1. |
To William Blake
02:09
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rainfall
the valley rests
how fell the dust of an open house
caressing memory
the garden in a kind of
gathered waiting shadow
drinks cold
i have put tigers there
the leopard
wet grass bent
kale and spinach with tiny bright
tongues speak it:
i have been like sound
on a raindrop
raincloud blinding the lake’s eye
i have been the heart
that never beats but flows
away
on my two feet
in the forest
a ribbon of green lightfeather air
fumbles in black crowns
of wet birch and sycamore
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2. |
Go Song
04:33
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go song
enter her thoughts like a bird
that enters the green horizon
fall like one leaf exactly
onto her shoulder
like one rain drop
onto her eyelashes
and change it all
send leaves from her fingernails
opening
and scattered
and rooted
and broken
and growing
and empty
and running
and torn
and held
and fallen
afire
and leaving
and pollen
and ember
and thirsty
and petal
and dying
and snowdrop
arriving
again
again
on the red
wall the tiny holly tree
thrills in the wind
polished green
crackling spineflower
the stream
forcing its way up again
how will we live?
what is the least
bread of living?
to stand in space hugging the garden?
the tiny birds fly off with it
bouncing through dense branches
singing its secrets in a tongue beyond us
i could be all i wished to be
with a pen in my hand
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3. |
Arbor Low
03:59
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trembling
all of it
except the stones
jewels fallen from cloud
cloud-coloured
wearing medals of lichen
earned under cold time
peppery rain
but they’re warm
these stones
the summer still in them
all the dry grass
undone
rippling with praise
in the wind’s temple
asleep
or eyes
staring upward
into light years
of sun
all this they see
all in their mind’s eye
grass hymns
sinuous and hesitant
the song of curves
and searching:
we have licked all surfaces
to test them
we have looked in all the weave
of this for everything
our song is everything
swept into one long shape
one long phrase
i am on the lip
of the wind’s fall
i am the black rag lost
and resolving into a crow
i live on the wing-thin surface
of disappearance
here i meet all that happens
or has happened
i never leave
i have learnt to be grass
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4. |
The Green Man
04:39
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slow sun signals through torn cloud
stones of the old mill bask in fact
why is the traffic so secure?
to learn again what song was
over and over
long notes on the edge of breath
do not equal it
the world of music far from here
inside the body
closed in here
a little oak tree at the hedge foot
green as a lime and
springy with two leaves
where my heart lives
who escapes?
and through what door?
the leaves sink into me
and change
i fall through the leaves
and change
they found cellars hung with scarves of dust
to hold their children
they found only the cage of the sabbath
to stage their exhaustion
they found earthless theatres of soot
to hang clean clothes
they found the furnace of rum
to burn their images
all falling pinched to disaster always
falling
hopeless and employed
now they lie fixed in my mouth
like a host of wooden tongues
all who pass my way are changed
who is lost?
and through what door?
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5. |
A Reforming Monster
01:47
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green air between trees
slanting white dust
through swart sycamore
a roof of feather-light
slow rain silver-green
jackdaws pepper it
falls out of time with itself
a reforming monster
strides the lanes
like rain
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6. |
Made From A Broken Star
02:40
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made from a broken star
i am exactly what you are
come from afar
when white was black
went out into the dark
home on a flight’s arc
falling through years of light
ripped down the wall of night
making every handhold bright
kiss of particles in love with time
quicken the heart’s fire
quicken the stone’s climb
universe in a lover’s eyes
gazing onto dust like rain
that flies above a rising tide
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7. |
Having Nothing
03:35
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having nothing
i have nothing to justify
no character
only choice
across the landscape
right or wrong
wind moans in the rooftimbers
cold september sunlight
the trees are green
only last week we saw swifts
summer’s confusion coming clear
all we have is to live
tender buds without recollection
push at the dry dam
of every leaf
to fall
in useful dissolution
the minerals of a smile
stay close to the heart’s fist
that’ll grip all misplanted flowers
and sail
out
free
will the rootless die?
what am i?
