Don’t delve into the creative well
Some of us were always meant to
Tripping round about the edge
Slowly, luxuriantly, stepping forward
Bathed in exploration of within
Finding pools are subterranean
Shouting discoveries through canyons
Echoes reach the light of day
Chilling listeners to gather
For occasional returning
Crushing, eager for some wisdom
Laughing, worshipping the diver
Seeking ways to live and move
Journeying involves return
As ancient waters, timeless, spill
Emptying lungs, and heart, and bile
Spewing dark, rich words is easy now
Somehow envying those who didn’t listen
Dancing in the meadows – laughing
“I can’t reach back to you!”
This fish is gutted, splitted, splayed
The facets now exposed
Will never go away
AS
Wishes of What You Are
I wish you
That which you are living
The road you are going
There is a pathway
It is in your heart
There are some situations
When you listen
Or are listened to
That you realise
After hearing both sides
We may never know the truth
My Friend
Us who feel vulnerable
Are noticed by others
And the heart which we have
Inspires them beyond Sense of the World
This blooming Bag for Life
Broke the first time I used it.
Where does that leave me???? Metaphor poem
This one is purely an exercise, for a poetry workshop where I am going to be demonstrating metaphor (some say I should cut it to not having the ’my’ type bits.) I think my performance will shock the group into understanding the concept.
Luscious Ripe Metaphor
This over-ripe piece of fruit
You hold in your palm
Is my heart
As your fingers enclose
The juice of my life
Squeezes out
Dripping down upon
The blackened banana
On the floor before you
You press down your foot
Feel the pulp of me gush
Step back
And spit at me
The small stone you fire
Is my cherry-red centre.
Haiku No
The title of this next one is No Title and that is appropriate because it intends to be a haiku and yet haiku do not have a title, hence the title of No Title, but it is not a haiku because haiku do not voice thoughts and considerations, they are not written by effort to write, they are a thing you see you report and the reader finds the meaning with no lecture. But then again I performed this at the poetry slam and people laughed, so, as hai means pun, perhaps it is a haiku after all.
No Title
Watching the writer
Busy in contemplation
No haiku here
The cats cradle girls
The cats cradle girls
Stood out from the others
Not downcast and sad
Not at all
Self-contained, self-absorbed
Lost – to us
Such things are witchcraft
If they continue
If they survive
Just think of the future
Of their descendants
What would
the people of this village be like
in the tomorrows!?
Ammonite
Don’t delve into the creative well
Some of us were always meant to
Tripping round about the edge
Slowly, luxuriantly, stepping forward
Bathed in exploration of within
Finding pools are subterranean
Shouting discoveries through canyons
Echoes reach the light of day
Chilling listeners to gather
For occasional returning
Crushing, eager for some wisdom
Laughing, worshipping the diver
Seeking ways to live and move
Journeying involves return
As ancient waters, timeless, spill
Emptying lungs, and heart, and bile
Spewing dark, rich words is easy now
Somehow envying those who didn’t listen
Dancing in the meadows – laughing
“I can’t reach back to you!”
This fish is gutted, splitted, splayed
The facets now exposed
Will never go away
AS
Wishes of What You Are
I wish you
That which you are living
The road you are going
There is a pathway
It is in your heart
You have the strength
We wind different ways at different paces,
and you walk a path to the woodland of your very own
We have been with you each step
You are going among in your way
Together
AS
Thoughtful
Being a limited being is beautiful
For we the bereaved
The damaged
The vulnerable
Are aware
AS
Times
I rise above
I lift
I like to be
I roll without knowing
I should know
I should
I am the news
The disaster
The fascinating
The moment
And the fall
I rise above
AS
Something Inside Me
I set the default
It doesn’t work
There is always a reset
But I go
I try
Old as I am
There is no wisdom
There is only
A new direction
I wait here
And wonder
What it is…
AS Forever in Lygra
Drummers and horn-blowers
Around the rocks
And in the sea
Ready
To welcome
As the ship comes in
To this rocky bay
In among them
In the waves
A woman
Such a woman
I will always remember
This moment
As we marched down
To proclaim
In all the tongues
Welcome
Welcome
Welcome
AS
Possibly
I think perhaps that this is
And how I am is how
Yes this is
I cannot walk across
To other than
Because of
As moments tell my lie
Belief is to fly
And I have been in there
Oh why doubt
Do I
Meeting systems of who
Of you
Being with another
Brings a lie
I do not doubt
I…
AS
A Collaboration.
This powerful poem by Norwegian writer Nina Instefjord retranslated into English by Adrian Spendlow (Me).
Videos and Paper
It seems so strange; all the ones who you love,
They never come back.
