#2001 - odyssey

 

2001

6.175

24.vi.25

odyssey

the ants come to Iceland

 

plus ultra

 

 

think of an outskirts

journey to the centre

                         then

 

there’s round the world in eighty clouds

 

life in the wishing machine

another face to make

 

some of them are horses too

                and giddy up

across the screen, across the page

the journey of a pen

           stain spread, drip line

 

the ball across the net

dry desert lap I’ll do one day

 

it’s one thing leads to another

so join the dots to here

speculate idly, sigh

 

up the beanstalk

round the clock

 

a single breath

this little … all the way home

and there re-live, in Jules Verne armchair

 

remember what’s to come

 

through seasons of such

one wanders lonely as the crowd

 

with oceanic feeling

under where the river went

one does the lemming dive

or in the lake as bid

 

what flashes then before the eyes?

 

rain falls upon us  

or we dream

through skin to marrow

 

the journey of a pill

top to toe

yoga nidra too

 

that penny from pocket to pocket until

 

fretboard, keyboard, out the door

 

inward as ever

and mountaintop magic

 

there’s music in us all

 

at bonerise to upright from bed

 

methinks it is no journey

 

his was name of my first car

 

making a midst of it    

I set out to be myself

 

under the radar

steering clear of ground zero

 

that was the long way round

 

there’s chewing gum as well as we go

one of many tricks

 

once more round the sun

bright idea!

the sun’s on its way as well

could be wrong

but there’s probably something bigger yet

 

I suppose we could go further

but you’ll say

‘here we go again’

 

I don’t suppose it’s very far

…

yet I will sing 

for reference -- 

Tom o' Bedlam

From the hag and hungry goblin
That into rags would rend ye,
The spirit that stands by the naked man
In the Book of Moons defend ye,
That of your five sound senses
You never be forsaken,
Nor wander from your selves with Tom
Abroad to beg your bacon,
While I do sing, Any food, any feeding,
Feeding, drink, or clothing;
Come dame or maid, be not afraid,
Poor Tom will injure nothing.

Of thirty bare years have I
Twice twenty been enragèd,
And of forty been three times fifteen
In durance soundly cagèd
On the lordly lofts of Bedlam,
With stubble soft and dainty,
Brave bracelets strong, sweet whips ding-dong,
With wholesome hunger plenty,
And now I sing, Any food, any feeding,
Feeding, drink, or clothing;
Come dame or maid, be not afraid,
Poor Tom will injure nothing.

With a thought I took for Maudlin
And a cruse of cockle pottage,
With a thing thus tall, sky bless you all,
I befell into this dotage.
I slept not since the Conquest,
Till then I never wakèd,
Till the roguish boy of love where I lay
Me found and stript me nakèd.
And now I sing, Any food, any feeding,
Feeding, drink, or clothing;
Come dame or maid, be not afraid,
Poor Tom will injure nothing.

When I short have shorn my sow's face
And swigged my horny barrel,
In an oaken inn I pound my skin
As a suit of gilt apparel;
The moon's my constant mistress,
And the lowly owl my marrow;
The flaming drake and the night crow make
Me music to my sorrow.
While I do sing, Any food, any feeding,
Feeding, drink, or clothing;
Come dame or maid, be not afraid,
Poor Tom will injure nothing.

The palsy plagues my pulses
When I prig your pigs or pullen,
Your culvers take, or matchless make
Your Chanticleer or Sullen.
When I want provant with Humphrey
I sup, and when benighted,
I repose in Paul's with waking souls
Yet never am affrighted.
But I do sing, Any food, any feeding,
Feeding, drink, or clothing;
Come dame or maid, be not afraid,
Poor Tom will injure nothing.

I know more than Apollo,
For oft, when he lies sleeping
I see the stars at bloody wars
In the wounded welkin weeping;
The moon embrace her shepherd,
And the Queen of Love her warrior,
While the first doth horn the star of morn,
And the next the heavenly Farrier.
While I do sing, Any food, any feeding,
Feeding, drink, or clothing;
Come dame or maid, be not afraid,
Poor Tom will injure nothing.

The gypsies, Snap and Pedro,
Are none of Tom's comradoes,
The punk I scorn and the cutpurse sworn,
And the roaring boy's bravadoes.
The meek, the white, the gentle
Me handle, touch, and spare not;
But those that cross Tom Rynosseros
Do what the panther dare not.
Although I sing, Any food, any feeding,
Feeding, drink, or clothing;
Come dame or maid, be not afraid,
Poor Tom will injure nothing.

With a host of furious fancies
Whereof I am commander,
With a burning spear and a horse of air,
To the wilderness I wander.
By a knight of ghosts and shadows
I summoned am to tourney
Ten leagues beyond the wide world's end:
Methinks it is no journey.
Yet will I sing, Any food, any feeding,
Feeding, drink, or clothing;
Come dame or maid, be not afraid,
Poor Tom will injure nothing.