Things That Happen (2)

From the age of seven, I began to have spells of what I would describe as moments of physical remoteness. My instinct tells me that somehow my experience of the old woman appearing in my house unlocked and opened a doorway. When the doorway opened, I was at once introduced to a different and altered form of consciousness. It started as a thin thread of connection to a world of spiritual existence. I believe my early experiences of these moments of physical remoteness are not exclusive to me and many other people experience something of a kind at some point in their lives. Certainly the mind of a child is more open but not exclusive to an altered experience or embracing the unknown. When you are a child, much is unknown. How a person relates to these experiences and positively uses them is an entirely different matter. The world of spiritual existence is as much inside me as it is outside of me in the physical world. As much as I took the first tentative steps to connect with this spiritual existence—I knew it did not normally belong in the physical realm. It was only many, many years later in life that I realised I had also taken the first steps towards my own soul.

The first spells of physical remoteness were extremely brief and were often over before I was fully aware the episodes had happened. Sometimes it could be as brief as a few seconds or half a minute. Over the next few years, right up till the age of about fifteen, the duration of physical remoteness grew longer. I usually sensed it start with my eyes. The best way of describing it is when someone stares ahead at a fixed point of interest, and for some unknown reason, they continue to stare beyond a period of time that is necessary or natural. But unlike someone simply staring blankly at something random when their mind drifts off on a deep train of thought—the moments of physical remoteness were incredibly intense and all my senses seemed heightened. Sounds, even distant ones, were clear and distinct. I started to learn that I could filter one sound out against another, no matter how distant it was. Likewise, visually, colours and shapes took on an extraordinary vivid definition and sharpness. More oddly, I noticed without turning my head, I could see definable objects at the extreme edges of my peripheral vision. I saw these objects as if they were straight in front of me. In spite of my heightened senses, paradoxically, the whole experience generated an intense feeling of disconnection from the world around me and even my own body. Outwardly, I appeared to be functioning normally when these moments of physical remoteness occurred. I might appear fixed or concentrated, but still able to carry out a task; getting dressed, walking to school, cycling a bicycle, and more often I started to realised they tended to occur when I was doing something automated or requiring little deliberate thought.

Between the ages of twelve to fifteen, the spells of physical remoteness became far more regular, sometimes two to three times a day, and they could last anything from a couple of minutes to fifteen minutes. I didn’t have to walk across a room to see if a magazine or book was on a shelf or behind the sofa. I knew it was there because I could see it from where I was. The novelty value of this experience long wore off by twelve years of age and I began to become depressed and troubled because I didn’t feel in control of it any more. I became more aware of an internal struggle as my conscious mind wrestled to take back control of what appeared to be subconscious and out of my control and choice. I stopped hanging around with my friends and remained close with just one. I feared the spells would continue to get even longer and I might one day never snap out of one. I feared walking under a bus on the way home from school or loosing time on school study. In June 1982, things came to an abrupt head.

My parents and I were spending two weeks holidaying in New York and Florida. The evening before we travelled to the USA, I was over at my friend’s house. He sensed I was anxious about the flight and he gave me a single white table he said he found in the house that would help ease my nerves. To this day, I have no idea what the table was, whether it was a prescribed drug or entirely illegal. The following morning, before we travelled to the airport, I stupidly swallowed the table with some milk. What followed were the most terrifying two days I have ever experienced.

At the airport check-in desk I was already feeling weak, but not sick. The weaker I became, the more aware I was becoming of a spell of physical remoteness. I had over some months come up with various ways of staving off a spell. I would engage in deliberate conversations with anyone or recite poems to myself that I had learned at school. I discovered the best method to avoid a sudden and prolonged spell was to look at numbers on signs, numbers on the clock, numbers on the chalkboard at school, numbers on car registration plates, and try, by a series of addition, subtraction, multiplication and division, to make answer be my favourite number – seven. It worked for a while with the flight numbers on the overhead monitors for a while until we boarded the flight to New York.

