Wednesday, December 21, 2016

Winter Solstice, Shetland. A videopoem for the shortest day of the year.

Solstice, Shetland 2016

349 minutes
21940 seconds
Five and three quarter hours and five minutes
Or thereabouts
Depending on the clouds
The rest of today
Eighteen and quarter hours, less five minutes
Roughly
Is darkness
Cold, fast-moving
Turbulent darkness
Dangerous, restless
Tip you up and chuck you in the big bad sea
Darkness
Powercut darkness
Empty gas cylinder, running out of peat,
Damp driftwood darkness
Heart attack, generator-won’t-start darkness
No spark, old unleaded petrol darkness
Candles flickering
Batteries dying
Darkness
1075 minutes
64500 seconds
Comforting darkness
Snug, centrally heated darkness
Rayburning, coal and turf fuelled darkness
Tilley-lit and laughter-leavened
Kettle boiling, soup sputtering
Flame-toasted, secure and temporary
Darkness
And afterwards
After, the world begins to turn
Looping back towards the sun
Like a grateful downhill cyclist
Gathering speed
First Christmas flickers
Then Hogmanay
Then New Year,
Faster, faster, stronger, stronger
Second by second,
Minute by minute,
Hour by hour
Days lengthen
Until the numbers
Vanish into light
Approximately


Tom Morton 2016

1 comment:

gz said...

Yes. comment unnecessary.
All the best for 2017