I take Max’s point, but as someone who was thrown into the water as a child & luckily held up by a friend of my father’s, since I didn’t know how to swim yet, that opening seemed rather violent, & I expected something other than what followed.., which was a bunch of neat descriptions…
Doug
> On Sep 21, 2016, at 7:11 AM, Bill Wootton <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> Thanks Max, Andrew, Pat. Yes, conditional opening, 'if' implied.
>
> Bill
>
> On Wednesday, 21 September 2016, Patrick McManus <
> [log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
>> what action!!!did anyone just drown/sink??cheers |P
>>
>>
>> On 20/09/2016 23:56, Bill Wootton wrote:
>>
>>> Throw everyone in the pool. They adopt
>>> a stroke almost immediately. Most
>>> freestyle it, face down, propelling from prone,
>>> alternate overarming, scissor kicking,
>>> Australian crawling, ice smooth repeaters:
>>> nose, nipple, knackers, knee; leaning sideways
>>> to draw unhurried breaths as they barrel
>>> ahead, barely creating a ripple.
>>> More casually, backstrokers reverse
>>> themselves, lean back from supine positions,
>>> thrusting faces, stomachs, genitals skywards,
>>> expecting no impediments, like so
>>> many half-animated, drifting logs.
>>> Double-arming butterfliers launch themselves
>>> from underwater, splay-grasping air then
>>> fresh wet territory, bound-leggedly
>>> threshing, projecting their exuberance.
>>> Now there's us lot. Tentative foragers,
>>> parting water in front of our noses,
>>> groping forward, too soon sweeping backwards
>>> to hips, legs frog-kicking, heads under dipped,
>>> emerging, for a snatched breath, bent-backed,
>>> and a fresh go at it. Maybe this time ...
>>>
>>> bw
>>>
>>
Douglas Barbour
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https://eclecticruckus.wordpress.com/
Recent publications: (With Sheila E Murphy) Continuations & Continuations 2 (UofAPress).
Recording Dates (Rubicon Press).
Four or five couplets trying to dance
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