I finally succumbed to it shortly after take-off, and so began five and a half horrifying hours on that plane. My parents presumed I was just nervous and particularly quite. I just couldn’t force my eyes to close and break the initial stare. Once in, I thought I would never ever come out of it. It was the first time the physical remoteness resulted in an entire out-of-the-body experience. I could see myself sitting in the seat of the aircraft as if I were looking at myself in a mirror. I moved uncontrollably around the plane as if I were caught in the violent current of a wild river. I remember seeing myself taking the passenger flight program leaflet out of the seat pocket in front of me. I must have held that program in my hands for more than two hours, in the same position, on the same page, just staring blankly ahead. Wherever I was, my feelings of my panic and upset seemed to show no outward signs of distress on the face of my body. I just sat there in my seat – almost appearing not to care that the most important part of me – my soul and my spirit – were somewhere else on that plane and I had no way of getting back. Years later, my mother has no recollection of me speaking much on the flight or at any time sleeping. I had long fallen out at fourteen years of age with mainstream Catholicism, but I prayed to God that day to help me try and get back to my own body. I felt helpless, vulnerable and exposed to anything happening to my spirit and soul. I felt I couldn’t protect them and they were exposed to elements and influences they should not be open to.

I have no recollection of how I got back to my body before we landed. I was terrified I would get lost and be left behind. I can only say that something guided me back. Some power beyond me. Whether my body simply became so weak and I managed to close my eyes, I will never know fully. But somehow I got back and I knew I was utterly shattered. The intense heat of that New York summer day pushed the temperature into the high nineties even at five in the late afternoon. I remember my Dad arguing with cab drivers as he insisted he wanted one with air conditioning. He thought he got one, but the driver’s idea of air conditioning was rolling down the windows. I think I went unconscious three or four times in the cab as my parents tried everything from slapping me on the face, dowsing me with water, and sticking small bottles of aftershave under my nose to rouse me. The traffic across New York City was particularly bad that day and the driver just wanted to get the crazy sick kid out of his cab for good. We stopped outside a hospital for about ten minutes with my parents debating whether they should take me in. I couldn’t even stand up under my own weight and sat on the sidewalk. My mind and my body were numb and lifeless. They put me back in the cab and gave me a whole lemon to bite on. I gnawed at it for a while until my stomach heaved and I shoved the lemon back into my mother’s hand.

I remember little more of the next thirty-six hours of our stay at the Milton Plaza Hotel in New York. I slept through those hours, but most of them were still filled with the most appalling nightmares I have ever had. I think I experienced every fear a child could have in those thirty-six hours of nightmares. When I awoke finally and properly, I was glad to be whole again. Though the spells of physical remoteness did continue for about another year, they dramatically declined in frequency and intensity. I had no real idea what I had experienced, or its greater meaning back then, but I learned there is meaning, purpose and reason in all our lives. I was simply growing older and moving on to another stage of experience and awakening on my journey towards my own soul.

Things That Happen (1)

My life was as ordinary as any ordinary life could be up to the age of about seven. I had an experience I neither had the understanding nor concept of that would unknowingly change the entire direction, motivation and course of my life. It was late summer, 1975, and I was home alone on an overcast afternoon.

In 1975, the world was a very different place. Kids played for hours outside on the street. It was a playing field of innocence and adventure and the only thoughts of returning home was when you got hungry or you were looking for a few pence to go to the shop. My older sister was a thoroughly social child and she spent every waking hour on the streets with her gang of friends. I was a more introspective kid, and while I had my circle of friends, I was going through one of my I need to be on my own phases. They could last a couple of days, less often, entire weeks. I think I may have been in week two of one of those phases. My mother had headed out to the shop for a little while. It must have been about three o’clock in the afternoon. The TV was off and I was sitting on the couch in our living room. Back then, TV was black and white and we lived in a world of about five stations, BBC1, BBC2, UTV, HTV, and RTE. I had obviously checked to see if Michael Bentine’s Potty Time was on UTV. It might have been out of season because of the summer holidays, but clearly I was happy to sit there with the TV off and probably muse on my next Lego project with a thousand pieces scattered across the floor of the front parlour room. Each one, a building block in the life I was going to live.

I heard footsteps on the stairs in the hall. It wasn’t my sister. She had no front door key. My Dad was at work. I hadn’t heard the front door open, so I didn’t think it was my mother returning back from the shops. The footsteps were slow and deliberate and seemed to be descending the stairs. I wasn’t scared, just anxious and puzzled. Finally, a hand pressed down on the handle of the door into the living room where I sat. An elderly woman made her way into the living room, made sure to close the door behind her, as if she knew the house rules and it shouldn’t be left ajar, and walked slowly toward the door into the kitchen. She was dressed in a heavy, dark, long dress. She looked around the room, and although I looked at her, she never once seemed to acknowledge me there in the room with her, nor did she say a single word. It is always difficult for kids to judge an adult’s age – they always think adults are much older than they actually are. I’m not sure what age I thought her then, certainly old, but I’d say she was in her early seventies, maybe a little more. I know this woman wasn’t a city-dweller, not only did she not belong in my childhood home, but she did not belong in a city, or for that matter, the contemporary 1970’s. This was more like a rural Irish woman, with a reddened and hardened face exposed to the elements of country life. She was stern and not a woman I would have like to cross swords with in whatever life she lived. This was the first time I experienced the inner coldness that seizes your body when you are in the presence of something which is not meant to be there and has no physical sustainability in the world you are living in.

