Category: Climate of the absurd

Climate of the absurd

Starfish -excerpt (CotA #4)

!Epic Tomorrows

My piece ‘Starfish’ was recently nominated for the Periscope Literary Prize, although didn’t win a position, ultimately. I am currently re-submitting it elsewhere, so I can only reveal an excerpt here:

Starfish

Dedicated to all the staff of Two Whales Coffee Shop

1) The ghost

The riddle of our living is the genius beneath the suffering. I uncovered this in Newfoundland. Here I was told a colonial story of which I am the extension.

A fishing vessel was wrecked but for one survivor, brought back to Petty Harbour. Distressed, boat-less, for days he paced the coast with a telescope, hoping to spy his shipmates. In the Newfy fog I was mistaken for his ghost. I was looking for whales.

I yearned to witness them from craggy cliffs, from where wind-stunted conifers pour lichen over blueberry carpets. Nature’s sensuousness expunged old manhood’s wraith. A whale-watching ride crafted into a slick but gutsy production in an otherworldly light, gave me finally, an encounter…

Climate of the absurd

Climate of the Absurd #3: The swinging bag

!Epic Tomorrows

I sat on my haunches with my back against the white-painted brick wall of the gym, the bag in front of me still reeling from the lazy combinations I had given it.

I positioned myself between the bag and the guys playing around in the ring, wanting a little privacy to centre myself back in the present, the challenging present. It is the climate crisis, always the climate crisis.

Remembering now the romance in boxing films, all that stuff about underdogs coming out of nowhere, training at odd hours to surface blasting into the lime-light.

The mass movement we need to end the climate crisis is non-violent, but it sure does help (a conscious Americanism, a nod to those romantic films) my personal resilience and resolve, after I’ve unloaded my arsenal of frustration, grief and anger, to see that swinging bag.

Climate of the absurd

Climate of the Absurd #2: Boxing again

!Epic Tomorrows

Boxing again. It’s not my favourite thing to do. I’m only doing it because the world is collapsing around me. I need the resilience that boxing gives me and a chance of escaping desperate future skirmishes, fought as part of guerrilla wars that could erupt in the unfolding climate crisis, within even the boundaries of this proud island.

I enter the gym early and nervously, but it’s okay -as I thought they would be, the kids are still training. I sit down to watch but am told to move into the back room where the other seniors are waiting. I stand in the corner of the back room like a chump. One of the trainers comes in and says don’t be scared, there are plenty of seats, but I still just stand there. Glad that this costs a humble three quid a pop.

We begin by stretching and then some rope work. I’m not too good on a skipping rope. I guess like many forty year old guys I dream of a late comeback in terms of fitness, but soon realise I am knackered when I watch the young guys doing doubles and criss- crossing. Besides which I chose a rope too small for me, a purple one that I have to hold by the very ends of the handles, which is a pain for my wrists.

Then we do some shadow-boxing and shadow-boxing with partners. I catch the eye-brow of the old guy I’m with, by accident, but he’s okay. I recognise him from another boxing gym, a while back, I’m not sure which one.

The temperature has dropped outside. How is there any way I can communicate the climate crisis to these guys? I guess I could wear an educational t-shirt, next time. I guess I could write ‘climate emergency’ or something similar on all my training clothes. And then show them how well I can box, so that they may follow what I say on a different subject. Maybe…

I enjoy the bag work. Someone has written on a whiteboard behind the heavy uppercut bag I am hitting, ‘There are no losers in boxing, only first and second place’. Typical boxing humour. I know enough to know that both first and second place can be very painful, although I’ve never trained enough to fight.

Then we play a game in pairs, where we each put our worst foot forward inside a hoop and hit each other in the stomach, and try to block the others’ punches. I go for it. I’m not scared of getting hit any more but I’m still scared of talking to people, especially these people, because I judge them to be rougher than me. I hope they punch all the judgement out of me.

I enjoy getting hit and hitting back. I have been to a few boxing gyms over the years, and now finally I have got to the stage of thinking ‘fuck it’ and understanding that I don’t need to be scared of the physical pain, and I don’t need to be scared of inflicting it either. It’s a game but a serious one, because my mind is on defending my girlfriend and my niece. I’m relaxing into this sport although it is still tiresome to me. I would rather be writing.

The physical pain is a necessary release and cathartic symbol of the stress of the climate and ecological nightmare we inhabit. If only these guys all knew about it, they would produce the best fighters in the region. They would all be as fired up to defend the planet as I am.

When I leave the gym, my jacket gets caught on the door handle. One of the coaches gives me a puzzled look as he helps me unhook it. He talks to me kindly as I resign myself to the cold night.

Image: ‘Wild Card Boxing Club Calavera’ by Ernesto Yerena

Climate of the absurd

Climate of the Absurd #1: I was overtaken

!Epic Tomorrows

My banners stopped cars. A bird flew backwards overhead; high winds, wrongly taken as a good sign.

///

The old female football player paced over there somewhere. She gestured, suggesting to an undefined audience that she was about to phone someone. I was suspicious that she would call on Green troops.

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I was overtaken by Earth’s Spirit. Tibetan bells rang. Ice slid down Himalayan slopes. A vixen wept.

///

I stood. In the middle of all these roads. A woman emerged from her house nearby. She spoke calmly in the middle with me. She asked, ‘Can I talk to you for a minute?’, then escalated like a rocket, screaming and shouting. Tableau of holier-than-thou Green troops in the background.

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Direct action is to wake this woman up to living hell. Green troops will stand, stare and vote as they clean their rifles squeaky clean.

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A troop finally intervened, apparently on my behalf. ‘Well you’ve just shown your ignorance’ he said to the woman. This troop wants me in his army. The army neat on the roadside as I slow the fossil-fuelled traffic.

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The woman, the public, is confused. ‘I will wait for the police if you want’, I said. ‘Why?’ she replied, ‘You haven’t done anything wrong’.