readers with a liking for serendipity will note that the socialist earl de la warr was a sackville ... see the sackville monument earlier this week ...
Sunday, February 04, 2007
Saturday, February 03, 2007
Friday, February 02, 2007
Thursday, February 01, 2007
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Monday, January 29, 2007
Saturday, January 27, 2007
the sackville monument at withyham church
i speculated on a short lunch break in withyham church, about two miles off my route
as i arrived, i found a sign on the door saying the church is kept locked and giving a phone number ... however, i heard voices within and entered
two builders were just packing up and about to lock up but they allowed me a two minute trot around the interior
i was astonished but there wasn't time to do justice to what i'd seen and i must return
the sackville memorial was carved by caius cibber, it is probably his best work but is poorly documented, & only after hours of searching the internet, could i find this black & white picture postcard from the nineteen thirties
it is a pretty good photograph but i can and must do better ... so watch this space
Thursday, January 25, 2007
love in a cold climate
Yesterday morning, before four o’clock, I set out to walk to the bus stop at Putney Heath, about ten minutes away. As I arrived, the first snowflake appeared & in two minutes a steady whirl of tiny flakes enveloped the City. I turned my face up and was tickled by them. At South Kensington, some young Polish maintenance men had come up from the Underground to catch the bus home & seemed pleased to see some snow. When I got off the bus near Harrods, some young Africans were laughing in an unknown tongue, & around the corner in Sloane Street, a young English couple were already waiting at the next stop although no bus was due for twenty minutes.
There was no shelter. He was tall & slim and vaguely old-fashioned in his corduroy jacket, child’s scarf, & Brideshead haircut. Her short jacket and shorter skirt, gave her long body no protection against the cold & she looked desperately unhappy. Neither spoke. He paced up and down the curb whilst she squatted against a shop front, lit a cigarette and shivered. Oppressed by their misery, I wandered off a little way to shelter in a doorway. Then their conversation resumed. His first words were unclear, but her reply was shrill. “Well, you shouldn’t have called me a fucking slag ! What do you expect ?” His reply sounded like, “Oh, do you deny that you are, then ?”
Silence returned for a few moments until another, sweeter, voice approached from the direction of Sloane Square, accompanied by the steady clicking of very high heels striding upon leisurely long legs. The woman was slender & tall & black, and everything she wore was black. Her high-waisted ankle-length coat swung elegantly beneath a huge black umbrella, and as she passed us she was singing sweetly into a mobile telephone, her laughter-tinted voice as deep & melodic as her silhouette was dark.
Later, passing the tenements in Nine Elms, where grass and pathways were now unambiguously white, a young woman with a big anorak lay on the ground beneath a young man with a big rucksack on his back. She was writhing voluptuously, her arms relaxing behind her head, palms up, & her fingers pinching snowflakes whilst she yielded to his passionate kisses.
There was no shelter. He was tall & slim and vaguely old-fashioned in his corduroy jacket, child’s scarf, & Brideshead haircut. Her short jacket and shorter skirt, gave her long body no protection against the cold & she looked desperately unhappy. Neither spoke. He paced up and down the curb whilst she squatted against a shop front, lit a cigarette and shivered. Oppressed by their misery, I wandered off a little way to shelter in a doorway. Then their conversation resumed. His first words were unclear, but her reply was shrill. “Well, you shouldn’t have called me a fucking slag ! What do you expect ?” His reply sounded like, “Oh, do you deny that you are, then ?”
Silence returned for a few moments until another, sweeter, voice approached from the direction of Sloane Square, accompanied by the steady clicking of very high heels striding upon leisurely long legs. The woman was slender & tall & black, and everything she wore was black. Her high-waisted ankle-length coat swung elegantly beneath a huge black umbrella, and as she passed us she was singing sweetly into a mobile telephone, her laughter-tinted voice as deep & melodic as her silhouette was dark.
Later, passing the tenements in Nine Elms, where grass and pathways were now unambiguously white, a young woman with a big anorak lay on the ground beneath a young man with a big rucksack on his back. She was writhing voluptuously, her arms relaxing behind her head, palms up, & her fingers pinching snowflakes whilst she yielded to his passionate kisses.
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
a snowy day
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
a rainy evening in stepney, eating in l'oasis with two other stout parties
dominic & diana, two too high voltage characters in no need of an author
dominic is complying with my request to sit still whilst i photograph the retro soviet hip flask he's brought me from foreign parts
dominic is complying with my request to sit still whilst i photograph the retro soviet hip flask he's brought me from foreign parts
diana is politely holding dominic's camera for me to photograph the screen ... the tiny image is of himself starring as the christmas fairy in the commissary panto a couple of weeks ago in a far off country
Sunday, January 21, 2007
the bridge over the canal at stoke bruerne
i've always been intrigued by the way bricks are arranged beneath oblique arches
and here they have drained the lock, revealing the flat bed of the canal, lined with bricks that are coloured by a yellow clay sediment
and here they have drained the lock, revealing the flat bed of the canal, lined with bricks that are coloured by a yellow clay sediment
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