CHOPPING

in memory of John Sharkey died chopping wood Sunday 9th February 2014

Well you’ve got a head start
On the rest of us strangers
Still at sea in the water-garden of this whirld.

First it was Wendy and John.
Then in the sixties’ acid shift
Wendy morphed into Myla.
And now you’ve morphed like Myla
Into memories…My first encounter
In your shared room near Hyde Park
You talking about having been spiked with acid—
Your amazing inner adventure–
(Whilst I’m  trying to conceal raging paranoia)
Guided by Mekon leading you through the door
Into another Self beside your self. ‘The word
Is the word HOME’
You wrote in ‘LOVE CHANTS’ (74) and also:-
What?
Dead you say
Where?
But how
When?
Painless you say
how?
But where
What?
Like a dream you say
Which
But when
Where?
Like it never happened you say
What?
But why
When?

When John? Sunday the 9th of Feb
Two thousand and fourteen.
Where? Outside your door In Wales of course.
But why ? you say. Well like a dream your ticker stopped.
And now your life-time here
May seem it never happened!

Bright Myla shot first
Over the top
Leaving the whirld’s constant flak
You’ll be joining her and Jasper
Tony, Frank and Harry
Fraser Clark and John Michell:
Whilst we bizarre monks and nuns
Strangely flashing on and off
From inside the invisible travelling monastery
Of the Golden Plum Blossom
Fragrance Eternal
Gaze on into the perpetual perplexity.

Well, you knew, and traced the way
An intrepid traveler pilgrim could
Find a heart warming light and glowing word
Through walking towards the Welsh setting sun
Sinking magnificently into the welcoming Atlantic.

Yes, it seems your last book you sent me
Was, I guessed, a last wave
From your deep Welsh store
Of darkening light. And now
No more.

Neil Oram
Goshem. 11th Feb 2014

Art: Nick Victor