She opened the door into the kitchen, but this time, she chose to leave it ajar. I remember thinking that there was no way on this earth I was going to follow her into the kitchen. I sat rigid for a minute or two, and then tried to see if I could lean over from where I was sitting on the living room couch and catch sight of her through the double glass panes of the door. She remained out of view and I must have sat on the couch for about five to ten minutes before the cold feeling inside me passed. I got up, went to the kitchen door, and peered in. She was gone, but when I took a few steps into the kitchen, I could feel the temperature was unusually cold, as if something of the old woman still lingered.

My mother found me where she left me when she returned. The TV was still off, and as she rushed in her normal deliberate way through to the kitchen, she stopped and looked at me.

“Are you ok, Michael?”

“Yes. But someone called to see you while you were out.”

“One of the neighbours?”

“I’m not sure. I didn’t know them.”

“Doesn’t matter. They’ll call back.”

It wasn’t until my mid-twenties that I revealed the full details of the experience to my mother. By then, much had happened, and I could no longer confine this curious experience at age seven to being a simple childhood illusion of imagination and isolation. There were more than just physical doors which had opened of their own accord on that late, overcast, summer day in 1975.

Within weeks of the experience, I had my first moment of physical remoteness.

All Things Grow - Mick Rooney

ALL THINGS GROW

I fell in love with a girl and a place
And my heart opened wide like never before
But all that is precious, yet fragile, soon breaks
Just as all waters eventually run to the sea

Bathe with me, believe in me
Hold me close to all things sacred and tender
Run with me, walk with me, fall with me
Breathe with me, love with me, cry with me
Curse me, if you will

I grasp the punishment of learning as if it were a thorn
And the blood from my hand pours out
But all that is green and fresh is drowned in red
Just as the life is sucked from me

All things grow, all things grow
We kept our hearts in jars by the window
The two together, looking out on a beautiful dawn
We kept our souls in our shoes
And we walked the imaginary steps to Cyprus

I drove a journey to your heart every day
And the miles alone would have taken me to Cyprus and back
But I had you and would never have fallen for the allure of Aphrodite
Just as you never wanted to fall with own my failings

All things grow, all things grow
We kept our fears out the back with the cat and the stars
The fur and the heavens ruminating on our future
While I got drunk on beer and you on warm chocolate
We talked with words that were quiet and delicate

Dream with me, discover with me
Hold your forehead against mine as if I might know your thoughts
A dream, a memory, a moment, a touch, a kiss, a cry
I will hold and cherish them all
While crazy pools of water mock me

I drive forward on my journey now
Not to reach a point of destination or respite
But that I might find a freedom
Just a freedom from myself and nothing else

All things grow, all things grow
I kept my heart and placed it safely away
In a box, in the darkness
I never kept my soul to truly see
The day when I have learned from my mistakes

All things grow, all things grow...

Tisima, Tisima by Mick Rooney - From Filigree & Shadow

I published Filigree & Shadow last year and this is one of the prose works from the book. Enjoy.......

It is her. ‘Again.’ It is me. ‘Again.’ It is you. ‘Again.’ It has always been you. You turn back homeward from the evening’s setting sun feeling sad and old. ‘Amadeanas, Amadeanas,’ your mother cried so long ago. So long ago. Slowly, walking the coastal road to your house, you look across to the beach. It is a desolate beach, but for the old man. Affections, affections; your father. A shadow? No. A memory, perhaps? His upturned boat has long been dragged in from the sea. The skeleton remains. It is a wooden world where insects have made their lifelong home. The sea breathes and the wind dies. Your father, perfectly still, only moving with the day’s change of light. The sand has claimed his feet. It relies on the sea breezes to creep slowly up his body. No gains this evening. The wind, too, has finally died.

