What’s the address? an Advent poem

Introduction:
This poem was written as I looked forward to a continued recovery from two years of serious inflammation of the brain.

The illness has destroyed many memories. Images from the past have helped restore a sense of self and well-being.

1.

No stranger – but I’ll stop there.

The rest you know as better left unsaid:

another best avoided rhyme.

Obliquely, strangely, through projection;

hermetic is a dialogue as well,

speech to an audience always there;

inside, outside, every cell.

2.

A steady tumble through a door

some call Advent. See those goods, they’re more

than our possessions, or an urge to stick a

label to a thing, acknowledge love; that shared hope

spreads. And canisters prove useful by not bursting,

stick around, and old, neglected stuff – like turkeys –

reappear.

3.

Busy people in a time of plague

turn to home improvements:

plan, then build, a garden fence,

rooms in their roofs. I’m cleaning and

amazed at how much dust

accumulates, and long before I’m done

our spiders have restored their webs,

co-operate in trapping moths that

eat your sweaters. More than time to

celebrate my second-rate intentions.

All thanks to costly pharmacology.

4.

That sudden movement was it

on – or in – the eye? A self-protecting insect

simply quits its prey. There’s no way of

knowing if no evidence is found: must’ve been a

rearrangement – liquids; pain referred;

a side-effect of brain electric switching.

Adam Clarke-Williams
photos Jane Dunster