Age Barrier

Tags

Beijing, dowager, eunuch, Prospect Hill, Time, Willow Pattern, wings of a dove

( A very old one which I have not published before.  Not a real romance.

Imagined ones are perhaps more thrilling.)

 

 

Where should we meet, except on Prospect Hill?

(Anticipation feeds sublimity).

Wan ray of hope gilds the smog-bound tiles. Thrill

of assignation’s anonymity

lifts me beyond pagoda roofs, above

blurred Beijing skyline. If by fate,

I flew with wings of that proverbial dove,

I’d soar forever on a Willow plate.

With brandished whip Time sets off in pursuit,

but cannot bring me down to earth. This day

forbidden cities and illicit fruit

seem tangible and not mere fantasy.

But you are many years too late. Oh, why

am I so punctual, self-aware and old?

You might well be eunuch; dowager I:

for while you’ve kept me waiting, I’ve grown cold.

 

 

(zh.wikipedia)

 

Cor Cordium Post 2

Tags

Angelus, curfew, Falls of Clyde, gargoyles, Immanence, Inglesham, Isis, Lechlade, Lycidas, Mary Shelley, Narcissus, New Inn, Severn, T L Peacock, Windsor Great Park, Wordworth

For introduction, see previous post.

(Photo: by Ballista at English Wikipedia, May 2006)

 

COR CORDIUM

(a monologue, as spoken by Mary Shelley…)

 

I remember he called me his veiled maid

and said I had a voice like his own soul.

Up what he termed the watery staircases,

we rose, emerging under a humped bridge.

Ostensibly, we sought the Isis source,

but were we really looking for the fount

of Inspiration… Imagination?

 

All the while, like Narcissus, he just stared;

reflected on the depths, till weeds choked us,

at Inglesham.  We lodged at The New Inn.

Peacock encouraged us to eat some chops.

Thus fortified, we strolled before the curfew,

through the ancient churchyard, which seemed to rouse

the Muse in him, for he became withdrawn

and it was only his echoing cough

which disturbed our tranquility.  The spire

pointed heavenward, as if to raise heads

cast down by the dejection of their pasts.

I thought of Clara- and mother also-

and dwelt awhile on my estranged father.

Well, Wordsworth was quite right- the good die first.

 

What strange visions and dreams I’d had before:

my babe resurrected, but then more deaths.

Suicides ensued.  Yet on that still night,

we watched the moon; heard the Angelus

and felt a kind of divine Immanence.

 

I wanted to drift forever on streams;

to exorcise my deep melancholy.

Harriet had threatened to prosecute:

she made his ‘atheism’ a pretext,

citing elopement and abandonment.

But he was only in love with loving:

like Augustine, he was not yet in love,

though he claimed to reject Beauty, Nature,

seeking to find full truth in a woman.

All that free love was, at times, fatiguing.

 

Why did I always have to share his love?

He even shared his father’s allowance.

We never made it to The Falls of Clyde,

for he could not produce the Severn fee

and Charles and Peacock could not contribute.

 

So, while he spoke of Lycidas and death,

I felt that I was drowning in sorrows.

Suddenly his ‘airy scheme’ seemed grounded.

I longed to return to Windsor Great Park,

but the gargoyles seemed to mock my desires.

So, what was I left with?

 

I edit work

and open the pages of ‘Adonais’,

gazing at that once strongly beating heart;

mummified now; wrapped around in white silk.

Is that all that remains of burning love?

 

No, for even among the crumbling tombs,

verse was produced on that late summer night

and his very heartbeat was metrical.

 

Now I hold the rhythms of his life- here-

not between the pages, but within them.

 

Cor Cordium

Tags

Adonais, Charles Clairmont, cor cordium, Cricklade, Douglas, dramatic monologue, Holamn Hunt, Isabella and pot of basil, Keats, Lechlade, Mary Shelley, Monty Don, Percy B Shelley, Protestant Cemetery, Robert the Bruce, Rome, Severn Canal, skiff, Thomas Hardy, Thomas Love Peacock, Tripadvisor, Valentine's Day, Walter Raleigh

(P B S’s gravestone in The Protestant Cemetery, Rome.

