Month: Jan 2022

Poem 72 – Collateral Damage

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To me this feels familiar and strange
Conflicting feelings jostle dissonant
It’s a relief to finally be back
Albeit we’re masked and social distant

Somehow, however, we’re now out of phase
Alternative dimensions are our homes
Like Schrödinger’s famous experiment
We’re both together and it seems alone

We watch each other from the corners of
Our eyes avoiding contact if we can
A living photograph doubly exposed
Collateral damage from Covid’s bans

Last night we went to see an episode of a sitcom being filmed (Andy Hamilton’s ‘Kate and Koji’). We watched a number pre-lockdown and it was lovely to be back, but noticeably the interaction in the queue and set was lacking, as if everyone else wasn’t really there.
(14.01.22)

© Ben Quant 2022

Poem 71 – The Verdict

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Today, I feel bereft, by lover scorned
A father’s ache as wayward child withdraws
I breathed my breath in you, my pulse, my thought
Do I deserve your snarling teeth and claws?

The pain of losing one too close is yet
Unknown to me but here I gain a taste
The labour throes expectantly endured
But cuckoo-like competing twins supplace

Adrift I grapple to regain control
An aimless ship that’s lost its sense of place
The pride anticipated at your birth
Usurped as hollowness and anger rage

Give me some space to rant and weep then pass
A paper bag to help me once more breathe
I know tomorrow I will find a way
But until then I simply need to grieve

Yesterday I received the written report on my viva for my DMin which took place just before Christmas. I already knew the outcome, after seven years of work the examiners sent me away to substantially rewrite it, which came as a complete shock to me, but receiving the formal letter and report once more unmoored me.
(13.01.22)

© Ben Quant 2022

Poem 70 – A Modern Conversion

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It started with a closure, then
Hot on its heels windows were shut,
Boarded up and scaffolding raised.
Before we knew it hammers rang
Fashion arcade transformed to the
Domain of clipboards and hi-viz.
Its fate seemed unclear, perhaps
Decay had snared our flagging shops
But no! At last all is revealed,
The veil is finally removed
Exposing what has secretly
Transpired beneath. Like hermit crabs
Into its former shell have crept
New occupants served and worshipped
By our national obsession
Consumerism’s gods installed
Our arcade transformed to match those
Found up and down the land, our own
Monotheistic religion

Our local shopping ‘centre’ has been revamped. I’m torn, guiltily excited to see new stores, including a bike shop, but a little disappointed that in so many ways it looks like so many centres today.

(12.01.22)

© Ben Quant 2022

Poem 69 – Ancient Roots

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I spat in a tube this morning
To find out who I am
And then that tube was posted
(Apologies postman!)
Of course there’s more to me
Than my genetic code
There’s everything that’s happened
On life’s long winding road
But I have always wondered
Where my tribe came from
Are my roots in Britain
Or do we have it wrong
Perhaps they are Germanic
Or Scandi, French or Switz
African or Asian
But whatever’s on my list
This fair land has shaped me
And others influenced
And through this cultural cocktail
My life has been enriched

I have always felt a ‘spiritual’ connection to the ancient past of our country, and am intrigued to know if my roots go back to the age of barrows and white horses, but whatever the result of my test, I won’t be disappointed as even through romantic eyes, I know this nation has never been racially pure but mixed and all the better for it.

(11.01.22)

© Ben Quant 2022

Poem 68 – The Classroom Drummer

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Remember the noise the ruler made when
You thrummed it on the side of the desk?
That drumming sound that slid upwards as you
Drew the springboard inwards crescendoing?
I swear I heard that as I walked amongst the trees.
I looked around but there was no classroom
Comedian, no scruffy school boy here.
Confused I turned again with searching eyes
But still no culprit was disclosed until
Skyward I lifted my attention, where
A flash of red revealed the avian punk
Headbanging yobbish rhythms on the branch.

Today, my afternoon walk was accompanied by the sound of drumming amongst the trees. I didn’t actually spot the culprit, but I knew who it was.
(10.01.22)

© Ben Quant 2022

Poem 67 – In Transition

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I find myself in that point in between
Caught in the tension, in transition from
One state to another. Belonging to
None.

Restless I tussle, looking for home, but
There is no peace to be found in this place
Nowhere to lay my head and rest. I’m in
Exile.

This no mans land has no alms to share
No favour to give. Is this how water
Feels, not ice nor vapour, but constantly
Flowing?

But rather than despair, perhaps this calls
For patient endurance, believing in
The possibility provided by
Now.

To arrive, you first must travel through this
Junction. You cannot arrive without the
Journey, and so, let’s travel onward in
Hope.

So much of life feels like this at the moment. As we wait for the pandemic to pass, we’re in a state of tension between lockdown and normal, neither one nor the other. Of course, this is not restricted to such large scale fluctuations, but is a state we pass through in a myriad of ways every day.
(09.01.22)

© Ben Quant 2022

Poem 66 – The Cardboard Prometheus

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The lid slides off with satisfying heft,
Revealed within an array of precious parts.
Opened, the board becomes the table’s heart,
The pulsing centre round which we congregate.
The rules its brain which regulates carefully,
Instructing every thoughtful turn we take.
The tokens, hormones, eliciting response,
Conducting celebration, dealing pain.
But on their own these parts remain mere props,
Empty, devoid of life, like clay awaiting,
Prometheus to spark them into life.
So what impulse provokes initiation?
It’s those who in anticipation play,
Whose mutual endeavour generates.

I’ve tried solo boardgames and computer games, but nothing beats playing with others. For me, at least, it is the social aspect that brings them to life and makes them a life giving activity.
(03.01.22)

© Ben Quant 2022

Poem 65 – Tsundoku

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The Japanese possess a word for when
You grow a stack of books to read one day
A day that constantly remains a day
Away from now. That word is tsundoku.
I guess there must become a point in time
When tsundoku flows into tsunami
A crashing pile that floods the room and pours
Ideas and plots across the polished floor.

This is a word that belongs in my house. I have many of them!
(02.01.22)

© Ben Quant 2022

Poem 64 – Aladdin’s New Year

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The chimes of Big Ben ring as midnight turns
A sorcerer ushering in the year
Calling new lamps for old as in the tale
But can the past be ever truly left
Behind or does it haunt our every step
A shadow shading, or whisper shaping
The present intersected by the past
Two conjoined twins inseparable from birth
And so give thanks for what has been, for that
Has made you who you are and who you’re yet to be

Over the last two New Years we’ve wished for better ones to come, but regardless of what they’ve been like, these years are now part of us.
(01.01.22)

© Ben Quant 2022