Warehouse Tapes
Soiled by oily traffic dirt everyday carry tour van repacked west coast terminus homogenised forecourt Grafton Place shortcut to sleep
Shelter canopy of sorts glisten of road sheen wisp of surface uphill the fumes regularise post box angled leans one collection per day
coffee & egg mayo on brown central reservation purple pipe south of the gap spotted by Rachel peels away like the northbound track
wherever it is, to wish into sight that which is made visible through its hiding.
drizzle ruffled pigeon like a fat full stop sentenced by rain that is felt only vaguely,
not as a committed statement of the weather but sponged into its own climate
& forecast as indecision, doubt & spray, & the pigeon toes sideways
as pigeons do,
by the boarded window. a plywood square
behind which no one stares, that same no one
that does not hold a recording device up to no ear
& now is not now & neither then
but drifting if
to a maybe when
that listens in
to all the sounds on this recording’s slow decay, this no recording
held up to no ear by no one, to play at being place again
behind a boarded window.
2 3 4 Advent calendar paper bags shelf pine blanket box a Christmas gift day after tree decoration tying knots on chocolate decorations
Can you start the peel? two days on squeeze the juice for the morning / glitter star purple loom band tilt of live tree toward the light
austere black & whites / relight the tree / blue poles 1952 / reduce the output to next to nothing / thinking about the work is a part of it
departing: wheeze & whir like rising snare & fade, the train
part-kettle part-cricket itch of pistons
is now where I am doubly apart departing
from a not there at the recording & not ever there
at the place of recording
Fresh coffee hostess self-serve first nine pause en-route /forthcoming season the call pre-dawn & twilight such regularity /set your watch
by leaving
a touch of Jack Frost to improve the flavour / over 'Four' robin song / pause to confirm decrease the volume pinpoint the toy piano
Let the vegetables get to know each other / go outside check the temperature place the parsnips on a frozen lawn think of the flavour
new field notes – clipped pause, parsnip frost & toy piano – catalogue
as if transcribing observation were listening
out or in another map & now overhearing overhearing
Winter thriller find some snow gathered in a corner of the car park the timer will brew the coffee and turn on the lights one lump or two?
drops Elevator scuff
to catch traffic of
a cross-hatching /// voice over voice
Down swoop the crows / you may need to retune / transition into winter / candlelight & heat / bread wrappers & coffee cups bear season signs
to partially ignore
and waiting for track 2 where Mello Mello
is the inspired hum of happening indifferent to its recording
Bare trees bones against the fog / travel north to get west third track of four / sweep points first valley fog lifts leaves carpet trace
chords
struck from room’s buzzing of particulars busying
& busy being in general & surrounding
'Liverpool your next and final stop' through rock & sandstone rain slashed window old footprint L2 slope of the Vernon floor cast of sodium
arpeggios sprite grim halls daubed from falling sirens, post punk egg café
sits at the space left by a piano where termites blend with city soil
clouding
Airport now 24 hours! the 86 runs toward South Parkway red amber green junction shine of surface like the August day we flew into Liverpool
where buildings exhale & the work of breath draws in
Cold streets empty paper bag deliveries done into three tier cereal centrally heated fight for cream washed empty bottles exchange for full
& you wrote into the warehouse
with ‘coffehouse ambience’ politely bustling
in sampled loop & there is a difference
between reproduction and replication
Water runs through tram tracks washes away the dust quiet doorways vacated open 24 hours 7 days a week 'take a little shelter with me'
reproduction can bare the seams of its transfer
& in the crackle of its document can wear
the decay – where the event breaks down –
in the ‘re’of its production
Cold creeps in despite layers standing watching marks made on ice anti-clockwise soup to thaw give a pound to the person in the doorway
replication multiples and replaces without trace
Traffic film removal frost slowly melts from shadowed flat roof
digital seems its own trace without showing seams for what & when its where erased
Slither where it sets wait for afternoon return / slight movement in the trees / headlights curve up the hill / sunrise 08.17 sunset 16.02
a glitch
incorporates the forum of its own denial
but the gift
of these recordings
is returning in track 10
to arrive again
where I began departing
Named tree replanted
panting locomotion
cold soil under fingernails
assurance, reassurance
afternoon sun quick to progress / from stacks shadows /
& the coarse laughter of seagulls
temperature falls further
Andrew Taylor is a Liverpool born, Nottingham based poet, editor and critic, who lectures in Creative Writing and English at Nottingham Trent University. His latest publications are The Liverpool Warehousing Co. Ltd. (zimZalla, 2016) and Air Vault (Oystercatcher Press, 2016). His second Shearsman collection, March, is due in September 2017. He recently collaborated with David Spittle on the NorthXNorthwest poetry tour curated by the Enemies Project and zimZalla. He is an editor at erbacce and edits the blogzine M58.
David Spittle completed a PhD on the poetry of John Ashbery and Surrealism at Newcastle University. Twice shortlisted for the Melita Hume Prize, David’s poetry has been published in Blackbox Manifold, Datableed, Shadowtrain,The Literateur, Zarf, and has been translated into French courtesy of Black Herald Press. In addition to poetry, he has written the libretti to three operas, performed at various venues around Cardiff and at Hammersmith Studios in London. In 2014 David was commissioned to write a song cycle for the Bergen National Opera, since performed internationally.
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