St. CUTHBERT'S

That midnight meditation was an impulsive endeavour
to engage with something infinitely out of reach.
I had expected impossibility, yet so avidly craved
that feasibility hinted at by Einstein's Theory
of Relativity. Also that night
Mars was in conjunction with Venus,
while opposing Saturn - a prospective time anomaly
according to my comprehension of both theories - the
proverbial red rag to an off-beat visionary like myself!
That conjunction filled me with excitement.
It was mainly the position of Venus
that fired my imagination.
For an amateur astrologer, it was
a true eureka moment - when absolutely anything was possible:
even Romeo and Juliet could have resurrected
to live happily ever after, well into old age.
Oh yes, that night the Astrological and Metaphysical systems
were in perfect harmony, forming a bridge
across the division of time and space.

Time tunnel:

Too much noise. Student voices reach deafening pitch
in a corridor of St. Cuthbert's College, Worksop.
Not now, but then:
1908, your final day there.
Dizziness. As if on a tilting deck of the Poseidon.
A silent Chaplin movie, blurred, jerky and out of sync.
Feeling sick. Now equalising. Still light though -
lighter than air, but feeling present. Then full, glorious clarity.

Suddenly -
                  fate must have decreed it -
                                                             suddenly you.

First glimpse close up, burned into the back
of my retinas - permanently etched into memory banks.
Less tall
than I'd imagined, but well-toned, athletic.
And those long, slender fingers
that would someday perform such miracles.
And your face, so hauntingly beautiful.
I see you there, clearer, more real
than in any of the subsequent years -
as if we both existed solely for that instant,
and time itself stood still:
the soft waves of your hair, that I so ached
to run my fingers through. That sensitive,
expressive mouth, and those soulful eyes,
deep-set and twinkling like stars
in an indigo sky - so vibrant and alive.
Yet I could sense a melancholy already in their depths. Perhaps
a premonition of tragedy in khaki
that only I had knowledge of then?
You completely knocked me out
with a vitality and optimism
that totally belied the horrors to come...


I remember very little
of the remainder of that night. Nothing
except an acute sense of separation
on returning to outer consciousness,
then my mesmerized observation
of your image that had followed me home.
And the discovery of the raised red welts
where you'd touched me
that branded my arm for the next week or so,
and my Soul, beneath them, forever.




I am taking a short break now, so will catch up with you all again in a week or so.

Until then...
have a fabulous weekend - and Happy Blogging!

xoxoxo