DJ and Doug MacGowan, summer 2019.
Guitarist, banjoist, singer and songwriter Doug and I have been musical compadres for many years and now with my partner Emma Semple on violin and viola we’re putting together a trio, as yet unnamed.
The poem is in memory of Doug’s mum Joy, written as an accompaniment to Doug’s tune ‘Joy’
JOY
A long time gone.
New traffic on the stairs
tracing your even pace
over the risers;
other long fingers
turning, turning
the wine glass stem;
other laughter wrapped
in the leaves of your voice.
How easy to live
in this reconfigured world:
an exchange of horizons,
alternative sunsets, a hill,
or no hill at all.
But easy too the swift
self-gathering into
one’s own shadow
on street, in hallway,
or on that same staircase
when tears reflux
without warning
and there is only
what was.
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About Dick Jones
I'm a post-retirement Drama teacher, currently working part-time. I have a grown-up son and daughter, three grandchildren and three young children from my second marriage. I write - principally poetry but prose too, both fitfully published. My poetry collection Ancient Lights is published by Phoenicia Publishing (www.phoeniciapublishing.com) and my translation of Blaise Cendrars' 'Trans-Siberian Prosody and Little Jeanne from France' (illustrated by my friend, the artist, writer and long-time blogger Natalie d'Arbeloff) is published by Old Stile Press (www.oldstilepress.com).
I play bass guitar & bouzouki in the song-based acoustic/electric trio Moorby Jones, playing entirely original material.
https://www.facebook.com/moorbyjones?ref=aymt_homepage_panel
http://www.moorbyjones.net/)
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=MOORBY+JONES
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I have a dormant blog with posts going back to 2004 at Dick Jones' Patteran Pages - http://patteran.typepad.com - and I'm a radio ham. My callsign is G0EUV
sisyphus 
Phew! That was the sort of psychic direct hit I guess we sometimes dream of when we write (I know what I mean!) . Very poignant.
Good idea deactivating FB. I’m tempted myself only it helps me stay in touch with certain family members.
Thanks, Dom! Very glad it transmitted successfully. Doug’s an old pal & I knew his mum very well. Shortly after her death, Doug wrote the tune & much later on I wrote the poem.
Re Facebook, pretty much all I was doing was curating items written by someone else & slinging them onto the conveyor belt as each minute raced by. My own stuff via links to the blog evinced virtually no response at all, which, bearing in mind the number of poet FB friends I have, didn’t do much for creative confidence! So, following a sudden uprush of ennui, I pulled out & deactivated the account. I might return at some point, but pro tem at least I’ll hang around on Twitter (where no one ever seems to respond to re-tweets!) & try to jump-start the poetry.