***

‘Amadeanas, Amadeanas,’ the voices still call to you. A voice alone without a home, echoing in the wilderness. You see your old garden. It has fallen into disarray, wild and empty within its surrounding walls. The walls are broken and badly cracked in places. The circle was finally broken. So long ago. The narrow road at the bottom of your garden is bereft of childhood shadows. The road winds its way to the foot of the hill where the wooden gate lays half-open. You walk in the evening dusk with the cries of youthful love-making far behind you. You see two shadows afar in the distance. They move steadily closer, hand in hand. One of the shadows becomes a small child carrying a ball. The other shadow, the father, whistles to himself. The two pass you by and the father nods feebly. You wait a few moments and then glance over your shoulder. He also glances at you before returning to his child and his whistling.

Motisima, Motisima; you spent many hours with him on the hill when all your friends had forsaken you. He hardly seems to recognise you after all these years. You remember he gave you a bluish-white pebble long, long ago. You carelessly dropped it in the long grass while you dreamed the passing hours of childhood away. This mortal coil unravels its secrets each day for you. You remember all those days of summer, when the sun rose and sucked its thumb contentedly. The day came when the light failed, as somehow it must. Your soul returns each evening for the part of you still remaining in this mortal coil. Callalamina, Callalamina; she will destroy you, without mercy.

Amadeanas, Amadeanas; you remember your faithful friend in your garden. ‘Motisima, Motisima,’ a mother cries to her child on the hill. Motisima was your last solitary companion, Amadeanas. You spent months awake at night wondering why all your other friends had forsaken you. Throughout the days of one spring, each friend you ever had disappeared from the meadow where you played, until finally, faithful Motisima was the last to go. On that last day, you lay on your backs in awe of the sky. It was cloudy, late spring; you both glanced from time to time at each other, knowing the inevitable. There was hardly a word exchanged all day between you, just the sweet glances, and the clouded sky above you. Motisima’s mother appeared late in the evening at the foot of the hill by the old wooden gate. You both walked down to the gate where his mother was waving and raging at him. Before he opened the gate, he pushed something into your hand. You did not look at it then. Your eyes instead fixed on the two departing shadows down the narrow road. You could still hear his mother waving and raging at him. You remember the bluish-white pebble he pushed into your hand, and how it caught the failing light of the evening.

On you walk in your garden, hardly sure of what you really see. The light is up to its old tricks again. You do not know the ghosts in this place as well as you might. Enough of touching the sky, of childhood memories, and the sky itself, touching you. It has long died and swallowed you. Your old ghosts haunt you in the trees and in the mountains. You see your bleak house of childhood in this landscape of the evening. Your soul is desperate to reunite with the part of you which still remains in the house. It is a parting of worlds amid the dreary and icy shadows behind the broken windows. You pass through the rotten door and into the darkness. The cracked and dusty stonework is breaking up all around you. This place would be suffocating had you the need for air. Your soul speaks, for so long it has remained silent. ‘Amadeanas, Amadeanas,’ a voice whispers silently in the distance. Motisima, Motisima, Amadeanas, Amadeanas; she will destroy you.

You go up the rotten staircase to your old bedroom. Nothing remains, only the frame of the steel bed and a drape hanging loosely across the broken window. You go into your parent’s bedroom after unlocking the stiff door. The silver key in the lock is still in perfect condition. You push the door open. Dust and dirt falls from above the doorway. The moonlight shines into the bedroom against the back wall. It is covered with graffiti of all colours. One scrawl upon another; probably done over quite a long period of time. You see names and shapes you do not recognise. A large circle with an inverted V in its centre dominates the wall. A six pointed star with a small B beside the third point from noon is scrawled next to the large circle. A mattress lies in a corner of the bedroom by the window. It is covered with slash marks and the inside stuffing is scattered across the floor. You walk across the room. You avoid stepping on the used condoms. From the window, you can see intermittent flashes of light from the lighthouse far out at sea.

Strange to see the lights still shine for you, Amadeanas. All those days, you felt like the last child on the hill. It has been years since the final few picked up their last belongings and left this place. You remember the many times you pulled open the gate at the bottom of the hill. The ghosts have no home. She will destroy you, without mercy. You still imagine the strangers pass by from the window. These are the figments of your mind. Loud, louder; counting the many times in your head that you ran from this house. Amadeanas, Amadeanas; you have been left broken in the wilderness of your future. Amadeanas, Amadeanas; she will destroy you.