Some because they no longer are
And some connected to the ones who are no longer
I just watch them on video
Some you like so much your heart bursts
I cry, laugh a bit, then cry again
I remember
One should not feel sorry
Not, for yourself,
‘I hear my father’s voice’
Then I dry my tears
“If things don’t get better, then I don’t know,”
Once my father said
I am thinking the same
But everything comes to an end.
I hope it will be good
And I hope that he is somewhere he can see it
I used to write everything that came into my thoughts
Someone read my thoughts. They
Beat me as a punishment
This stopped my writing
My heart broke
I stopped writing my heart on paper
Life carries sorrow
So I am writing again
Because I have learned
Love and being true to oneself
To close ones
Might be something they don’t know
They can read
So they know
I hope they don’t cry
Like I did
I will write my heart on paper
Again and again until it is mended
Some things never come back
I accept and know
This is not a negative thing
This is how it is going to be
Sometimes you don’t decide over life
Like the weatherman
He also gets weather-sick.
I found the little pieces of paper with words
Now
I am at a crossroads
And I know a change is going to come
I hope it ends up with laughter
Like in the videos I just saw.
NI / AS
Touching Base At Last
When all is desperate
And there is crisis
One has a feeling of
Just getting through
When everything is fine
And all back to normal
The general perception is
Just getting through
AS Style Gurus
As a loud car passes I contemplate, when I was the age of those passengers old men would shout at me, “Get your hair cut!” Now young men shout the same thing at old men.
AS
Who Is That Man I Am
All the drives
The wishes
Shattered
Gone
I am
I think
I am
So I will be
But to be free
And decide
Who is that man
I used to be
Who
AS
Heart of Norway
Here and there the river
Finds a way to flow
To channel; wind
Despite deep ice
My heart embraces
Love and wonder
Even though
Part of me is dead
Now,
Within the mountain.
So close to the source,
It fills
This land it brings
Such very strong emotion
AS Broken
The rug is pulled from under
You crash to the floor
And are broken; broken
All you did was listen
It was gradual
Yet now sudden
You once were
Capable of anything
Anything
Hear it said again,
Anything
Anything
You cannot now
Pick yourself up
To climb to your knees
Inside, deep inside
A quiet voice
Is spoken
Love yourself
Hear only your heart
Breathe
Believe
You hardly hear
This tiny part
For you…
Are broken
AS
Top of the World
We occasionally feel
On top of the world
But this earth revolves fast
You have to set quite a pace
Just to keep still
AS
and my most inspirational and most veiwed poem blogged so far
It is early days to be reblogging this, but I have my next title for a Viking Comics Inc production: The Horned God and the Wild Hunt.
It is just in the ideas stage at the moment so is very early days, but I guess this is an advanced call for expressions of interest from all you talented friends out there.
A great big thank you to all involved in this huge project. In the end I think there were 17 contributors.
Please share and let us see this project grow.
I was originally inspired to create this by taking part in a Jorvik Viking Festival project at Strensall Explore and The Robert Wilkinson Primary Academy.
Together we will see more come from this project.
I plan to create a canvas version for a woodland walk so it will inspire further comic creation.
At present all artists generously donated their work, for which I am extremely grateful, and I hope we will create revenue by a printed version and further projects in the future.
All artists are available for commissions, and can be contact through me.
24 Hours in Gudvangen – plus Dangerous Moose Sighting
I had broken my journey twice.
Firstly in a drawer.
It was slightly bigger than that, there was room for my suitcase next to the bed.
I enjoyed my stay in the airport hotel though and while there I received an invitation to sleep in a room with big cats. They were not quite as big as I feared they would be, but when they tried to force the door open, (to get away from me!), it sounded like a very large person shoulder charging it.
They were Maine Coon cats…
This is a full grown example off the net
Beautiful beautiful creatures.
Here is the Queen. Mum to be…
She had a very lumpy stomach. The kittens were due in a week, there was something about the way she mewed when her tummy was stroked that made me think it would be sooner.
My prediction was right, they were here within twenty four hours.
Dad isn’t as big as the example above just yet. He is more like this…
Or this might be more like it…
He is not the brightest of buttons in the jar bless him but he is a metre long though and quite beautiful.
In came the message, ‘Could I look out for Norwegian art?’ The plan being that my artist friend was looking for inspiration and a new direction.
The art was there all around me.
Just add tea lights
My photo does not do it justice, a brilliant figure of Odin by Nina I.
Figures, paintings, then chest after chest after Teina (probably spelt wrong, but a wooden Norwegian lunchbox) full of amazing trinkets and keepsakes; Viking or from long ago in the family.
i particularly liked this urn…
It it was made all in one piece and yet the rings are not attached; ingenious.
