Photograph: [Public Domain] Wikimedia Commons
A collision between the said and the unsaid
Colin Winborn has been interested in the relationship between poetry and spiritual enquiry for a number of years. Most recently, he has published Gleams & Fractions and Nerve Cells. He lives and teaches in West Yorkshire.
In this week’s guest post for The Culturium, Colin explores the correlation between what is spoken out loud and what remains forever held within—and that tantalizing space where the two collide.
CASTS IS A sequence of interlinked poems that springs from an interest in the relationship between speech and silence: between what is said, and what is unsaid or unsayable.
For me, the blank space of the page is as much a part of the texture of the poem as the words themselves: it allows the latter to echo, perhaps sound out.
I am drawn to sequences because of the possibilities of colloquy they offer: the way in which poems might speak to, even argue with, one another. Different conversations can be overheard, depending on the room we’re in.
I’ve always liked Tom Waits’ suggestion: “Pin your ear to the wisdom post / Pin your eye to the line.” Words to be unpacked. Unpinned.
oOo
to
see
clearly
love
overhead
seasun
these fila
ments un
threading
out walking
past the cove
I catch sight
in passing of
caritas
un-
matched
depths
what
remains
blue
into
evening
flames
yellow wagtail
lemon heart
throatsoaked
sweet in-
seeing
become bitter
air out
here
the in-
visible in
plain sight
what’s
the catch
standing
alone
evening
into evening
this seeker
or
wave
wave
lets
at
a
stretch
the
brow
of
a
hill
settled
differences
dawning
curacy
curiosity
testy
not the sort
of thing that
stays exits
cleaves to
sea forms
the logic
of coral
antlers
on
ahead
stag
do
heart
mur
mur
mind
you
the
eye,
the
ear
the sand treading water
till well
enough
to become
voice &
body
slip
of
the
in-
visible
off
spirit
sings
this
“singing
this”
infra
read
vision
stance of
happiness
gannets
on the cliff
top
piling
over
in
droves
any
moment
now
the news
When is it not
a space opera?
unphased
fleet
there
of
to better
appreciate
say,
a prayer
clear
lines
under
compass
streaks
of
a
bay
make
for
the
farthest
pin
point
love is
never in
concert
just
this
once
rip
roaring
day
break
out
the
dawn
immediate
satisfaction
stipulate
de-
fib-
rillation
in
a heartbeat
clean sweep of
a wing
a river
etch a
monument
a donation
already given
you already have
made it already have
Post Notes
- Gleams & Fractions, Colin Winborn (Red Ceilings Press, 2014)
- Nerve Cells, Colin Winborn (Knives, Forks and Spoons Press, 2012)
- Emily Dickinson: A Woman Before Her Time
- Sappho: The Tenth Muse
- Matsuo Bashō: Deep Silence
![[Public Domain] Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gustave_Courbet_-_Le_bord_de_mer_à_Palavas_(1854).jpg){kind=link}