The Cartographer’s Journal

Hello there,

It has been a little while since I’ve dropped in here to announce anything but in the background things have been happening.

During June I was participating in the #JARWriteathon where I set out to write a zine combining vignettes and poetry with continuous line drawing.

It is now finished and very soon it will be available for sale.

Here is the blurb:

The Cartographer’s Journal is the fragmented exploration of a man’s life following the death of his grandfather and is the catalyst for examining his life and the moments he remembers. He plots his experiences as way points and erects milestones to understand how memory, distorted and fragmented as it is, constructs an identity although it is not fixed until secured in retrospect.

These random moments of memory are catalogued in our heads, a sequence of unconnected and disconnected events that serve as marker points of who we are. To explore the past is to chart the periphery of maturation as “Here Be Dragons.”

We make our way forward in life by walking backwards.

You can see a preview HERE.

And The Kettle’s Whistle Went Unattended

A cold torrent shudders from the tap into the cauldron-like bowels of the kettle. He clanks it down on the stove and presses the ignition switch, hearing the click, click, click, WHOOOSH as prelude and prologue to conversation. The flames tickle the kettle’s underbelly as an anticipatory act, fostering his nervousness while he waits.

He dispenses one, two, three teaspoons of leaves into the round-bellied glass pot. On the bench two cups sit side-by-side, their handles turned inward, barely touching.

The kettle whistles and he pours a question. Silently she lets it draw. He pours the milk, stopping when she nods and stirs the words again. She adds sugar to both cups, two for him and one for her, and posits a question of her own.

The tendrils of steam rush headlong into each other, tripping over one another and caught in tangles, melding into one breath.

Lest they burn their lips the conversation is spoken in sips. As the beverage tempers and cools, deeper thoughts are expressed in longer draughts. Drained almost to the dregs, remainders of words stain the bottom of each cup. An unfinished conversation threatens to evaporate as each hand holds the cup for the last whispers of disseminating heat.

She ignites the flame knowing it simmers close to the boil.

They depart while the kettle’s whistle remains unattended.