anywhere to had where I live. It wasn't that we needed them but we tried to get them for a vulnerable neighbour. He also asked for baked beans, pasta and eggs. None of those were about. We were able to get him the canned fruit he asked for. He isn't desperate for these items, and if necessary we can give him some bits from our supplies. People have cottoned on to the fact that smaller shops have supplies...or rather they did have on Monday. Now even their shelves are depleted. I think the supermarkets should have had restrictions earlier.

I've been doing a lot of reading and yesterday I dragged out my sketch pad and searched for something to copy. I ended up with a Picasso. I don't profess to be an artist, just someone who likes to have a go now and then. Here is the result. Now there is time to dabble I hope to do more.

My writing group leader is setting up a virtual writing class on Saturday through Google Hangout. I shall let you know how this goes. Hope my IT skills are up to it! These are positive things. Thank God for the internet. At least we can keep in touch with people and carry on with some of our interests and hobbies but in a new way.

I'm thinking about exercise. I shall miss my usual Friday morning racquet session. It's too tempting to stay on the sofa at home. I shall have to drag myself up and do something, either exercising to music or skipping. As long as we don't get a complete lockdown I can still walk around local parks.

Stay safe everyone.

Supermarket shopping, sunshine, mice and poetry

It is a strange world we are living in at the moment as Coronavirus digs its heels in. A trip to the shops is a nightmare. I actually walked out of Tesco this morning before I'd even set two feet inside the door. I saw the queues and the piled trolleys, and I thought, I'm not doing this. I went to Waitrose instead. Their queues were normal, however a lot of their stock was running low and many shelves were empty with no eggs, flour, bread and very few cleaning products. I got  most of what I wanted, but used a small shop to buy eggs.

Gradually my everyday life is changing as I think about what I am doing. A meeting I was due to be at tomorrow has been cancelled and I can see my holidays going the same way. One of my son's will work from home tomorrow as his company try this out for a day to see how it works.

I have been trying to look on the bright side of things and today at least the weather has improved and I spent an hour and a half outside reading on my bench in the sunshine, and watching the birds and squirrels going about their business oblivious to our plight. It sparked a poem! In fact this is the third poem I've written about Covid 19! Every cloud....

If the weather holds we will plant the potatoes out this week and I shall enjoy more reading on my bench. Meanwhile, we are being plagued by mice and I actually bought a fish net to try and catch some (blighters will not use the humane trap). We had a fun hour chasing one around the living room with the net. No, we didn't catch it. Almost, but not quite. The mice are mainly in the cupboard under the stairs where we keep food because our kitchen is so tiny. We've had to move the packets out or put them into old cake tins. I'll never find things again! I took everything out of the cupboard to clean it, washed the floor in solution of water and vinegar (mice are supposed not to like strong smells) and then left blobs of peppermint essential oils on the floor. They are laughing at us!

To end I'll share with you my self-isolation plan poem (should I need it). Stay safe and well.

Self-Isolation (if I have to, this is what I’ll do)

I shall read all those books piled up on my bedroom floor,

Drink through all the wine and spirits to kill the virus off!

Walk around my garden fifty times to keep my muscles strong

Catch up with all those TV programmes I never see,

Order in bags of flour and eggs

Bake

Finish the book of Sudoku puzzles I’ve had for five years

Play through my collection of old vinyl records

Grab my sketch pads, draw and paint and ink the pages

Read all those magazines that sit under the coffee table

Paint the kitchen with the odds and ends in the paint cans!

Write

Sleep

Do absolutely none of this and do nothing at all!