Waiting

In response to

Stalker by Vahni Capildeo

For K.M. Grant

He waits. Without knowing me,

he waits. The tips of branches,

edible and winey, bring

spring by suggestion to him

who in autumn dawn, eager,

with wet knees, disregards me,

being drawn by me. He waits

and in me he waits. I branch,

the form is branching, it bounds

like sight from dark to bright, back

again. The form is from me:

it is him, poem, stag, first sight

and most known. In him I wait:

(when he falls) needs must (hot heap),

nothing left over (treelike

no longer) nor forlorn: we’re

totalled.

Waiting room. Waiting on tables. Waiting for everything to change. Is waiting better than arriving? I wait therefore I am? Is waiting the same as being? Do we just call it something else, under the illusion of free will? Ha ha! I always take a book in my bag, in case I have to wait. Currently I am reading, re-reading that is, Susan Sontag’s ‘On Photography’, her series of essays originally published in the New Yorker, on the nature of photography, its power and meaning. Written in the 1970s, her meditation on this most elusive of visual arts feels as relevant to today’s snap happy world as it was when I first read it as a student in the 1980s. Sontag talks of the loaded camera as a gun, of capturing images (subjects), or controlling the outcome, of ‘framing’ subjects, of stealing souls. Above all she talks of the photograph’s ability or should I say bid to stop time or at least to halt momentarily the inevitable trundle. This was our family, that was our happiness, these are the meals we prepared, those the clothes we wore. The form of the photograph is important to me, just as important as the form of a poem. Its holding capacity, its frame, the container it provides. When you are developing 35mm film you must wait for the image to emerge. The birth of that image on the white paper, its slowly assembling form - flawed and mysterious - is a process over which I have no control. That is good for me.

Waiting. Waiting for words to come, for images to form, for a voice to appear. Another voice, or this voice to gain confidence, to step beyond the role of recording these thoughts, and into a space of creating, of creation. To give form, birth to. To watch. To take inside me or go inside it/her. To become intimate with, to know. And to wait, as she grows, evolves, matures, flourishes, and dies, lets go, passes on. And I left here, waiting, for what will arise from that passing, what is stirring in the ashes, eager to ascend. Ascend. Ascension. A grand word. “The” Ascension. And is there only one, one final magnificent/grand ascension, or are there not many; many acts of ascension all day every day everywhere. People picking themselves up from the rubble, the wreckage, of lives that feel or seem totalled. Discovering the whole is much bigger than we can ever comprehend. The endlessness, the immensity. The cycle of life and death, recycling, rebirth. Creating and recreating again and again. Persistence, patience, watching, waiting, getting inside, into the very belly where the warm expiring breath surrounds, encompasses – here I am brought up short, words have gone, the flow expired in me. One expiration – you and I – we cool together, our essence steaming above us in the autumn air as we lie together entwined, a heaving heap of hotness, then warmth, then cooling. And now cold we lie as the earth settles under us and the air crystallizes above us, and we wait. We wait for the hungers that will come to feed upon us, take us into them, shelter us in their hot bellies, bellies ascending and falling over and over with the stream of breath, hot and cooling now, heaving and steaming breath. Bodies united in different ways, in life, in death, in flesh, and in earth, becoming one, becoming new, becoming something beyond our limitless imagination and the knowledge of now. Here now in the present we are and we are becoming. Always the relationship of known and unknown. Do we stalk our future or does it stalk us, waiting, watching for the right moment to enter us, to take form, to become known, to become one; to take our old life and make us anew. Is there a suffering in this, a letting go of the old; or perhaps a sweet surrender, knowing it is time, or down on wet knees eagerly, waiting.

Still. Constantly. Forever waiting for things to make sense. My file, my presence, my reasons. Not everyday. Some days. Most days my heart is at peace and I accept my place without understanding others'. I accept what I offer, what I take, what I have taken. I take from you. But you take more, much more than I have to offer and sometimes I grow afraid of this constant dipping from my well. Little hands splashing water, larger hands cupping water out, grabbing handfuls from my pond, my limited supply. Yet every time I feel empty I know I will fill up again. Nourished to nourish. Waiting for brightness. Waiting for the morning. New beginnings. Old endings. Old wounds. Waiting to heal. Waiting to be whole. "I will always be a son without a father," he said. "No matter what I do." Early trauma is unforgettable, we learn to deal with it but we can never mould ourselves into a different shape, a perfect shape. There is always going to be this protruding imperfection sticking out of what we thought could be a smooth surface. We sand it down, smooth it over, but it's no good. We are imperfect. Forever imperfect. But I could look at it differently. I could consider my imperfections as a positive. Something that gives me the extra edge to understand the world better, see it from a different angle. A different truth.

Waiting

Waiting

Waiting

Waiting to die.

Waiting to leave.

Take me with you.

Where did you go?

Why are you back?

Can you hear me?

I’ve reached the time of life when waiting time has become deeply meaningful. I wonder how long I’ve got before my waiting time expires? Realistically, I know that the final moment is not far off, but my impatient Western mind is irritated by the indefinite nature of the waiting that must be tolerated. Waiting for someone late for an appointment creates anxiety and self doubt. Waiting for a kettle to boil seems to take forever - but we haven’t got forever. I can’t imagine the feelings of parents waiting for their unborn child’s arrival into the world. Can it be equated with those anticipating the end of their time of waiting?