28/8/04 Author: carptrash  Einar Einarsson Kvaran

transferred from en wikipaedia)

‘Cor Cordium‘ was inscribed on Shelley’s grave and means ‘heart of hearts.‘

Valentine’s Day  seemed an apt time to look into what happened to his

physical heart.

Apparently Mary Shelley kept it wrapped up in white silk and it was

placed between the pages of a book, at her husband’s poem on

Keats: ‘Adonais.‘  It can’t have been the whole organ, so must have been

a sliver which was saved from immolation on the beach at Spezia.

It reminded me of Robert the Bruce’s heart being encased in a lead

casket. It was meant to be taken to The Holy Land, but Douglas failed to

dispose of it there, so it returned to Scotland.

Hearts were often removed and, like Thomas Hardy’s, were buried

separately from the rest of the remains.

It is rather ghoulish to ponder on what Isabella had in her pot of basil,

or what Walter Raleigh’s widow carried around with her in a leather bag.

Yes, sometimes it was a head and not a heart.  People can be weird.

(I don’t know what you have to feed basil, the herb, with, but I never

seem to  have any luck with growing it in a pot.  Isabella seemed to be

quite successful, judging by Holman Hunt’s painting, but I don’t think

Monty Don would prescribe such an extreme compost.)

Anyway, my next dramatic monologue references Mary, in later life,

meditating on their September voyage up the Thames, in the

company of Charles Clairmont and the novelist Thomas Love Peacock.

They failed to reach Cricklade and the source of the river and, in any

case, did not have the £20 to pay the navigation fee for their skiff to

enter The Severn Canal.  So, they stayed two nights in Lechlade and

P B S ( pernicious bowel syndrome- not) wrote a poem in the

churchyard there.

Peacock called the inn ‘comfortable‘ so it would have had a good review

on ‘Tripadvisor,’ had such a site had been in existence.

The day before yesterday I traced the hostelry in which they stayed and

viewed a bedroom which MIGHT have been the one in which they lodged.

Then I walked through the churchyard of St Lawrence’s Church to admire

the snowdrops, which they certainly would not have done, their visit

having been in late summer, 1815.

My poem:

Cor Cordium  (a poem on Valentine’s Day)

see next post…

Up Yonder/ Down Under

Tags

Abbots of Unreason, altruism, boy bishops, conceptual socialism, Dame Edna, damnatio memoriae, Dolce & Gabbana, Down Under, empathy, Francis Rossi, Gunnamatta Beach, Heliogabalus, Kylie, Lagerfield, Lee Mingwei, Let a Hundred Flowers Bloom, Mao, Melbourne, Mis-Rule, Moonee Ponds, NGV, Point Leo, Prince des Sots, Rick Parfitt, Saturnalia, The Moving Garden

Photo: Fir 0002/ Flagstaffotos

G’day, possums!

Still haven’t achieved my ambition to bump into Edna Everage,

in, or around, Moonee Ponds.

That great Lord (or Dame) of Mis-Rule should re-appear, as

we all have need of an indigenous stalwart of comedy, a she-oak

of satire, in these topsy-turvy times, when the rule-book has been

torn up.

Yes, I am no longer Up Yonder, but am Down Under, escaping the

status quos in Europe and the USA, which seem to be presided*

over by Abbots of Unreason, Princes des Sots and other anti-

experts, who seem to be having a field day.  We might as well be

governed by the likes of Francis Rossi and Rick Parfitt, as our theme

tune seems to be ‘Whatever You Want.’

(* note the spelling, Donald.)

Bring back Boy Bishops!

Yet, this is no restricted time of daft usurpation, lasting till the 28th of

the month, when metaphorical steam would be released cathartically

and order restored – granted by some Saturnalian blood-letting of the

temporary ‘ruler.’

