3. صباحا

.صباحا  لا اريد ان افتح العيون، ولكن التفكير عن أمي، أبي، أخي،

افعل الجمل في رأسي مع كلماتي

احب الدافئة والصمت

 أشعر قلبي والجهاز التنفسي

Easter lunch - Mother's Milk Books Writing Prize Anthology 2013

Easter

My brother and I both fooled around with our phones. Now I can't double click to get hold of them. My mother had an idea to seat us facing each other, 2 versus 2, instead of having my father at one end of the table. The dynamics were more friendly, cosy even, this way. We had flowers at each end of the table.

Photos...

To prevent interrupting we waved a paper knife around, the talking stick. We didn't actually use it, but we were better than usual at taking turns to talk.

I made some mini films before lunch. Apparently there is a whole world of them out there on Vine. I thought I had thought of it myself. One of my mother's hands chopping potatoes, another of my brother's hands.

Films...

While we had champagne upstairs I took photos of the mantle piece and bookshelves. It's an easy way to take all those items back home with me. One is of my brother aged 2, looking thoughtful on a park bench, and another of me aged 3, little feet sticking out and happily looking at a big French children's picture book.

Photos...

Mother's Milk Anthology - 'Parenting' - edited by Teika Bellamy

While H was having his 2nd driving lesson I stumbled on the Mother's Milk collection. I read most of it, flicking around the booklet, sitting on the floor. My poetry books are so hard to separate out into sections, so I read one instead. I am sure I recognise some poets' names from 52 in there.

Oh my God! London - 1 Saturday

This is me being over the top, but London is just amazing.

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I have lost the little notebook with my info about Saturday, which means that some poems of mine have gone awol too. Oh no. And good grief. That's one way of getting published.

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 Lunch visit with my mother at the hospital.
So very lovely to be pushing her in the wheel chair and generally hanging around.

I buy an Arabic newspaper, I buy one a year at the moment!
My mother suggests I circle the words I do know on the front page.

Off to do some work, peering at this translation I am doing.
Cafe packed out, so I sat in the bookshop, Arthur Probsthain (again).

Chatted to woman near me, turns out she knows Jenny Lewis,
What a very small world, she has done the Praise workshop I am going to.

Back to see my mother, we all meet up there,
Because we are very noisy when we all get together we all go to cafe.

Debate plans and current situation, bit of a war cabinet at the cafe,
Then I decide we must have a family photo, someone kind takes a few for us.

Off to my evening event, Reuters News Oratorio
Drenched thoroughly due to making some bad decisions.

Roam around the church before it starts, can't settle down.
Try the upstairs balcony, but I am not one of the cast.

The church is huge and gracious, peeling walls, cracks, darkness above.
Warm crypt with cryptic route to loos, unusual.

Finally sit down with a group of people, we chat and chat.
The improvised - and - structured performance is how it is.

I sit and lean forwards, look here, look there.
People do their thing with guitars, cellos, other musical instruments.

Jude stands at the piano and does her thing.
What I adore is the seriousness and stance of people in the middle of their own worlds.

I just have to give my whole attention to what is happening,
Let it be and let it continue, witness it, be part of the essential audience.

Imagine a poetry reading with no listeners?
That is how important being the pew-bound crowd is.

There was burning afterwards, scrolls from a dream project in Olympic Year,
A version of the Wailing Wall for Bethnal Green.

The private and unread scrolls were tipped into the fire, a brazier in the rain.
We held and relit our candles while this all went on.

We wondered whether by now some of the wishes had come to pass:
The wishes for a baby, for a partner, health.

By the end our little group had refound itself on the steps of the church,
But we had to break it up and go home. Twitter/email details...all given.

What a wonderful day and evening.

Assimilation

I was shocked recently when my mother used the word 'assimilated' to refer to the process her family/my family has gone through. All these years I have known her and not one mention of such a thing. I never realised that she was aware of this transition. Of course she was, it was so obvious it didn't need talking about.

To me it is clear as day. We just weren't here before the mid 1930's, apart from one grand parent. The rest were in other places. It's a long time ago now, but it wasn't when I was born.