Tom Harding

In his own words:

Tom Harding is 26 and lives and works in London. When not selling over priced furniture he wanders the Euston Road in search of a better way.

All that’s worth knowing about him can be found at www.tomarianne.net. Ignore all other reports.


the briefcase

1 A notebook.
2 The Trial Of Socrates -Plato.
3 A cassette player.
4 Back to back tape of Dylans’ Knocked Out Loaded & Nic Jones’ Penguin Eggs
5 A Jews harp.
6 Moby-Dick or, The Whale - Herman Melville
7 A checked shirt.
8 A Compass
9 A Sailors Guide To Ports And Places - J.R Rubberneck
10 A picture of Marianne.

 

1. blow wind blow

our miniature tragedies
play against the shaking scene.
searching out the fixings
of our poorly constructed confines.
people pass in the wings
like leaves over our doorway.
words rattle from nothing
like paper bags blown off the tongue.

i'm jittery, traveling hallways at noon
wondering what will come from all this.
quiet days working, yearning for the islands between;
windy mornings brewing green tea,
nights lost in alcohol,
the occasional blessing of a woman.
how far am i from what's right?
how we long till we get comfortable with silence
and unburden our soul from it's labour of yearning?
how long till i find something to say?

blow wind blow.
shake through the city this morning,
busying to life with noise and uselessness.
run wild through it's proud structures,
thin doorways and petty confines.
round up on the head and heals of it's statues of state,
it's thin limbed figures waking in doorways.
blow through the city and us,
shaking, yearning, together in solitude.

2. scene

her tongue hinged
up and back
and with that,
detached me
from her life,
'don't forget your jacket.'
 
slung over
the bedstead
like a melancholy hide,
the meat and soul
lost from it.
i rounded it up
and climbed in,
she lingered awhile
then returned to
the mirror.

i left.
outside more women
thundered past;
red dresses,
hips and heels
swinging away
like sirens
up against the wind.
it was ten to noon,
i followed on behind.

3. late city midnight thought, one

the city under the
weight of solitude
brings up it's cast-
suffering no holy
contradiction a la
whitman
just a vastness lost
to thought
and production.
a mass
thriving on the
urge to propagate.

under burdens of debt,
statuary dissatisfaction
geographical,
sociological constraint-
people turn each other
in for the stories.

there is only the can can show
the baseless magazine scrawl
the tail feeding the snake-

the film makers
the television maker's
the advertisers, newspapers
financiers and
contractors
piling their accommodating libido
up against the western wall.

tonight, to do my bit
i add my mouth to the chorus.

4. at 3:34pm today

i followed a man
buying eggs
he bent over
and the girl didn't
look up
and never looked
up
whilst he bent
over, so slowly
. the
whiskey
ham
and eggs
passed
before he was
half way
in his descent
so long
and wretched
it was
as if dredging the
earth
up in a
impoverished
final ailing will
for
judgment.
he was heading
for a coin
and got stuck
there
as the items passed
and passed
until
eventually
i switched lanes.

5. aftermath of an awards show

all the real voices
are dead or brought
the talentless
have it now
everything
so utterly painful
to know it's
happening
as we wake
and tie our shoes
and change bulbs
find purpose
and function
in our diminutive roles
knowing their
slapping backs again
blind and damned
in their uselessness
gilding their lives
whilst elsewhere
men cut each other to pieces
and tremor in their prisons
and those who shrink
this knowledge best
accept awards.

6. imaginary mexico city blues

i have an image of
south america
as I do of many places
I’ve never been;
lost
strewn
and hot.
the city is like that today,
my hands are sweating
and my neck too.
black flies are buzzing.
i stand in a shaded alley
with
peeling movie posters,
waiting for the heat to die
down.
i consider
getting out of town for awhile.
at least
until it all blows over.

©  Drawing and all poems copyright Tom Harding 2006 and are reproduced with kind permission.

Please email me if you want to contact the author.