You only have the darkness left to befriend you. All those youthful hours passed you blindly by. From the children on the hill to the children in the meadow, their past images still playfully dance, but their ghosts have no home. You see the meadows stretch out from the window. They are empty until you fill them with the images you remember. Simple memories; childhood memories. Motisima, Motisima, Amadeanas, Amadeanas; she will destroy you. You remember the times you spent in the meadows with the others dancing a circle around you, unbroken and unending. You remember how they tied a red ribbon around your head to cover your eyes. The eyes, the eyes; anything but the eyes. The dreams, the dreams; the crystal dreams, shattered and forgotten like an echo in the passing night. ‘Children on the hill,’ a mother cries. They play and rage in the light. Run to you, run to them, and each one, a figment of your mind. Motisima, Motisima, Amadeanas, Amadeanas; she will destroy you.

Darkness dares to fall upon you this evening, but how the light used to greet you each morning. Up as always at first light and steal away the morning hours with an arc of doves and a gentle breeze. You took the best of the day’s fullest hours which passed your way. You rushed out each morning to greet the rising sun. The still night air, faintly there, and a passing chill of crystal. The wind ran wildly through the lonely fences in the meadows. The sky never let you down all day, a calm and comforting blue, without the least fleck of white cloud. And, yet, all the time, you knew from the first light of the day that you had already failed.

***

                

It is her. ‘Again.’ It is little Amadeanas. ‘Again.’ It is you. ‘Again.’ It has always been you. Through the broken window, down below in the meadows, you see yourself. A shadow; all that remains of you. You see yourself lying back in the tall grass. Your arms are outstretched by your side kneading the blades of grass and their thin roots with your fingers. You are only disturbed by the odd bird above crossing your field of vision. You have spent the day dreaming and breathing as the mood took you. You clutch your pebble in a tight fist. You breathe heavily with the pollen fever deep in you all morning and afternoon. You were awake early that morning. Your eyes were rubbed raw with sleep and tears. Run to you, run to them; the figments of your mind. Motisima, Motisima, Amadeanas, Amadeanas; she will destroy you. Loud, louder; counting the times you ran into the meadows to be among friends. You finally outgrew the pollen fever just as easily as you had let your little pebble slip from your hand.

***

You turn slowly towards the beach below the hills and the meadows. The strand is lit by a lamp which throws a beam of light out in the direction of the sea. You cannot make out the shadows on the beach in the distance. You remember your father. All the many days he spent walking on the beach and up in the hills. You remember the last time you went up the mountains with him. Your father, beckoning to you, and all the time the last ray of sunshine slipping away. Out you both went, hand in hand, up the old mountain. You were both soon high up there, among the gorse and granite with the wilderness at your feet. You never once spoke to your father about your mother. Tisima, Tisima, your mother; she touched you and made you feel so old. You remember watching your father’s eyes fix on the sea in the distance after you had told him. He sobbed to himself and you clutched his waist, knowing all the time that the truth had finally destroyed him. He walked the whole journey downward with you perched on his shoulders. It was the last journey you ever made with him. Your father did not follow you into the house that evening. Your mother sent you to bed as soon as you arrived home. For a while, you sat at your window and watched the silhouette of your father at the old wooden gate. His silhouette was all that was left of him...

‘Who was it, my beloved Amadeanas?’

‘Tisima, Tisima.’

The days have swallowed the shadow of your father. You remember being told by your mother that your father had forsaken you and would never return. Your older brother took you to his grave on the other side of the hills. Even now, you cannot understand how your father could have taken his own life in such a horrible way. You are haunted by the image of his body hanging limply from the roof beam of the garden shed. The dog had barked up at him all night until a neighbour cut his body down the next morning. These ghosts have no home. All those long days after his death, you were filled with grief in your world of unearthly beauty.

The memory of those years reoccurs over and over again. The meadows and sunshine left you.  The passing winters became your solace. You locked yourself away in your bedroom for hours on end. The moments bit and the pendulum swung. You no longer have the pebble to touch. Loud, louder; you still hear the faint voices of your past. Motisima, Motisima, Amadeanas, Amadeanas; she will destroy you.

