Monday 26 May 2014

Monsoon - audio

I wrote this poem a while ago, and thought I'd record it with some background music (Hammock - Birds Flying in Sequence).







Monsoon

Scrottle necked and thick whiskered he lent me an ear,
his salmon lobes sweating with hair and gristle.
It wasn’t clear if he was listening, his raspy breathing 
shaking the windows in their casements.  My secrets

were to remain buried deep in his auricular channels,
lodged in silt, creaky vessels on estuarine shelves.
At times, his great head lolled on his shoulders,
and his rheumy eyes rested a little too long on mine,

and I feared my mumbled words may sprow out,
thickened and darkened with their immersion.
But his eyes would soon move on to the next drink,
his belly rising up and down like the tide.

I watched him daily at the bar, his skin thickened,
reddened and glowering with the heat of the day.
The sun had ploughed deep crevices into his neck, 
through which his briny sweat ran, tempering the edges

of his work shirts.  More animal than man, 
he growled and grimaced before feeding, 
bending over to bite at his meat and spoon in
careless mouthfuls.  After watching him daily

during a wet monsoon season,
I finally left town on a long distance bus,
departing with little ceremony, the heat of the day
making us sluggish and ill tempered.

He promised not to tell the thing that I should 
never have shared, though it was probably lost
anyway, my words neither tethered nor treasured,
declarations of love lost in the water, in deep flooded creeks.  

3 comments:

Cynthia said...

Oh, this is so lovely and wonderful to hear read aloud.

Jade said...

Wow! I think I remember this poem when you first wrote it. It really comes alive with the music, such a fitting choice. I am a fan of Hammock, this is one of my favorite pieces of theirs and it complements your poem so perfectly along with your excellent narration.

Mark Sargeant said...

Thank you Cynthia, glad you enjoyed it. I did enjoy recording the audio and putting some background music in. It took a while to figure out how!

Jade - thanks for your feedback. I only recently discovered Hammock, along with Mono (who are quite similar). I'm glad you felt it went well with my narration. Hopefully this will be the first in a few spoken pieces, just need to write some new stuff ;)