Yes, slaves becoming masters is no new concept. If you think nepotism

is novel, refer to Heliogabalus, who raised the women in his family to

senatorial titles.  He used cosmetics to enhance his appearance and

saw himself as the sun god, before he was eclipsed from public memory-

damnatio memoriae.  So perish all with such a degree of hubris!

But what to do while the black farce plays itself out?

Walk on Gunnamatta Beach, or Point Leo?

(You could still be sprayed by effluent from the discharge of over 40%

of Melbourne’s sewage from a nearby pipe.  The surfers don’t seem to

mind.)

You could eat wallaby on South Bank- surprisingly delicious with a confit

of beetroot and pickled red cabbage.

You could gawp at what I call Vulgari jewels at the NGV.  Or enjoy a

confection of Kylie’s stage costumes by Dolce & Gabbana and Lagerfield…

There are plenty of distractions, I assure you. One can emulate Nero and

fiddle while everything is incinerated in a global bushfire to end all

international  infernos.

On the other hand, you might enjoy participating in Lee Mingwei’s The

Moving Garden, a curiously apt installation and piece of conceptual

socialism which takes you out of yourself and reminds you of the intrinsic

hope of human altruism and expressions of empathy.

The cynic in Candia has to overcome alarm bells at the memory of

Mao’s Let a Hundred Flowers Bloom.  Self-expression can be dodgy.

However, I felt constrained to write you a poem about this

meaningful experience, so be sure to read the next post!

Maybe there is hope for the future, possums.

Travelling from Zhaoqing to Hong Kong, via The Pearl River Estuary- Feb. 1997

Tags

Ansel Adams, Dim sum, El Capitan, foreign mud, Hong Kong, Jetcat, kitchen god, Kung Fu, lai see, Lion Dance, lotus, Mongkok, opium, Pearl River, sampan, Tsao Wang, Winna Lodge, Yosemite, Zhaoqing

Found this period piece in the garage:

(View of Zhaoqing- 7 Stars by Antoine Mouquet,

23/7/2005)

It’s just as well there are no Pearly Gates

in Spring Festival iconography,

such is the push to be the first one through.

Being British, we naturally wait,

believing that the last shall be first.

Chinese courtesy proves just as ‘Christian’

and stewards show tourists to the best seats-

or is it that we have a group booking?

Further enigmas for us to ponder.

From the Jetcat we hear the deep drum beats

of a Lion Dance; then we are whisked away

from Zhaoqing to Hong Kong, through a grey mist,

as dreich as any Calvinist devil

trafficking in foreign mud* could invoke,

to cover up his nefarious deeds.

Sampan fishermen float among lotus,

seeking a catch of mercury-tainted fry,

while passengers gorge pre-ordered noodles,

violent videos, or gawp at old films

of Yosemite’s winter wonderland,

with El Capitan’s giant monolith

more enduring than Communism.

I feel guilt, having experienced both:

the luxury of Winona Lodge and

mainland China’s dire sanitation.

My eyes stray to a peeling pagoda

while chipmunks skitter through the pristine snow

on screen.  The only wildlife that I saw

in town was a dangling, threaded turtle

and two spiny creatures gnawing through mesh,

in adjacent cages outside a shop,

while all the little yellow trapped birds sang,

to celebrate the British Handover.

By the time we had reached the neon bay,

the children had grown bored by loud Kung Fu

and animal tracks in Adams country.

They were focusing on their next Dim Sum

and whether the Kitchen God, Tsao Wang,

would report favourably about them,

on his annual journey to Heaven

(which might have seemed like the United States

to those who had no hope of travelling there.)

Clutching their scarlet Lai See envelopes,

they sought Mongkok, their Chinese Paradise,

to eat mushrooms of opportunity

with relatives who must have pushed harder.

We waited politely and then disembarked.

The Star Ferry turned around and sailed back.

