spoken word

The Water Tower

The water tower

perched high on the rise

floating world

of childhood holidays

muesli, orange juice

perfect vegemite toast in Penshurst

searching for

unfear

raw

remember

that girl was

always anxious in a way

now wonder if

my addict’s real

or just someone who

found self-harm easy

and crammed defeat

into flamboyance

a proud sham

now soiled

bored

with final flounces

doused in

sanitiser

nostrils flare

that witch wakes up

occurs to me

it’s moments of practicality

when it could be love

instead of flames

a soft patina

murrs pebble heart

like moss

or not

gosh am I lucky

to be so low

the one

who sees

how it goes

stupid mind that tracks and twists

yearning for

the years

of concrete towers

and hours

of unshed tears

 

Soundcloud recording: https://soundcloud.com/clairevetica/the-water-tower

Photo: Mihai Lazăr on Unsplash

these waves

these waves

stacked like trays

in the corner of Vinnes

a mess of levels

all over the place

and whoever said

liquid is flat

a plane of rock

like a jewellery box

glory spots, lots of treasure pools

the smooth grace of sea

draws up her skirt

gathers into a bastion

of Prussian blue and

as wind stipples the topfoam

back in a cockatoo crest

and the rest

tips forward

crashes on and over

those uneven shelves, the

cutlery drawer

of my coastal shore.

elephant-hide stone, I hop

from plane to plane and feel

brave

like the water could

engulf me

at any stage but of course

I’m safe

not near enough the edge

prefer to watch

put my mind

in the boiling blueturquoisewhite

cauldron and thrill

to the thought of

how I’d die, cold and afraid

while a cormorant

slips oilsmooth

quicksilver, alive in the place

that would surely be

my grave

 

 

Photo: Claire Doble

Finally recorded one!

Link: https://soundcloud.com/user-808707280/these-waves

 

Sale!

I clip the coupons

shop the bargains

steel myself

for the feel

of cheap shoes

that sweat up my feet

cheat and lie

that it’s working

I’m saving

the planet?

ha ha

steal some time

from myself

spend some time

on myself

me-time

me-spend

me-save

me-fake

new year, new you?

what about

me, me me!

never keep

the receipts

 

Soundcloud link: https://soundcloud.com/user-808707280/sale

Pack up your bushel in your old kit bag: Spoken word

 

I think the problems

are the bad things ?

I think the strengths weak

oh, cut the strings

 

Talk, talk, talk, talk

feels like a beginning

but it’s banter, chatter, nothing-muchof

saying ‘I am’ is not winning

 

It’s all fused like

a mangled globe of light

don’t hide it under a bushel, love!

but what if/ the bad things/ the bad thoughts/ the bad strengths/ the bad weaks/ the bad weeks/ the bad strings

are right?

 

 

Soundcloud link: https://soundcloud.com/user-808707280/recording-125

Photo: https://unsplash.com/@pieschwarzler

Out of Rage – spoken word

 

When I think about it

I don’t want to think too long

or feel too hard

keep moving on

 

Snap judgements

First impressions

Status updates and

click bait

passive aggression

hold it in

keep moving on

outrage is a content-commodity to them

 

Wow – it’s been ages since I’ve had the mental / time bandwidth to record a poem. Hope you enjoy it.

Soundcloud link: https://soundcloud.com/user-808707280/out-of-rage2

 

 

 

Up in your shit – and Spoken Word

 

what was red in tooth and claw

is covered now in iron ore

this springtime that I once enjoyed

is today spoilt by the noise

of busy building sites a-groaning

how must it feel for those in loam liv’d

oceans pure and deep and blue

scummed over with plastic refuse

while we finger glowing screens

ignoring slave-mined metal’s screams

Nature thou art but a plaything

for human waste and fattened purse strings

however one does hope, suspect

in the end, you’ll win out yet

 

Soundcloud link – with added building site backing! https://soundcloud.com/user-808707280/up-in-your-sht

Today’s NaPoWriMo prompt was to write a nature poem. Um, now I look again it was supposed to be about a place / animal / thing you know well. I guess I wrote it about the whole damn unknowable world. Hmm… 

Spoken Word collaboration

Image: Riccardo Annandale @ https://unsplash.com/@pavement_special

Pic by Riccardo Annandale @ https://unsplash.com/@pavement_special

Well this is exciting. My first spoken-word-poetry collaboration!

I came across Kate Duff’s poems through the blogosphere a while ago and they really resonated with me. I approached her about doing a reading of one of them and she was kind enough (and brave enough!) to say yes.

