I confess I am not a great fan of autobiographies that begin at the beginning and follow a temporal path up to the present day – not that the person might not have some interesting stories, facts and opinions strung on their necklace, but it just doesn’t appeal as a structure. On the other hand, in my last, extra year at school in Oxford, retaking an A-level and adding a couple more, I was allowed out of school on my recognisance and saw a fascinating Exhibition at the Modern Art Gallery. The Artist had laid out and photographed every single possession of a single person – for example, all the cutlery was laid out in one shot, all the shoes in another. This more thematic approach appeals more and although I am not arranging the objects which I have chosen to tell my story in chronological order, I hope that my writing will be sufficiently interesting to keep your interest Dear Reader, and that on the journey from A to Z, you will assemble an impression of my life and who I am…
The object I have picked to represent Love is the statue above, which I bought, mounted and gave to my partner Barbara and which is one of our favourite treasures. It encapsulates so many memories, the song “The Voyage“, a favourite even before we went to live in Ireland as it was often sung by our Irish son-in-law, the studio in Sligo and my friend Bettina, and for me it is a reminder of my signwriting and art-making days in Ireland.
Love and Hate are often designated as opposites and Love and Sex are often confused and in the following poem, previously unpublished, I consider the latter confusion…
Sex and Love…
I had a sheltered upbringing
and a late start
in affairs of the heart
my parents love-life
a secret to which their
obvious love offered
no clue.
A generous friend fired
the starting pistol but offered
first sex once but no more
love in confusion mired.
A Brazilian friend also
bemused by sex in England
told me how in Brazil
girls in a friendship circle
sit on any lap except
the one they fancy
sending a coded message
to the cognoscenti
coming closer by staying distant
but in England, you meet
at a party, say
and suddenly you find
you have vaulted over a wall
you didn’t even notice
to find yourself in bed
with a stranger.
There for the birth of
her grandson, her mother
gave me my first massage
and then so much more
showing that Brazilians
excel at vaulting too
I became the toy of
another older woman
not that she was a player
for we both confused
sex for love
and in the end became
respectively frustrated
and disappointed
because you cannot find love
in the cracks of another’s
flawed marriage – there may be dirt
but not the soil in which a
relationship might flourish
If she was not ready
or able to leave her husband
I finally found the one who did
and reached the sunny uplands
where sex and love
in true commitment bloomed
not knowing that winter and the
darkness of the past
was waiting in the wings.
After a short first act
the curtain fell suddenly
with seeming finality
where abundant happiness
had flourished in the light
sex wilted in the dark
but not before true love
had taken root – its holdfast
wrapped tight to the rock of life
And now, in later years
Persephone has been drawn
into the underworld
and winter reigns, mostly
but love leads me again and again
to venture there
to lead her back to the light
if I may, instructed not to look back
But in truth that is her affliction
the past, a cast of characters
who crowd her head
hiding her real self
asserting their various strategies
to protect her from a past
that is no more
and yet is kept alive by the
very protections and distractions
that hide her truth
Those who do not deal with the past
are doomed to live there
but doing that deal
is easier said than done.
So now I know that love
is stronger than sex
and though sex serves to
feed the seeds of love
once the tap root is driven
deep into the earth
the strong trunked love
sustains through long Winters
good Summers and bad
flood and drought
and for the tree of love
the flowering and fruiting of sex
is a bonus
not the whole story…
© Andrew Wilson, 2023