* opium

Chipping Snodbury

Tags

Absent Freinds, aperro, bachaqueros, Bolivar, Chipping Sodbury, Corbyn, Deist, Embers, Farrow and Ball, Ford Pinto, gloaming, Indian Summer, Malapropism, Pele Tower, River Camel, Sandor Marai, Snodland, The Cotswolds, Venezuela, Voltaire

Great-Aunt Augusta: RIP

 

Mrs Connolly, the housekeeper at Murgatroyd Syylk’s pele tower,

was exhausted.  She had overseen the triple marriages- well, dual

marriages and one re-espousal- of Augustus and Virginia, Drusilla

and Nigel and her employers: Diana and the aforementioned Murgatroyd.

She had given Dru a lace-trimmed hankie when her mascara had

threatened to run, as the bride had welled up at the thought that dear old

Aunt Augusta would not be with them.  The old curmudgeon had loved a

good wedding, funeral or general family crisis.  She had been sorely

missed.

Gus had raised a toast to ‘Absent Friends‘ at the end of his father-of-the-

bride speech, by way of respect.

Curiously a feather had floated down onto the top table at this very point.

It was black, but was nevertheless pronounced a good omen as it

appeared to be exactly like one from Aunt Augusta’s feather boa which

she always wore- even in Snodland Nursing Home for the Debased Gentry, at

‘aperro-time‘ as she was wont to call that crepuscular, inebriation

time-zone.

Clearly, she was with them in spirit, if not spirits.

They had left a place at the top table for her, or for The Grey Lady whom

she had conversed with, though nobody else had had direct

communication with the resident phantom.

Mrs Connolly had kept a lid on the petulant Mrs Milford-Haven, mother

of Nigel, who had been confused by her lengthy, Corbynesque train

journey from Cornwall.

She had scarcely been over The Camel in her lifetime, but was naturally

acquainted with the concept of a hump.  This was no crude allusion, but

merely indicative of her tendency to sulk when she was not the centre of

attention. Maybe it was some kind of physiological Radon effect.

Mrs Connolly had handled her robustly.

Whit’s the matter with yon wifie?  she had enquired.  Has she peed on a

thistle?

Soon she had calmed the situation down by introducing her to a Farrow and

Ball paint chart, which gave the peevish guest big ideas for Nigel’s post-

honeymoon guilt trip, to finish off the decoration of her bathroom.

Even Gus had been a tad emotional about his more-or-less step-brother,

Hugo, who was stranded in Venezuela.  He had been unable to leave the

country to take up his proffered teaching post at St Birinus Middle, even

after all the hard work Virginia had put in with visa application and so on.

A black market hawker was unlikely to be able to afford a trip to The

Borders.

Bachaqueros was a romantic collective noun, but everyone knew that it was

euphemistic.

Dru had been exasperated: Why doesn’t he just add billions of zeros to a

Bolivar note and turn up at the airport with a wheelbarrow of them?

It’s not that simple, darling, sympathised Diana.  We should have opened a

‘Generosity’ site to raise funds for him, I suppose.

Oh, I hadn’t thought of crowd-funding, Dru sighed.

Or he could have sold his Ford Pinto, muttered Gus.  Though we have lived to

see Voltaire’s comments on paper currency come true.

The Rev Finlay Armstrong had been aroused at the mention of this notable

Deist.

Yes, it returns to its intrinsic worth, Snod explained, as if he was back in the

classroom.

Flickr-Voltaire (marble) by Houdon. Nat Gallery Art, Chester Dale,

  1963)

Author: Sarah Stierch

 

But he was not back in the classroom.  He was now to be a married man

and Virginia had suggested that he burn all his old teaching notes in the

new trendy, fire pit which Murgatroyd had installed so that his guests

could sit al fresco in the midge-ridden gloaming on the few Indian

summer evenings which were dry.

That was quick! she had remarked.  There was a few singed curls of paper.

Where is all the rest?  Had you shredded them?

No, Snod replied.  I am of the old school.  All my lessons were, and indeed still

are, in my head.

At least she was assured that there had been no incineration of erstwhile

love letters.  She still had a little explorative rake-through with

Murgatroyd’s self-wrought poker.

