What starlings spell has three dimensions.
Even with our earth-bound scansion
we try to catch some hidden beat of language
in this up-fall at the sky’s edge,
around feral symmetries, banked warp and weft,
those fricatives of flight.
Flocks that tongue the dusk
unthread as they construct
story arcs, speech-clouds,
this outpouring mouth.
Originally commissioned by Paul Evans for the collaborative exhibition All Things Bright and Beautiful (20-21 Visual Arts Centre, Scunthorpe, autumn 2012) and revised for The Song of Meeting and Parting, a poetry walk led by Jones and Matthew Clegg to coincide with a new billboard artwork (above) by Paul Evans (commissioned by Sheffield’s Bloc Projects). Listen to Chris Jones reading this poem on location:
Here’s a short film to accompany the poem:
Longbarrow Press 