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• The Cosy Jumper

The Cosy Jumper – Poem ‘In Memories of Memories’

Below is a poem or short meditation by Scott Farlow, created in response to conversations during workshops at Heald Farm Court and Foundry Whalf on 13th December 2021.

The Cosy Jumper is a project exploring human feelings of connections and togetherness, through knitting, poetry, sound, and movement. Lou Chapelle will hold a series of workshops that will lead to the creation of a video which will be presented in the public realm in January 2022. The Cosy Jumpers is a commission by Heart of Glass, working with Taurus Housing, residents from Foundry Wharf, and U3A, and inspired by a previous project: You make me feel good. Funded by Arts Council England, Creative People and Places program.

Artistic director Lou Chapelle
Film-maker Tim Brunsden
Sound artist Laura Campbell
Poet Scott Farlow
Choreographer Stacey Atkinson

 

IN MEMORIES OF MEMORIES – a short meditation

 

Through the haze,

With birdsong calling,

And echoes reverberating

Across the dense flat mire,

The shadows swoop, flitter and disappear

Only to reappear, here and there, in a blink of my eye.

 

I sit quietly

With my thoughts, calm in the gentle breeze,

And admire the ever-changing evanescence

That brings to life and magnifies buried treasures

Of past joy and chaos

Of love and loss.

 

What is life when you are gone?

 

At sundown

The departing light

Gives rise to memories and reflections,

Illuminating obscured fragments that I keep alive

And bright

By their telling

To the moon at starlight.

 

The fading pattern on your faded gold-rimmed tea cup,

That sits still and alone on the sideboard,

Not chipped, not perfect, but waiting imperfectly and patiently

Watched over by sepia prints and an assortment of framed portraits of

Swept back hair and frozen smiles

And vanishing pastimes.

 

Your elusive scent sometimes fills the air

And catches me unawares,

It takes refuge in the folds of the curtains

And occasionally greets me with a gentle kiss from the depths of my pillow;

Still potent and bold.

 

I am becalmed now,

And in possession of my senses

As I recall the most precious of your possessions;

Your wry smile,

That keeps us both alive.

 

And the music

And the timbre of your voice

That echoes gently, calling

Ghostlike

Now, as delicate threads

Through the twilight trees.

Quiet whisperings of you.

 

Sometimes I am angry with you

For leaving me behind.

Sometimes I am maudlin, lost, paralysed, inert, inept,

Sometimes I am simply empty.

Sometimes not.

And, sometimes,

For only a moment or two,

I actually forget you.

 

Yes,

A memory,

Reborn in the now

And alive in my mind,

Will never die.

 

I hope that you are pleased to know this,

Though the presence of your touch is distant now,

It remains felt

And real

Where it needs to be felt,

As I try to hold on and let go.

 

And though this wasn’t always true

It is now.

And I am grateful for that.

For the rich golden fabric of your spirit

– sometimes coarse, sometimes silken –

Is wrapped around my heart,

Aglow,

And softly beating still,

And I smile.