She was right about the non-incineration of the amatory epistles. Diana

still possessed them- including the Valentine card which had gone astray

like many a Messianic sheep, all those years ago and which had led to the

current denouement.

But this seemed to be all in the past.  Virginia had been reading Sandor

Marai’s book Embers and an apposite quotation from it had come to mind:

Time is a purgatory that has cleansed all fury from my memories.

We shall subsequently see whether this is indeed the case.

Meanwhile Mrs C was showing her fatigue in her usual Malapropistic

manner: So, when will you be back from Chipping Snodbury? she asked

Murgatroyd and Diana, who had planned a little antique-hunting

expedition in The Cotswolds.

Sodbury! they had exclaimed.

 

 

 

Chinese Restaurant Think Tank

Tags

Buddha, edible snake, Longevity, proverb, think tank, traditional Chinese restaurant

(Table Setting 5/10/12: photo by micah sittig

flickr.com/photos/msitttig/4675623306)

 

 

If you want to be a nine hundred year

old fish, then stay at the back of the tank,

our guide quipped.  A proverb?  But I heard fear

from a not too distant past, when some sank

without trace.  Huge frogs with bulbous eyes

hunkered behind smaller fry: plump Buddhas,

withdrawing from contact, like all the wise-

too intellectual for consumption. As

we eschewed the coiled snakes and frilled reptile,

we saw longevity and survival

was to become what others revile:

thus to outlive an attractive rival.

 

Marriage Preparation

Tags

aubade, banns, Barrowland market, BBC 4, Bletchley Park, Burns documentary, Camp Bastion, Canary Islands, Carlo Curley, chanter, Classics teacher, Dog Star, Enigma, Hymen, Isle of Dogs, kist o' whistles, non-binary, organathon, ornithology, retractable telescope, Souter Johnnie, Tam O' Shanter, Tenerife, The Dambusters

( Image: Postdlf, Aug 2010)

Diana Fotheringay, Virginia and Mrs Connolly, the housekeeper,

sat round the kitchen table to discuss all things matrimonial.

Dru should have been present, but she was in Tenerife at

the time, given that it was the Easter break.

It was Virginia’s holiday time too, but she did not like to encounter

school children and she and Snod had reckoned that the pele tower

in the Borders constituted as good a bastion as they could find-

except perhaps Camp Bastion, and they hadn’t reckoned on Afghanistan

as being terribly relaxing.  In some ways it might have reminded them

of their day jobs, except that at times, St Birinus Middle could be regarded

as being marginally more stressful.

Mind you, Snod was not finding marriage preparations terribly relaxing

either. That was why he was doing some male bonding with Murgatroyd

and was heading off to the nearest hostelry, in the company of The Rev.

Finlay Armstrong, who had just visited to discuss banns, registers and

orders of service.  ‘The Rev’ had never conducted a triple ceremony before,

but he felt that there was a sound Trinitarian basis and so had agreed.

Nigel, Dru’s fiance, had gone to Tenerife too, which had further infuriated

his mother, since she had been let down by yet another decorator and

her apron strings were developing an elasticity which no longer

seemed to exert any tension on her son.  In short, he was now switching

his submission to a different female.  And some say that that is what

distinguishes a married man from a bachelor.

(Image by Forest and Kim Starr

flickr.com/photos/starr- environmental)

Tenerife had not been his first choice.  He had suggested The Canary

Islands to Dru, who had looked at him in a funny way, before informing

him that they were one and the same.

Shall I take the binoculars? he asked, trying to cover his faux pas by a

forced interest in ornithology.

Why? asked Dru and then the penny dropped.  No, they’ve got nothing to

do with canaries.

Oh.

She wasn’t the daughter of a Classics teacher for nowt.  The etymology is

to do with dogs.  Canis, as in Dog Star, par example.  And don’t ask if you

should take your retractable telescope.

Was that a double entendre?

Nigel wasn’t very good at picking these up, as his classes knew all too

well.  He smiled anyway, but not too broadly.

Oh, like The Isle of Dogs? He continued to dig his own grave.

