Saw all Bill.
I think 'not offering crossability' is what it's all about, & intriguing, indeed.
I imagine you can extend this sequence should you wish to...
Doug
On Jan 8, 2014, at 6:03 AM, Patrick McManus <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Bill old lad I saw Kasper's email only when you replied to it - P fretting
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Poetryetc: poetry and poetics [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
> Behalf Of Bill Wootton
> Sent: 08 January 2014 12:29
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Bridges
>
> Pat, can you not see Kasper's email below? You responded to Kasper's comment
> it looks like to me. I may be stuck but your frets are wobbling it seems.
>
> Funny you mention 'orchardist'. I remember as teacher this came up when
> students came to read the word, probably in Chekhov's 'The Cherry Orchard'.
> 16/17 year olds couldn't pronounce it. Had never seen the word in print.
> They would say it like 'orchid' with no sense that that were
> mis-pronouncing. I suppose all fruit they ever had came from a supermarket.
> My great uncle Jim lived on an apple orchard, in a stilted wooden two-room
> shack with a Coolgardie safe to keep his milk cool, at Harcourt near
> Bendigo, a hundred miles or so north west of Melbourne.
>
> Bill
>
>> On 8 Jan 2014, at 8:06 pm, Patrick McManus <[log in to unmask]>
> wrote:
>>
>> Kasper's email never arrived here!!
>> Bill hope you are not stuck - orchardist sounds a nice job Cheers P
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Poetryetc: poetry and poetics [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
>> On Behalf Of Bill Wootton
>> Sent: 08 January 2014 07:21
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: Re: Bridges
>>
>> Many thanks, Kasper. Final couplet (and indeed final section) is still
>> a work in progress, appended yesterday when I realised the two
>> particular bridges I was celebrating were not ones to put spring in
>> step, they not offering crossability.
>>
>> Bill
>>
>>> On 8 Jan 2014, at 11:36 am, Kasper Salonen <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>>
>>> This is magnificent, the majesty of bridges at their best resonates
>>> strongly in these four sections. The hint of myth in the Benezet
>>> story rounds out the mysticism. Not only that, but the lyrical and
>>> yet perfectly disinterested style makes up for the splash of water
>>> that is the final line. I love it.
>>>
>>> KS
>>>
>>> ---
>>> Kasper Salonen, toiminnanjohtaja
>>> Helsinki Poetry Connection
>>> http://hkipoetryconnection.blogspot.com/
>>> +358505554947
>>>
>>>
>>>> On 7 January 2014 23:05, Bill Wootton <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Bridges
>>>>
>>>> i
>>>>
>>>> Walk a bridge to connect, to pass
>>>> over a gulf. To be on a bridge is to be
>>>>
>>>> neither in one place or another. Rarely destination, bridges embody
>>>> journey.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> ii
>>>>
>>>> Avignon's stone bridge stops mid-Rhone tantalising with just four
>>>> extant arches
>>>>
>>>> of its once majestic twenty two.
>>>> Even computer imaging and years
>>>>
>>>> of research can't line up remnant piles.
>>>> Must have been zig-zags
>>>>
>>>> for added strength, perhaps, in floods.
>>>> Benezet the shepherd it's said,
>>>>
>>>> 850 years ago, with Divine push, hefted and hurled a huge rock in
>>>> the river
>>>>
>>>> which became stone one of Pont
>>>> d'Avignon. Benezet's journey ended
>>>>
>>>> with his interment within the bridge before its completion.
>>>> Disinterment
>>>>
>>>> nearly 500 years later,
>>>> scored him patron sainthood.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> iii
>>>>
>>>> Just north of Melbourne, two parallel bridges span Arthurs Creek.
>>>> Only one takes traffic.
>>>>
>>>> Burke's duplicated concrete and bitumen bridge towards Nutfield,
>>>> flat and functional
>>>>
>>>> but adjacent, original Burke's Bridge, a timbertrestle construction,
>>>> now spattered
>>>>
>>>> with leaves and gum bark peelings, blocked at either end with
>>>> boulders, remains
>>>>
>>>> the real enchanter. Patrick Burke, orchardist and nurseryman settled
>>>> on 20 acres in 1864.
>>>>
>>>> None of which explains why supporting posts either side of the creek
>>>> are not parallel.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> iv
>>>>
>>>> Alighting from a bridge makes you feel lighter.
>>>> Puts a little spring in your step or your tyres.
>>>>
>>>> You've left somewhere behind. Crossed.
>>>> You're somewhere else. What now?
>>>>
>>>> But it takes now uncrossable bridges to remind us how well stuck we
>>>> might be.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> bw
>>>> 8.1.14
>>
>
Douglas Barbour
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http://www.ualberta.ca/~dbarbour/
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