A sculptor I admired was Leif Gjerme. Then when I left Bergen and headed to Fjordtell, Gudvangen I discovered that it was this artist who was on the team who designed the marble…
The railings…
And the chairs…
But more on Gudvangen later, back to the cats, or rather, their owner.
I heard of a love of the sea. How as a child she used to disappear off to her special place; a sheltered crevice in the rock that looked down on the sea below. She would often sit there for hours and no one knew where she was.
When I got here I heard that the family home, or rather, a friends holiday home she visited, had become available and she had phoned me to say she was packing up the cats and moving there.
The magical crevice is just along the island.
Another dream come true that I have witnessed. Tru deg meg nä.
So I very much look forward to getting a bus to the ferry and visiting that Island.
The family home has stories aplenty, I can only give you a taster here.
On a farm by the ocean it may be nearer to here by sea than by bus. Quite a journey though, and it was quite a journey to Bergen when grandfather needed an engagement ring.
This is where I heard that when we get out Viking ship at Gudvangen it will need a modern engine (that or all the tourists will have to row) as sailing the fjords is a dangerous business.
The journey to Bergen was uneventful, and most of the sail back was too. The little fishing skip sailed perfectly, until it got within the walls. With those steep sides beware the south easterlies. The winds come on you strangely and suddenly. He lost her.
He very nearly lost himself. He only just made it to the shore. His family had almost given up on him, it took days in sodden clothing to walk the rugged coastline.
But, but, but, did he still have the engagement ring!
It all ended happily ever after.
It ended happilly for a relative of hers even though they had spent two years in a prison of war camp.
A radio was found and he took the blame. When he returned after two years hard labour he wrote an article. It started, ‘We hear much in the way of sad reports of the war. Let me report something happy. I made many friends. We endured terrible hardships but we stuck together through it all.’
Another prisoner was a Russian in a different prison camp. When he escaped he was kept hidden in the farm for three months. When there were rumours his whereabouts might be reported he decided to try for home. They sailed him as far north as they dare then they left him to it.
One of the family was wanted too. When the occupying forces came for him he was gone. He was in England but his fishing boat was adrift and his family were mourning his drowning.
And so to Gudvangen in Aurland. The area receives a million visitors a year; you wouldn’t think so now at minus ten with the fjord frozen.
“I’m home!”
That doesn’t stop the ships. I talked to Sigrun, captain of one of the ships. There are still regular runs and tourists coming through.
Those million or more come through here, but most are here in the warmer weather. It was minus eleven when I got off the bus, it wasn’t so bad. It feels colder in Britain when it is about zero, because it is wet and windy. Here all the moisture is frozen out of the air.
When Georg opened the door I called out, “I’m home!” I am with my cheiftain.
Georg Hansen cheiftain of Njardar Vikinglag
The presents for Angela were unpacked; Pledge and Pantene Pro. When you are living away from your home country there are things you miss.
For the Polish guys near me in York it is pickled mushrooms. It is polish with a small p here. I suggested that each of us who visit have a small drawer, not like the one I slept in at Gatwick, but to leave clothes behind in.
Don over in Osterøy supplies such drawers, so his visitors have a lighter case next time they visit. Then they have more room for pork pies!
If you were a Viking in the old land of Northumbria it would be reindeer meat you would be wishing for.
Here in Aurland there were many. Enough to make it a rich area; a rich area with a king. Until he chose the wrong side in a civil war and was strung up.
Long ago this land was ruled by one woman, and her son would go to war for her.
I am reminded of Bjorgvin Marknad where I do storywalks.
Photograph by Tove Gulbrandsen
The museum there have placed an information display near the site of the boathouse. This was a place of warriors , long before Lindesfarne.
We are talking armies not raiding parties and we know this to be so because of the vast industry which has been uncovered.
To supply armies you need whole areas of blacksmiths, raw materials storage and much much more.
Way back when, there were armies leaving from Gudvangen area. So somewhere in the area is evidence of all this; barracks, furnaces, food stores. Somewhere.
This is my cheiftains sword; not a common type it was made for him so me years ago.
One discovery I know of is just up the road. When a houses as being rebuilt a body was found. A cheiftain. He, had the same type of sword.
Sigrun the sea captain talked of the Vikings in Britain and how I may be a descendant. I have never dared find out about my ancestry in case I am not Hiberno-Norse. What if I were Norman for instance! Sigrun said that would make me Viking too.
I will just take a break from writing to have a snack – mmmm I think I will have Lobnobs…
Lobnobs
Back to history.
