Image by Janina Holubecki
This
is a guest post from Char March, a local writer who gave a lot of
support to Leeds Survivors Poetry in its early days. Char has published a
lot of poetry and stories and had many plays on the radio, my favourite
being 'People Come Here To Cry',
the story of a woman (Sue Johnston) who visits a crisis centre. The
poems this play is based on were published in Char's 2011 collection 'The Thousand Natural Shocks'
I live in a dark damp crack in the earth. And yes, I have even started to look like a toad – all warty and wrinkly – because of the excessive rain we have had this ‘summer’.
The dark damp crack is called Hebden Bridge. Actually it is a stunning
steep wooded valley with gorgeous walks off in all directions, and a
veritable plethora of excellent teashops to gorge yourself in when you
get back glowing from a brisk walk on the moors. Plus there’s dozens of
splendid knick-knack shoppies to get all your gift wants for the coming
festive season. We keep winning the Best Independent Shops in Britain
prize, so this town really is as special as you often hear. And we’ve
been badly hit by three nasty floods this summer, so there’s yet another
reason to come and spend your tourist ££££s here!
However, the valley is steep-sided (all the glaciers stopped at about Keighley,
so our valleys were cut with the massive run-off from roaring torrents
as the glaciers melted). So, on overcast days, it can feel like you’re
in a tightly-lidded box.
Since I got up and walked – Lazarus-style – from my hospital bed and almost
certain death (all I remember from my delirium is the consultant trying
to shake me awake to tell me “We don’t think you’re going to make it
through the night, so who’s your next of kin?”) I have been
exceptionally keen on getting out walking again. I grew up in Scotland,
so the Great Outdoors, and in particular getting out onto the
mountains, was formative to me. So, I took it steady, but I’ve got
there. It took a few months of being bedridden and being looked after
hand and foot by my marvelous friends, then a bit in a wheelchair
(bloody thing!), then on two sticks, then one, and very gradually
increasing the distance I could walk without collapsing, and lo, the
hills are once more (12 years later) if not my oyster, then certainly a
whitebait starter.
So, getting out of this particular damp dark crack in the earth (no matter
how cosy and trendy and full of Reiki healers and Shamanic drummers it
is) has become a daily necessity. I go out whatever the weather – it’s
ALWAYS better outside than it looks like it is from the inside! And
now, although I can’t do the mileage I used to do before the consultant
shook me, I can certainly tackle all the steep hills around here no
problem.
It was a real privilege for me to be Writer-in-Residence for the Pennine
Watershed Project last year. My ‘office’ was the moors from Ilkley
right down to Saddleworth, and I could get onto my ‘office’ just three
fields up from my house. Throughout my year, I worked with masses of
different groups who had either never been out on the moor, or hadn’t
been there for decades, and I took them up there kite-flying, eating
hawthorn leaves, cloud-spotting, building sculptures, writing poems,
drawing, gathering smells and sounds and textures, and generally filling
ourselves with wild moor air and fun.
So, get up there and try it. It doesn’t matter if it’s foul or fair (and
let’s face it, this is Yorkshire, so it’s more likely to be foul!), just
get some sort of waterproof on (a bin bag will do!) and get out there,
even if it’s only for half an hour. The moors are elemental, and, I
reckon, good for your spirit.
Here’s a poem from my latest collection: ‘The Cloud Appreciation Society’s
Day Out’. It’s all about my year as Writer-in-Residence of the Pennine
Watershed, and you can get a copy direct from me through my website: www.charmarch.co.uk
or from my publisher Indigo Dreams, or, if you really want to support a
multi-national that doesn’t pay any tax, through Amazon.
Nesh by Char March
Last week they said it was cold in London.
A thin bit of mizzle brought them out
in a rash of umbrellas, much buttoning.
Up here, cold
is the landscape;
rain the absolute norm.
And no pissing about
with mizzle, drizzle, mist –
we shove through solid water,
that holds us lurching
at gravestone angles,
across Heptonstall’s cobbles;
through bucketclanking farmyards;
out onto the moor.
Our air is luscious,
alive, viscous,
slapping us awake
like a wet cod
across our chops.
