A Clockwise Direction (revised)

[tectak]

I found the last remaining wedding photo whats not to like? A narrative opening, easy flow, conversationally imprecise as conversation often is. We are in the daughter's bedroom. Now I stop. Consider. Never a good idea. There is a wedding photo (last and remaining are not good together) behind a doll. It is asmall photo or a large doll. Why do I care. Well, this is image building. I want clues. I want to know that the writer is seeing what I am seeing. This is a doll....obscuring a photograph in a daughter's room. It is a Russian doll...........I am interested.
behind a doll in our daughter’s room.
Russian, as it happens, the doll that is,
though I read very little into that;
there are layers of dust upon dust in the loft Whaa?Whoa. Huh?I am in the loft not considering conversion. How did that happen?
and I’m loathe to consider conversion
at this late stage in the game.

I placed it on the bookshelf where O meets P; The doll?
I’d have liked it before your favourite author
but her shelf’s too close to the ground.
My books are in alphabetical order;
I wake at 7 to clean and tidy
each day in a clockwise direction -
starting at the front door and ending in the bath. This is good. This stanza tells me something and I can gain comfort from my own grasp of the situation.I hope I am reading OCD.

I compare it to my parents’ wedding picture OK. "It" is all about the photo. So what's not to like, again.? That easy style is back....nicely punctuated. Helpful,even. I am drawn back.in. What doll?
that’s hanging next to the dining room door;
they had a bigger cake, more friends and relations,
dressed black and white, a formal occasion;
contemplative, no eye for the camera.
My mother’s fatter in the face than I remember,
and isn’t that an ashtray beside the cake?

Blow these pictures up out of proportion
and maybe we’d spot the germ of a future:
leukaemia, cancer, emphysema,
buried deep within a Russian doll.
How happy we appear! My Mum said never
had I looked so handsome, like Richard Gere;
perhaps that’s the joke we’re laughing at. I am loving it. It is a cure for indigestion, insomnia, nervous twitches,it is a balm. This is gold. This is conversationally potent. This the powerof punctuation in action.

Behind us I trace the faintest whisper
of the tower blocks blown in ’88. 88?
As we’re cutting the cake, your face
burns with embarrassment
or anticipation of the sauce to come.
I can feel the grip that you have on my arm,
as if I might be the first to depart.

When lights fade I think I can hear you breathing,
but it’s central heating or a noise in the loft.
I close the windows to keep your scent in,
I reach out to touch an amputation;
I said we shouldn’t buy a bed this wide.
You never see pictures taken at funerals
unless somebody important has died.

Very competant. A joy to read and savour. In fact, I'mgoing to read it again. Thank you.
Best,
Tectak (rarely this sanguine....but no blood to let in this piece)
Hi penguin,
I will come back to this one but am mid-creation right now. Is this your first or only posting on this site? I ask because (and tell me I am wrong) this smacks of commitment verse "brought on" by a real event. I have only made a low level pass over the piece but not found a landing site on safe ground. This is usually a sign of sincerity which always buggers up my critical compass.
If you reply to this before I add to it, could you direct me to some of your other work?
Best,
Tectak