Fleet ii
By Paul Holman.
fleet ii
By Paul Holman.
how many springs arise
within a hollow
landscape where some lord
of the high places
impregnated cattle
before descending
in human form
to reign
at the junction
of green parishes in
meadows now fringed
by houses which concealed
all trace of
chapel and
oak at
this site a friend not
a follower of Christ
maintained the gospel
to be Roman cant
preached a more
oblique system such
observances as the veneration
of antlers had
been effaced
to suit
the resurrection
of kings yet continued
in secluded neighbourhoods
between which
the children carried
no weatherbeaten
or
patched saint
but ranged in the character
of deer on account
of this visitation
the chatelaine of
the forest could
declare the souls of boar
and wolf to be
dangerous to a faith
that led Adam and Eve
to couple in disgust
for the entertainment
of
a minister
who cursed the irregular
and clandestine
publication of their history
by means of
a ceremony which
few observed in a garden
of mineral springs
next to that of
lonely drinking
then performed
works of
a holy character
rising from some parallel
stream to the
establishment attended
by conflict with
the state in loss
the primitive
body is supposed
to possess formidable
virtues the miraculous
countenance
hung in smoke its
likeness never faded
in decay but was
known
from a treatise
of no value to most who
belonged to the company
that followed
Oldcastle from prison
into the great oven
the milk of Black Mary
flowing with the waters
of the brook
under a wooden
foot-bridge and on
beneath the arches of
the Temple an inscription
named
obsolete
and barbarous queens
who suffered death
yet exist within a
deep chasm having
been deprived of all
prestige in maze and
amphitheatre one
sister rising to
intrench
the citie menaced
by famous squadrons
a sign drawn in
fire-works by the council
of beggars and gamesters
against every
manner of masters
the
curiously substantial
appearance of
a spy in the museum
of dust and archaic
refuse where
the accumulated traces
of a
former culture
allude to nothing more
than the corrupted
name of Jerusalem both
vine-yard and fish-pond
a
site favourable
to mysteries that
supersede the miracles
performed in an
open street with
the characteristic
gallantry of demons
they do not howl at the
gross comedy of death
but make sport
of
the consolers bearing
a testament of
the slain lamb before
its skinners and
crying out in
spite of
a passion for obedience
that made them
express regret at so
public
an illustration
of their unease
as they stood in the presence
of a corpse
under Blackfriars
Bridge sliding naked
upon
silt and filth
the inhabitants
of the Fleet renewed the
discreet but troubling
power which once
existed in that burnt and
break-neck friend
whose misery
was treated as
some cruel
device of angels
by the immortal wardens
of this stream
[Author photo by Paul Lambert, pictures of the lost River Fleet by Rich Cutler]
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Paul Holman has been engaged for some twenty years upon The Memory of the Drift, a shifting but ultimately circular work which is both a record of operations and a process in itself.
Four previously issued sections were gathered in paperback by Shearsman Books in 2007: much of the writing he made for the project in the 2000s was first published on the Great Works website, and is still archived there. His new book, Tara Morgana, is now available from Scarlet Imprint.
He is currently working on a modern emblem book, and a gallery project, in collaboration with the photographer Rich Cutler, on the lost River Fleet, of which this is the text.
First published in 3:AM Magazine: Sunday, January 29th, 2017.
