.
Bus shelter near Baltasound, Unst, Shetland: photo by shirokazan, 28 June 2012
And then the time grew short as the days
grew longer and we understood
we were going north more swiftly than the snow
The red sun slipped from the sky
and something laid its first chilly fingers
across our temples
In our glass box the faces looked white
the blue veins stood out against
the condensation dotted transparent walls
Ice and unbreathed air the stillness
like a bubble frozen a little observatory
two lit dials a clock a speedometer
and the night rushing up on us
and no stone left to throw
Bus shelter near Baltasound, Unst, Shetland: photo by SalemSkye (Hazel Hey), 5 August 2011
Bus shelter near Baltasound, Unst, Shetland: photo by Nicholas Mutton, 22 August 2008
Bus shelter near Baltasound, Unst, Shetland: photo by nz_willowherb, 16 June 2012
8 comments:
Tom,
Wonderful photos, kind of a scary poem -- hang in there!
3.15
light coming into cloud above blackness
of ridge, song sparrow calling in field
in foreground, wave sounding in channel
“cosmologic problem,” since
first red shift lines
form of field corresponding,
of matter, that which
grey white fog against invisible ridge,
circular green pine on tip of sandspit
Thanks, friends.
Always good to start off the day at the bus shelter with a "cosmologic problem"!
(Who could say no to a problem that has both logic and the cosmos in it -- the ultimate strange bedfellows.)
I've heard it said that Norwegians who can't afford a Mediterranean holiday make do with a weekend in Unst.
A welcome injection to the economy, but nothing compared with the erstwhile profits from herring.
Though perhaps to a near-sighted denizen a vacationing Norwegian might appear to be a tall two-legged herring.
(Cold fish are cold fish, after all.)
And speaking of injections -- here's a wee bit of fiddling in Baltasound Hall on Saturday night.
...but in case anyone cares, the inspiration here came from:
Hit the North
the condensation dotted transparent walls
Sharp/wiry sound, very direct, almost hurting
Ice and unbreathed air the stillness
like a bubble frozen a little observatory
two lit dials a clock a speedometer
Each image dropped in - ineluctable - before night hits.
Being a Fall obsessive from the age of thirteen, I took great pleasure in the link. Good to see Birmingham showing up on the painted map, though there'd be many, locals included, who wouldn't see us as Northern.
We're not Southerners, of that much I'm sure.
I've seen plenty more less inviting bus shelters than this one but there's still one two-pronged question running through my mind: What do the buses look like and do they run on time?
I did wonder at seeing Mark E Smith had recognized Birmingham as part of the North. But then one does at times get the impression that as with New York, though not geographically central, London is often perceived to be the centre, not only of a certain country, but of a (phantasmal) universe. By which perception, accordingly, Pennsylvania, for example, would become a part of that vast vague geographical agglomeration called "The West" -- and Birmingham, thus, by a similar sort of flat-earth-ish pseudo-logic, a part of "the North".
Vassilis, I did manage to find some photos of the buses in question, but as they appeared to be less out-of-the-ordinary than the shelter (and indeed quite similar to the conveyances we have seen in a number of Wooden Boy's engaging Bus Notes), I thought perhaps to vary the style and circumstances of virtual transport just a bit, today:
Raymond Queneau: Exercises in Style: Man with long neck on bus
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