Ragnar left followers behind him and so did Ganger Hrolfr, so when Guillaume Le Batard conquered England he brought their descendants (The Normans) with him.
Harold Hardrider wrote to Guillaume (William) offering 60,000 ships. It has been seen as a boast. I hear though that it was warmer here then; Scandinavia was more fertile, there was a higher population. When you add into the mix the warrior fjords we knew of with their industrial complexes perhaps he could muster such a fleet.
Sigrun tells me that when a Norwegian visited Sicily when it was in the hands of the Normans they proclaimed him king.
They still had a Scandinavian identity, (or Viking even), they felt they belonged to here.
it is a bit liked the pork pies pies or the Pantene Pro.
There are more Norwegians in America than there are in Norway.
I am told that if everyone in America who felt themselves to be of Irish descent were to return to the homeland at the same time Ireland would sink.
Me? I am Hiberno-Norse settled in Jorvik in my heart and let that be an end to it.
It was at this point I asked the whereabouts of Sigrun’s ship. “Out there” came the reply. I looked out of the large windows of Fjordtell at the length of the fjord, it was all ice.
I had chatted with the captain on a fateful day, he was watching out for the ship on a maiden voyage. The ship had been this way many many times, but he had been training a new captain and this was his first time alone.
Photograph by Angela Jones
‘Ping’ ‘Ping’ ‘Crack’ ‘Crack’ ‘Creak’ The ship was returning through the dark fjord and through the thick ice.
My cheiftain and I haven dream – a tour as Vikings: The Cheiftain and his Skald. A mix of the ways of the Vikings and their tales.
There is another dream. Where we hold our annual market (festival) in July in Gudvangen, there will be a Vikingby – a Viking town!
It is starting to happen already.
For this we will need a ship.
There are teams out there who can build them.
Authentic techniques and materials.
So it is possible.
What type of ship? A fleet? Yes, but, one must start somewhere.
Start small and build up
A merchant ship.
It will have to have an engine as an option. It is very dangerous to sail within the walls of the fjord, as we leant fron Nina’s grandfather earlier, and not all tourists will be willing to row!
Just ask the guy in the shop about those South easterlies, that come in down off the wall and take huge picnic tables back up the other side with them.
A merchant ship is where a town would start. I disagreed. A fishing boat is smaller and brings a quicker result. The skills learnt in generations of fishing the fjords is what gave the Vikings the ability to go further once ship building techniques progressed.
“It is great to be a fisherman”
Which brings us to Holger. Anyone who goes to Viking markets will know him, yes yes yes yes yes.
He is renowned for his slave trading company and is very entertaining.
Slaves!
He told me of his dream, and I passed it along; to fish the Sognefjord and bring the catch ashore and entertain the crowds while preparing, wrapping and selling the fish.
We may even cook it on the spot and serve it too.
“I too have an inheritance,” I hear. An interesting thing to be left; a huge pile of fishing nets.
“I have a boat too” ‘Can Holger use it?’ “Most definitely.”
Holger’s dream is about to come true. This July at Gudvagen Market.
“Not only that,I will go with him the first time and show him my secret fishing spot.”
“I told myself I would never tell anyone of my secret places, but, I will tell Holger.”
“It will be most interesting to see.”
The Loose Moose Alert…
Oh my god there’s a moose!
Look at it go!
It’s on the roof!
It’s on the bloody roof!
Look. Look. It is. It’s on the roof for gods sakes.
A great big thank you to all involved in this huge project. In the end I think there were 17 contributors.
Please share and let us see this project grow.
I was originally inspired to create this by taking part in a Jorvik Viking Festival project at Strensall Explore and The Robert Wilkinson Primary Academy.
Together we will see more come from this project.
I plan to create a canvas version for a woodland walk so it will inspire further comic creation.
At present all artists generously donated their work, for which I am extremely grateful, and I hope we will create revenue by a printed version and further projects in the future.
All artists are available for commissions, and can be contact through me.
Otternes Farm, Flåm Valley, Sognefjord, Aurland, Norway
When I sit here, I have sat here before. I am hobbit-like and living. In my sense of belonging, I know: I know this place.
Families are thin, thin on the ground, of the mountain. Long line of families in the mountains, dug in, right into its rock and earth and grass. There are long deep roots which hold us in place. Some say if you chop too many the whole mountainside will slide with us into the brakk below.
Yes here I belong, and feel I always have and if it is so and I have visited before it would have been in ancestral time a momentous occasion.
I still feel, when I stand there now, the haunting presence of one unallowed to love, ghostly appearance in the corner of story. Even with a broken heart one can still…
