Finding a language
- Josephine Dickinson (U.K.)
1
Arrivals
from Cyprus,
from
Preston, from Pisces,
from
India, Guangzhou,
Orion,
Beijing.
From
Shanghai, from Pleiades,
Greece
and Hong Kong.
From
towns where traffic snarls,
from
rainbow lucent isles.
Nuclear
engineering, pottery,
physics,
agriculture…
Young
boys in suits,
girls
in patent boots
eating
nuts
on
benches in airports.
Groups
of Deaf
on the
station platform signing,
from
where there's nothing
between
them and the sun on the sea,
but
iron, I.T. and geometry,
philosophy
and dentistry…
2
Rattle
of keys,
travellers
in B&Bs.
Light
reflected,
light
dispersed,
students
determined
on a
first… Stone,
geography,
history,
revenue
management,
chemistry…
Going on a journey with a partner
Opening and closing like the petals of a
flower
I am you and you are me: no difference
I am your dancing partner
waiting to see
which way you will step
Backward and forward -
what is the difference?
Silence
in a night.
Who is
still awake?
Someone
is singing.
It is
night and silent.
Someone
is still awake.
What do
they hear?
The war
is past.
It is
silent, very calm.
It is
night, all are sleeping,
but a
voice sings somewhere
3
Goldsmiths
hammer ingots into leaf,
for
champagne and cathedral roof,
for
paintings, mouldings, decorations,
cakes
and grief…
Mythology,
biology,
operations
research,
sociology.
Canals
and celtic mounds:
an open
book
Isn't it lovely to be held?
Leading the dance in the middle of the floor,
circling each other like two tigers
Backward and forward -
What is the difference?
I may be leading you
but I wait
for you to step
into the space I vacate
Silence
in a night
who is still awake?
Someone is singing.
It is night and silent.
Someone is still awake.
What do they hear?
The looms have gone quiet.
It is silent, very calm.
It is night, all are sleeping,
but a voice sings somewhere
4
Clear water,
plants and pebbles
on the bottom.
Clocks that work,
clocks that are broken.
Slant of light on an afternoon.
Bronze, law, anthropology,
ethics and medicine,
all together,
in a glass vessel,
on a green sea.
A ship in the middle
of shippon fields.
Riggings across
the open sky.
Graffiti,
the Lune.
Philology,
a lion,
two roses,
religion
Leading the dance in the middle of the floor,
circling each other like two tigers
isn't it lovely to be held?
I am your dancing partner
waiting to see
which way you will step.
Backward and forward -
What is the difference?
Silence in a night.
Who is still awake?
Someone is singing.
Time it is to conjure
maps of the stars,
to drop bright scraps of tint.
For though it is night and silent,
someone is still awake.
Someone can hear
all that is past,
all that is present,
all that's to be.
It is silent, very calm.
It is night, all are sleeping,
but a voice sings somewhere
5
They'll soon be departing
by rocket to Vega,
to Cassiopeia,
Fomalhaut and Achernar,
Scorpius, Grus -
they're going all over,
they're full of the juice