Closed Circuit
Sat on the top deck, smokers smoking,
my father blows growing rings.
Signs above jammed windows read:
“For your safety CCTV is in operation.”
The shutter clicks on my empty plastic
camera. Pointing it at the narrow sands
of Colwyn Bay, I imagine I can store
moments on the invisible loop of film.
When I’m allowed to use my father’s
camera he crouches behind me,
shows me how to twist focus, to set
lightning. Often I forget to wind the film.
We look at a simple electronics kit,
silver solder, silicon semiconductors,
resistors control current, capacitors store
charge, concealed under a circuit diagram.
Left to create my own devices, no more
am I pictured on my father’s knee when
we attend weddings, christenings, funerals.
His camera sometimes stays silent.
Now, in pedestrianised zones I’m caught
in low resolution, followed by the whir
of little motors. Circuits concealed, swivelling
heads watching, like owls, with nightvision.
© Matthew Joseph Johnson, 2009
Tuesday 16 June 2009
tracing mirror balls
The Body of the Dance
As he dances through and beyond,
past and back, returning to the
time before he started to dance,
he shifts and skips, changes focus:
Seeing others spiral and twist,
breaking through thrown squares of light;
picking up mirrored tiles, to
hold, to squeeze, to eat.
Watching them dance through letters formed
by dashed lines, through sharing better
toys (the least-chewed), through losing
first names to a last initial.
They dance upward, older, taller,
round the social circle, in-out,
weaving a learnt-friendship maypole
of go-to-school, make-friends, close-mind.
He danced to a stillness of thought,
and of mind, and he fell apart
from the throng. He was no dancer;
he was removed from the body.
© Matthew Joseph Johnson, 2009
As he dances through and beyond,
past and back, returning to the
time before he started to dance,
he shifts and skips, changes focus:
Seeing others spiral and twist,
breaking through thrown squares of light;
picking up mirrored tiles, to
hold, to squeeze, to eat.
Watching them dance through letters formed
by dashed lines, through sharing better
toys (the least-chewed), through losing
first names to a last initial.
They dance upward, older, taller,
round the social circle, in-out,
weaving a learnt-friendship maypole
of go-to-school, make-friends, close-mind.
He danced to a stillness of thought,
and of mind, and he fell apart
from the throng. He was no dancer;
he was removed from the body.
© Matthew Joseph Johnson, 2009
weeds in textbooks
The Scholar as Carp in Pond
“I was swimming through learning all along,
I drew breath from it, blew bubbles in it”
said the scholar who was as carp in pond.
“I drank until full and my mind grew strong,
though I never could quench my thirst one bit.
I was swimming through learning all along.
“I had friends, and lovers, and I was fond
of trivial pursuits, cheap magic tricks.
Cyprinid, the scholar as carp in pond.
“I studied, neglected to maintain bonds,
scaled heights on the desk where I loved to sit.
I was swimming through learning all along.
“I cast back to find the stroke that went wrong;
when my skin became scales, my neck gained slits”
said the scholar who was as carp in pond.
“My eyes glassed over, I folded my tongue,
so mute and benighted I’ll now admit:
I was drowning in learning all along.
I’m a scholar as carp in a small pond.”
© Matthew Joseph Johnson, 2009
“I was swimming through learning all along,
I drew breath from it, blew bubbles in it”
said the scholar who was as carp in pond.
“I drank until full and my mind grew strong,
though I never could quench my thirst one bit.
I was swimming through learning all along.
“I had friends, and lovers, and I was fond
of trivial pursuits, cheap magic tricks.
Cyprinid, the scholar as carp in pond.
“I studied, neglected to maintain bonds,
scaled heights on the desk where I loved to sit.
I was swimming through learning all along.
“I cast back to find the stroke that went wrong;
when my skin became scales, my neck gained slits”
said the scholar who was as carp in pond.
“My eyes glassed over, I folded my tongue,
so mute and benighted I’ll now admit:
I was drowning in learning all along.
I’m a scholar as carp in a small pond.”
© Matthew Joseph Johnson, 2009
Monday 8 June 2009
Monday 1 June 2009
tie your bows tight
When the Bow Breaks
I loved the swing in our back garden;
I would swing alone for hours, free
to kick my shoes through the hardened
dirt beneath, stretch to touch the tree
that grew by the swing in our back garden.
My legs wrapped under the wooden seat,
I swung back, looked up at the bar, then
plunged forward to the familiar creak
of the noisy swing in our back garden
complaining as I dangled underneath.
That creak worried me; the chains were bound
to break. Looking up I fell back, hands still round
the links, my head a crude brake, slowing me down,
harvesting dirt until I let myself crumple to the ground.
© Matthew Joseph Johnson, 2009
I loved the swing in our back garden;
I would swing alone for hours, free
to kick my shoes through the hardened
dirt beneath, stretch to touch the tree
that grew by the swing in our back garden.
My legs wrapped under the wooden seat,
I swung back, looked up at the bar, then
plunged forward to the familiar creak
of the noisy swing in our back garden
complaining as I dangled underneath.
That creak worried me; the chains were bound
to break. Looking up I fell back, hands still round
the links, my head a crude brake, slowing me down,
harvesting dirt until I let myself crumple to the ground.
© Matthew Joseph Johnson, 2009
