Capacious Void

Broken spoke on the front wheel meant an outing a piede this morning, dropping into the repair shop en route. A couple of days ago a soft fall on the overpass on Millers saw a middle-aged pair sail by on their bikes touching distance, without the merest enquiry. Yesterday on the other hand two people stopped offering assistance and suggestions for the spoke. The river was drawn in closer afoot, a direct, friendlier greeting. On the bike some days it was taken under the left arm and carried along up to the power station like a parcel. Pacing along with the flow downstream one was almost enticed to kick out the feet like in the Russian military march. The black plaster stallion on the upper storey of one of the show-off places on the Strand had hardly been sighted on the bike; in the saddle glances away from the water were rare. The horse stood close against the glass as if looking out onto a daunting crossing. After a short time living opposite such vistas occupants quickly lost interest. Around by Fergie corner old Paddy Bricks had placed a kind of terracotta warrior sentinel on one of his balconies. Or at least his wife placed. The pieces had been sold at Going Going Gone in Richmond a couple of decades ago when Paddy was building and Bini supervising works. Back then Bin would often accompany wives of clients on shopping expeditions for their interiors. You could bet B had needed to diplomatically defer to Madam’s enthusiasm for the sage/warrior. Along with the daily new case numbers, hospitalisations, ICUs, ventilators and deaths, the hours of sleep needed inscribing (usually in the two stints averaging four and three respectively). Just recently there was the countdown for rejects from Smokelong and Journal of Compressed Creative Arts, two notoriously trigger-happy outfits which could come in even 24hrs later. (Currently both were mulling excellent pieces, outstanding flash that in both cases had been honed through countless revisions following a good number of earlier declines. The usual process. Oh! for those stupendous glories of first drafts taken up more or less instantly and appearing in gleaming form beneath handsome banners. In at least two cases with Frederick Barthelme at the New World Writing desk, no more than 5-6 hours in total—from time of submission mind.) The void has taken its toll on output lately. There was resistance to sitting down and memorialising, in whatever form; if the impulse bubbled up from beneath somehow with some force, some urgency, that was another matter. Alone in the room; take-outs: one point five distance even with passersby. Telephone phobia more or less and emails and other messaging empty of content. An extreme example of this latter yesterday with Era. For our Whatsapp we could manage with the aid of G. Trans, but for live converse forget it. Era was not a candidate for phone sex either, no more than Neet, and the reliable Ni continued to cool her heels after some cross words 4-5 months ago. Therefore void entire & utter. In the salt mines Solzhenitsyn had heaps to write about; Genet too in the cells. This was another kind of animal. Add the suburban grid—and within the confines of five kilometre radius during this latest lockdown. In the newly gentrified quarter here neat front gardens almost throughout, empty verandas and balconies, dull conservative paint schemes. Some kind of sporty Audi it may have been in fire engine red in Willy positively hurt the eye footing past this morning. Missing Geylang Serai on the equator, where Kamala Harris was currently offering assurances for liberty and free passage over the seas to the Chinese overlords (who were forced to dance the tightrope with the powerhouse Mainland). Another mad notation of recent times was the record of the pushes that had been started again after the strained tendon. Forty-five now first off. Run breathless to the desk to record. Was it managed comfortably? Perhaps an intake of breath was needed for the last 2-3. Record. Then the 30, how did that go? OK? Not strained too badly? Last 25. Often between the last two sets a run was needed downstairs to the bathroom. Duly noted.