I enjoyed reading someone else’s work and -ahem- it may have even provoked me to try a bit harder and do a few more takes than my usual slapdashian approach!

I’m really pleased with this one. Have a listen (it runs for about 1.5 minutes). And throw some blog-love towards Kate over at https://athousandbitsofpaper.com/  Thanks Kate!

 

Soundcloud link: https://soundcloud.com/user-808707280/thinking-by-kate-duff-read-by-claire-doble

Link to original poem: https://athousandbitsofpaper.com/2016/12/01/thinking/

Motherf*cking February

Photo: Marco Ceschi via https://unsplash.com/@spantax

Photo: Marco Ceschi via https://unsplash.com/@spantax

A little something for everyone this week. Here’s a short spoken-word piece

 

Every mother looks tired today

Or perhaps it’s the harsh light of Monday

As she sat with a baby in a sling

With the sun on her face

I could see the exhaustion

of the night before

And I also saw

Those dedicated mums meeting their friends

In cafes for lunch

Trying not to be in the way

Trying to get their two year olds to eat something

It’s not even much fun

But better than not having gone

What a mess they make

And I think maybe I’ll just get a job

And outsource all my childcare from now on

Every mother looks tired today

Motherfucking February

 

Soundcloud link: https://soundcloud.com/user-808707280/motherfcking-february

Clairevetica: Year in Review 2016

Lake Zurich

Although it’s against popular opinion, 2016 has been a good year for me. Maybe one of my best! It’s been a great year for this blog too. In fact, a lot of my joy in 2016 has been directly tied to Clairevetica so it seems appropriate to write this post.

This is the year that I randomly decided on 30 March to participate in a month-long poetry writing challenge: NaPoWriMo/GloPoWriMo. I feel like that spur-of-the-moment decision has changed my life! A month later, I’d written 30 poems in 30 days, I had a bunch of new followers and was following heaps more blogs myself. It helps that it coincided with a friend/local blogger starting a Switzerland blogger group so I simultaneously followed a bunch of local blogs as well as all the poetry stuff. Clairevetica has gone from having around 50 followers to having 200. Impressive. And I really thank you all for following, liking, commenting and supporting (both on the blog and elsewhere) – hell, even just bothering to read all the words I write! Fittingly, as I was writing this post, I just got a notification from WordPress that I’d achieved 1,000 likes on this blog altogether, w00t!

However, stats aside, perhaps the most important thing about the poetry month was it meant poetry went from being a thing I occasionally dabbled in to a Thing I Am. Alongside my various other jobs and titles, I’m now “Zurich-based poet, Claire Doble” and fuck that makes me happy.

My most popular poem was The Earth / His Purpleness about Prince and Earth Day. Which seems even more appropriate since this year is ending on a media storm of all the famous people who’ve died, as well as there being ongoing worries globally when it comes to ecology and politics.

Other current affairs poems I did included The Unicorn and the Lion about Brexit, Stars and Stripes about America, Over Heard and Cincinatti about Johnny Depp’s breakup and that Gorilla grabbing a child (remember?!) and Landfill – deploring all the waste.  Other poems I wanted to mention again included Alison, which I’m humbled was read aloud at the funeral, Morning Song, which really evoked something about my life here and Rollins Rules, trying to capture the give-no-fucks spirit of the man. While I’m thanking people and noting poems, I should give a shout-out to my ever supportive husband, Himself: Respect! (and love)! 

I also wrote a few book reviews In Deep that’s stayed with me and I am a Feminist as well as a couple of film reviews from Zurich Film Festival.

I had my spoken-word debut, and went on to do a few more spoken word recordings. Possibly my favourite so far is Vanish.

And, of course, I had a good dose of soul searching and attempts to find my way – Time Out of Mind and Writing for My Life/ Fighting for my Life (which is my second-most viewed post of the year) . It’s nice for me to take a look back at these and see how things have worked out (mostly well).

I also started and finished writing my first novel – which I should mention as it’s pretty huge. Although it doesn’t have a lot to do with the blog…

In the midst of all this, we had an amazing summer of international visitors to Zurich. It was so great to introduce our adopted home-city to friends and family from near and far and to spend time exploring more of this gorgeous country with them.

As I said in my previous post of New Year’s Resolutions. I’d like to do some more travel stuff in 2017 with our 26 Swiss Cantons in 52 Weeks challenge. I’ll do more poetry of course but hope to get stuff published above and beyond Clairevetica. And you can follow my spoken word stuff on Soundcloud.

Happy New Year everyone – I’m so delighted to be writing so much and to have all these Clairevetica followers old and new. I appreciate each and every one of you. Here’s to a rockin’ writing 2017!