each goes into death
as if under trees
a history of touch
a crowd in rain
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8. |
Jack Of All Trades
02:22
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jack of all trades master of none
keeps all the trees alive
the deer know him
and move slowly round
his hands listen on tree trunks
learning the heft
of the wind
jack of all trades master of none
attends to every tree
their wishing choir
turns slowly round
root-deep frequencies
in the song
jack of all trades master of none
converses with flies
bright metal on cherrybark
turns swiftly round
to follow the jackdaws’
casual descent
jack of all trades master of none
knows the map of saplings
the badger’s path
no need to turn around
he hears the tide come
over the grass
jack of all trades master of none
as if on the bridge
of the sailing wood
wishes into distance
a long romance
to uphold song
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9. |
The Nine Ladies
03:19
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birchsong of waterleaves
swerves into harsh whispering
there must be time
for the stript twigs
of wornaway heather
there must be time
for the single green birchleaf
to dither crosswise
and land in the heatherflowers
alone
there must be time
for words to form
around the sooty legs
of the birch grove
there must be time
for the pine cone
shadowblue within
ochre-green blades
i thought i had never prayed
until i saw you dancing
among the nine ladies
your hair swept back
reappearing
like an echo danced
of leaf-fall
small decisive searching
of ants
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10. |
Birdflight
01:58
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all song bound in the heart of a bird
birdflight beats in the heart of each song
music is the see-saw deer cantering
the stag sounds across the valley
a harsh tenor
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11. |
The Kindest Water
05:15
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the privileged weep
so bad the times become
the pen is empty?
write with charcoal
rain
the kindest water
rolls off the atlantic
onto our wounded moor
a salve of powder
a shower of kisses
knocking on seeds’ deep thatch
drink of the universe
clear dusk light
the town folds flat
angular & interlocked
in grey and black
and all its men and women
merely players
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12. |
This Is The Sum
03:06
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this is the sum
the seen and heard:
i will not walk this world
as if in constant need
strength flies to my arm
sky drifts on my eyes
soon the swifts
and swallows will carve
from air such shapes
as make my song
a doctorate in the movements
of grass
to disappear into looking
light through glass
the gale has dragged is claggy tail
off to Norway
still day clears of frost
making faint smoke-mist
under cloudscrape
ready for sun
green has begun
oakwood stained
by buds
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13. |
Think Of A Time
03:47
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think of a time
when the sky could be described
the oak could be described
white-hot black silk tremor
at dusk
before autumn
uncertain
light shifts
cloud-weft stretches apart
frays into blue
to compress into number
the skies in one day
to fit on a dice
in a pocket
precious and smooth
this and the call that brings it
the hand that turns it
so the eye contains a whole sky
cloud-drift through the heart
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14. |
Flight Flower
03:58
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my voice become dust
become starlight
wind combs the canal
my voice become sun
in the swollen poppy
coursing of light
under ribbed petalskin
voice become each
pinpoint open mouth
of the buds’ choir
now
pass and drift like sun
through water voice
become spiral
flightdance
frictionless orbit
of bees
butterfly petalwing lightskin voice
become silk
and stained-glass bluebottle
motionless a moment on neon leaf
like the world’s jewel
unnoticed
first and last
voice become soft
and delicate
as moonlight’s kiss
i have been the sap’s tide
crystalline wire upflood
into the moon’s pursed mouth
oakdance under gales i improvised
all for the purpose of falling
i have seen my own hand vanish
in soft rain
i have been poured like a leaf
into earth
like a leaf’s wafer
on the meadow’s green tongues
i have been sung
now
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15. |
A Book Put Me Here
00:58
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a book put me here
to watch the rain eat
green into snow-patched moors
the room and its music
pretending
as if that could begin it
a clean flight's arc over the naked valley
only sticks of rain below
soft and cold
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16. |
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in part two our hero dissolves into a tree
like fog in the arms of a thorn
a making bud
an escapee
i do not set my life at a pin’s fee
dandelions plan
grow tense
to spring out light
tilt on the current
clouds lit silver
magnesium
run shadow
sea-grey
bruise
words fall
a field of rosebay in seed
moulting all they remember
all the garlands i might weave
or hammers wield
----------------------------------------
rainfall
the valley rests
how fell the dust of an open house
caressing memory
the garden in a kind of
gathered waiting shadow
drinks cold
i have put tigers there
the leopard
wet grass bent
kale and spinach with tiny bright
tongues speak it:
i have been like sound
on a raindrop
raincloud blinding the lake’s eye
i have been the heart
that never beats but flows
away
on my two feet
in the forest
a ribbon of green lightfeather air
fumbles in black crowns
of wet birch and sycamore
|
Discus Music Sheffield, UK
Discus Music was founded in 1994 by Martin Archer. The label releases leftfield rock music, free jazz, extended songform,
electronics, improvised music, and other sounds which defy categorisation.
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