Just don’t go there- okay! replied Dru, who sometimes wondered what she

was hitching up to ….But, no… Nigel was really sweet.  Really.

Mrs Connolly rose and poured some tea.  It’s awfie nice that yon Mr Poskett

has agreed to play the kist o’ whistles fur ye, she commented.

Oh no, replied Virginia.  We are having a bagpiper to greet us in the morning,

like an aubade.  I don’t think Mr Poskett is acquainted with the chanter.

Naw, Ah’m referring to our church organ, Mrs Fisher-Gyles.  Ah ken fine that

Ken is playing fur ye earlier oan in the day.

It’s guid that Mr Snodbury’s friend will do the musical honours at the kirk,

as old Mr MacPhee’s no’ sae reliable nooadays.  Not efter that episode at the

cremmie.

Cremmie?  Virginia was not completely au fait with the local patois.

Crematorium! laughed Diana.  Oh, Mrs C, tell us what happened.  It

never fails to make me laugh…

…till ye greet!  Och aye, weel, Mr Mac was playing at a service and there

was a delay, so he started improvising.  Always a dangerous activity, if ye

don’t mind me sayin’…

And? Diana was keen to force her to the point.

And…jist as he was runnin’ oot o’ tunes, he turned aroon as the corsage

had jist entered…

‘Cortege’, Mrs C!  You’re getting mixed up with wedding paraphernalia.

Aye, so Ah am.  But she looked a little put oot at having been corrected.

Go on! Diana encouraged her.

Weel, he looked ower his shooder and saw these twa wreaths on the

coffin.  He thought that the chrysanthemums spelled oot ‘Biggles.’

Wait for it, laughed Diana, whose shoulders were starting to shake.

He didn’t! expostulated Virginia.  Did he start playing The Dambusters?

He did just that. And Mrs C took a lace-edged hanky out of her sleeve and

started giggling like the teenager she had surely never been.

Aye, and it was only Big Les, the biggest crook this side o’ the Borders,

though he was well enough liked. They said he made his fortune at the

Glasgow Barrowland market.

Naw, ye can do withoot that kind o’ misunderstanding on your big day.

Mr Poskett is a professional, I understand? she queried.

Absolutely, said Virginia, who was used to supplying anxious parents with

such reassurances regarding the musical education of their precious

offspring.  He once appeared in an organathon with the great Carlo Curley.

(He had only turned the pages, if truth be told.): Editor.

Drink your tea.  Look, it’s gettin’ cold, cautioned Mrs C.

Virginia was dying to ask if there had been, or still was a Mr C, but one

somehow knew that one should not ‘go there‘, in modern parlance.

And, as for the boys, they were just explaining to The Rev, over a pint,

that Murgatroyd and Diana were actually just renewing their vows,

whereas Snod and Nigel were first-timers, or novices in the realm of

Hymen.

Virgins! smiled The Rev.  I’ll drink to that!  At least no one is saying they are

non-binary, or anything too complicated for my form.  We have had to add

some boxes recently on the request of The Registrar, but in our neck of the

woods, we hadn’t come across some of the categories – at least not

consciously- and so we weren’t sure how to fill in their damn forms.  So,

‘virgins’- that’s easy peasy!

Shhh! Keep your voice down, blushed Snod.

It would be just his luck if some St Birinus parent had a second, or third

home in the neighbourhood and had made this hostelry his ‘local.’  He

looked around nervously, but, thankfully, it seemed to be populated by

Tam O’Shanter and Souter Johnnie extras from a Burns documentary for

BBC 4.

Non- binary?  Now that was a new one on him.  He thought binary was

something to do with codes and Bletchley Park.  Oh well, the whole birds

and bees business had always been an enigma to him.  And now he was

about to crack the code.  Hmm…

 

 

The Wrong Wellies

Tags

barista, Botticelli, Brassica, Brunetti's, Chinese New Year, Commissario Brunetti, Commissario Montelbano, David Cameron, Donna Leon, Donna Tartt, Hunter wellies, kiddychino, Nicola Sturgeon, Rebekah Brooks, salted caramel eclair, SamCam, Singapore Sling

(image by abc 10)

 

So basically you have been unfaithful to ‘Costamuchamoulah’ cafe here in

Suttonford? Brassica accused me.

