adrift in the sea of memories 


while i teach a flood of memories comes to me, half torn to shreds, half destroyed by time and distance and yet poignant and sharp, Probably the cumulative effect of not enough sleep for days on end. The relentless tide of memory brings a surf of things long forgotten, half decaying already and breaking up as they surface and crash against the waking world.

...oh, what was his name, and we were playing neil young's 'down by the river' on two guitars, alternating primitive solos on the one pentatonic scale we knew. Or I'm sitting in the setting sun at a park overlooking Avenida Bolivar with that girl who I had gone to meet after she'd finished work...... She wasn't any more interested in me than I was in her, so, why did we kiss? why were we playing romance sitting on a park bench in the setting sun?

But I don't get the story back, only a vignette with a fragment of emotion attached, like some old fragrance freed upon opening an old jar containing it and a few old photographs.

...I know it is not a dream, I know what a dream is but can remember little about myself and nothing about how i got there. There are other shadows that I can make out in the distance and beyond the bends in the red passage.... There is a current quietly taking me away little by little.

...Heidi screamt, I had water in my eyes now so could only look down and see the wooden toy-like rail sleepers, the water coming up in bursts, the small metal wheels, the green seats that looked bright in the distance but which this close look chipped and shabby.... I don't do either, I am there and yet I am not, as always, detached as well as immersed.

Out of the red darkness comes the train, sun beams breaking through the foliage and dancing on the carriage seats, the light and colour outside also dancing.

...As I haven't seen in waking life the Grey Dawn Beach either, the heavy clouds dragging themselves across the horizon, the grey colour sand under the leaden skies, a hut in the distance and me standing there on my own, shaking out of cold or fear or something else I cannot fathom from here, from my classroom at Watford Boys Grammar School where I spend my tuesdays waiting for the next pupil, not awaiting the shot that may finish me to appear from some distant corner which i cannot see. 

while i teach a flood of memories comes to me, half torn to shreds, half destroyed by time and distance and yet poignant and sharp, Probably the cumulative effect of not enough sleep for days on end. The relentless tide of memory brings a surf of things long forgotten, half decaying already and breaking up as they surface and crash against the waking world.

I'm sitting on top of the long stairs up in the barrio with.. oh, what was his name, and we were playing neil young's 'down by the river' on two guitars, alternating primitive solos on the one pentatonic scale we knew. Or I'm sitting in the setting sun at a park overlooking Avenida Bolivar with that girl who I had gone to meet after she'd finished work... now, what was her name? We kissed but there was nothing there. She wasn't any more interested in me than I was in her, so, why did we kiss? why were we playing romance sitting on a park bench in the setting sun?

But I can't recall, I don't get the story back, only a vignette with a fragment of emotion attached, like some old fragrance freed upon opening an old jar containing it and a few old photographs.

I float in a red darknness. I do not where I am, do not know what it is. I know it is not a dream, I know what a dream is but can remember little about myself and nothing about how i got there. There are other shadows that I can make out in the distance and beyond the bends in the red passage. I feel I must avoid them. There is a current quietly taking me away little by little.

Splash! Heidi screamt, I had water in my eyes now so could only look down and see the wooden toy-like rail sleepers, the water coming up in bursts, the small metal wheels, the green seats that looked bright in the distance but which this close look chipped and shabby. People giggle and scream. I don't do either, I am there and yet I am not, as always, detached as well as immersed.

Out of the red darkness comes the train, sun beams breaking through the foliage and dancing on the carriage seats, the light and colour outside also dancing. We are steadily climbing. I do not know where I am. I must be six or seven. But this cannot be: there are no trains in Venezuela. This cannot be a experience of the waking world. I haven't seen it in a movie either.

As I haven't seen in waking life the Grey Dawn Beach either, the heavy clouds dragging themselves across the horizon, the grey colour sand under the leaden skies, a hut in the distance and me standing there on my own, shaking out of cold or fear or something else I cannot fathom from here, from my classroom at Watford Boys Grammar School where I spend my tuesdays waiting for the next pupil, not awaiting the shot that may finish me to appear from some distant corner which i cannot see.  

Posted: Wed - March 10, 2004 at 08:00 PM          

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