It wasn’t like that, I tried to defend myself. No bog-brush bearded baristas

were involved, I assure you.  It’s just that ‘Brunetti’s’ salted caramel eclairs in

Melbourne were so tempting.

That Italian name’s familiar, Brassie interrupted.

You’re thinking of Donna Leon’s Commissario Brunetti, I surmised, knowing

she’d read a couple of the volumes in the series at her ‘Bookworm’ group.

But, you know, I’d prefer to make a tangential mental leap to summon up a

vision of Commissario Montelbano- the young one, I mused.  Actually, one

of the waiters who brought me extra marshmallows was kind of like him. He

had the same bandy legs, but Botticelli curls.

Mmm, quite a lot of Italian guys do.  Yet, you’ve been swanning round the

globe while the rest of us were generating mould in our ‘Hunter’ wellies from

the condensation build-up of Apocalyptic precipitation levels?

Join Nicola Sturgeon’s clan.  But not David Cameron’s.

How so?

She shares your taste in trending wellies.  Apparently Cameron wore a cheap

pair when he visited the flooded areas.

Oh, that was for the press, she exclaimed.  Do you think SamCam would

let him out in anything cheap if he was (say) visiting Rebekah Brooks for a bit

of a pot supper, after helping her to muck out at her stables?

Okay, I’m sorry.  By the by, I would be surprised if SamCam, as you call her,

allowed him out at all, when he is off-duty.  She would probably prefer him to

come home smelling of roses.

Why do I always get Donna Leon and Donna Tartt mixed up?

Dunno. Easily done. I took my tablet out of its case.

Look! This was us on our final evening at ‘Raffles’, on the way home.

Put it away, barked Brassie.  I’m not interested.  Anyway, you said you

went there twice, so I can’t forgive you.

She couldn’t resist a peek.

What were you trying to do?  Live up to your gravatar?

No, I was just having a ‘Singapore Sling.’

She drew me an even greater disapproving look.

Not a ‘fling’. You can get virgin ones, you know, I pleaded.

Silence.

No, actually.  Look, I’m not trying to be elitist.  Nowadays

it is a virtual extension of a creche.  Kids everywhere.  All these

special venues are commandeered by fathers in baseball caps

and shorts and mothers pushing giant buggies with babes who

only require feeder cups.  You dress for dinner and they throw theirs

on the floor- or ground-, if we are referring to the outside courtyard. 

Sometimes the infant accessories even manage to project their

regurgitations into your lap.

I do so agree on the distinction you make between ‘floor’ and

‘ground’, Brassie reflected. But, have you always been irritated

by kids, Candia?  I mean, didn’t you once teach the little darlings? 

Surely teachers like children?

Don’t bank on that, I replied.  D’habitude, we only like the well-behaved

ones, of which there are fewer and fewer.  I don’t mind them at informal

eateries at lunchtime, but if I am spending a mint on a rare grown-up

treat, I prefer a kiddychino-free zone.

Kiddychino?

Coming to ‘Costamuchamoulah’ by Chinese New Year, I predict.

We both sighed.

 

DEPARTURES

Tags

Beijing, carp-shaped kites, Chengde, Daoist, Deng Xiaping, firecrackers, Five Pagodas Gate, Forbidden City, George Osborne, Great Wall, Guanzhou, Heze, Hong Kong, Mao, Putuo Zongcheng, Qin Shi-huang, Simatai, Sir Ben Ainslie, Taoist, Tiananmen, venue of Eternal Peace, Wanfaguiyi, Yangtze, Year of the Ox

(..uploaded by Rabs 003)

I could hardly make out what Brassica was saying, as the skoosh

of the coffee machine, coupled with the background animated

conversation in Costamuchamoulah must-seen cafe left me

exhausted with the intense concentration which was necessary

to filter out the brouhaha , as well as the baristas’ choice of radio

station.

(Photo from HM Treasury)

I was talking about George Osborne and his Chinese fascination,

she shouted.  You went to China once, didn’t you?

Twice, I mouthed.  In the mid to late nineties.  It was a college trip.

What did you do? she asked.

Em, the first time, we mainly stayed in Beijing and went up to

Chengde to the Mountain Resort.  It was a summer getaway for the

Emperor- but it was February when we went and there was snow.

The students had a free day in the town, but I hailed a taxi and

went to the Putuo Zongcheng Temple, to see the golden roof of

the Wanfaguiyi Hall and the Five Pagodas Gate.

Did you go to The Forbidden City?

Oh, yes and the Wall at Simatai and Taoist and Daoist temples.

We had Sir Ben Ainslie with us.

Was he promoting Olympic sailing?

No, he was in my Form Class and was a very pleasant

young man.  He was only eighteen, but already well focused.

So, what did you do on the second trip?

Look, I can’t hear you very well.  I’ll e-mail you something

tonight.

A poem?

Wait and see.

DEPARTURES

(Portrait by Zhang Zhenshi and a Committee of Artists)

We filed past Mao before we left Beijing

and wondered if he had gone to meet Marx,

or his Maker, in his great leap forward.

The digital countdown in Tiananmen

displayed in red a hundred and thirty

days, till Britain would quit Hong Kong’s harbour.

The sleeper to Guanzhou arrived on time.

Some minor official’s car drove along

the platform.  His compartment was the same

as ours- First Class.  The red carpet was out.

We settled in our bunks and asked our guide

if the Chinese ever tried to de-bunk

their leaders.  Did they wait till they were dead?

No, not really, she insisted, for Deng’s

‘one country; two systems’ helped our peasants:

1.3 billion poor, to be precise.

She looked over her shoulder and we laughed.

At dawn we stopped at some dismal station.

Black market rail tickets were being sold.

Uniformed females with loudhailers quelled

a near punch-up.  We watched behind lace nets.

A man with torn shoes, grim smile and cake box

seemed resigned to his unsuccessful bid.

The next train would be in twenty four hours:

not a good start for The Year of the Ox.

We crossed the Yangtze where it was averred

macho Mao had swum to the other side

to show prowess..  The pink agapanthus

and formaldehyde had not fragranced him-

those floral tributes on sale, re-cycled,

we had thought, as none rested on the glass

against his tomb.  We felt we’d seen it all:

The Forbidden City and The Great Wall;

the dear-departed father figurehead.

We even speculated Deng was dead.

Our guide told us when Qin Shi-huang had died,

his courtiers were so afraid, they’d tried

to mask his corpse’s stench with crates of fish.

That whiff of death came with us from Beijing.

Peasants in Heze watched a meteor shower.

The entire sky became a vivid red.

They felt a dynasty was going to fall:

and fall it did.

Yet, contrary to what was said, some joked

when Deng departed later that same week.

Outside the Wax Museum, someone said,

Deng may be dead, but you can see him here

before 3.30, if you pay ten yuan.

A carp-shaped kite played in the sky above

Tiananmen, while yellow stars fell to earth,

from a venerated flagpole: a scene

so different from 1989,

when student posters said: The wrong man’s dead.

We were in the clouds when bold headlines screamed:

Deng has massive stroke; in Arrivals

when the news broke; had opened our brandies

by the time Beijing had been prepared

for the incineration of Xiaping.

(ROC govt, 1937.  Uploaded by Tholme)

As the smoke ascends, we watch his rival.

All over China, nervous firecrackers

exorcise demons, calm jittery nerves.

And the man on the platform, with stale cake,

wonders if he’ll get a ticket this time;

wonders if there will be a departure

from what he has accepted as the norm.

A hundred thousand line The Avenue

of Eternal Peace, while a minibus

travels through white blossoms on leafless trees.

Image- 2010: Austalian Cowboy talk)