The comforts of your early years are long gone. There was always light for you even during the darkest hours at the dead of night. Little Amadeanas, the light never let you down. You remember peering out from under the covers of your bed. You saw the thin crack of light from the foot of your parent’s bedroom door. It kept you awake in the stillness of the night, a time, that time, when the world begs to turn a little quicker. You heard the old clock strike the hours and half-hours downstairs. The house creaked and cracked to its very heart. You felt bloody and burnt all night long. You were stretched out on your back on your bed with the moonlight pouring in the window. One light set against another. There were vacant traces of shadow-play on the walls of your bedroom. You saw their shapes; a lion and an owl, a bear and a cry, and the sounds of gentle pornography from the room next door.

You leave your old house and garden. The loose gravel sounds out under your feet. Not one of the gravel stones is like the lost pebble your faithful friend Motisima gave you. Night after night, you rolled it between your fingers under your pillow. It became a symbol; a distraction during the night. You knew every point of its surface by touch. There were some nights when you dreamed of the thousands of years the earth moulded and shaped its complex surface. You clearly remember the day you lost your pebble in the long grass and frantically searched for it until late evening. You arrived home with both hands and knees stained green and brown. For weeks you felt guilty, like it was a divine punishment. Motisima, Motisima, Amadeanas, Amadeanas; she will destroy you.

Amadeanas, Amadeanas, the voices begin to subside in your head. You go down the narrow road to the bottom of the hill and there is not a sound. You look over the fence across the meadows. Somewhere, out there, something exists which you never really had. Perhaps another child discovered it, knew it, and treasured it. The wooden gate into the meadow has been left ajar. You pull it closed and latch it on the post.  You turn and make your way toward the beach.

***

It is her. ‘Again.’ Tisima, Tisima. ‘Again.’ It is your mother. ‘Again.’ It has always been your mother. ‘Amadeanas, Amadeanas,’ a mother cries out for her child. You remember two outstretched and welcoming arms at the end of a long day. It is strange; the things we can do with our arms, our hands, our fingertips, the places they can go. You remember how they touched you and made you feel so old. The beach is desolate. The water is still.  You stand at the edge of your universe. You look into the water and there is nothing. You open your mouth and beg for the words, but there is nothing to hear. You are as alive as the ghost of your father, as the ghost of memory itself. If you could utter words, they would cry out for those eyes, that sweet mouth, the touch of those arms, those two hands, those fingertips, but what good are words uttered too late; like an unshared forgiveness, like remembered touches; they all pass away into the shadows of the night. Amadeanas, Amadeanas, it is time to follow them; the light must go out; off to that sleeping world. ‘Goodnight father and goodnight mother. Goodnight Motisima...my sweet.’

Mumford & Sons - Little Lion Man: Latest Repeat Play Track

It's hard to quite categorize London band Mumford & Sons and that perhaps is part of their appeal. Part English folk-part rock, they product a unique blend of raw passion in their music and lyrics. This track is one I have found myself listening to over and over again and is the first single from their from their debut album due shortly.

Mumford & Sons are a folk band from London. The band is made up of Marcus Mumford (vocals, guitar, drums), Winston Marshall (vocals, banjo, dobro), Ben Lovett (vocals, keyboards, organ), Ted Dwane (vocals, double bass). They formed in late 2007, rising out of London's folk scene with other artists such as Laura Marling, Johnny Flynn, Jay Jay Pistolet and Noah and the Whale. The band have often supported Laura Marling at concerts, while their association with Noah and the Whale can be traced back to King's College School, Wimbledon, attended by Mumford and Lovett of Mumford & Sons, and Noah and the Whale bass-player Matt Owens.

In February 2008, the band completed an extensive UK tour with support from Alessi's Ark, Sons of Noel and Adrian, Peggy Sue, Pete Roe, The Cutaway and more. They have been longlisted for the BBC's Sound of 2009.

They have recently been touring with The Maccabees.

Having recently signed to Island Records, their debut album is due to be released in October with "Little Lion Man" being the lead single, Dave Berry of Xfm made it his record of the week. BBC Radio 1 DJ Zane Lowe made "Little Lion Man" his "Reaction Record" on 27 July 2009, before naming it the "Hottest Record in the World" the following evening.In an interview during the show, Marcus confirmed the album would be titled Sigh No More, from the name of a track on the album.

Mumford & Sons won Best Band at the 3rd Annual BalconyTV Music Video Awards in Dublin on 3 July 2009.

Something Wonderful: Musical Inspiration - Sufjan Stevens Performs Chicago Live

I have not been posting too much on the site, so I thought for the next few days I might share with you some of the music which inspires me when I write.

First up, an extraordinary musician and composer, Sufjan Stevens from Michigan, with a live acoustic version of his much loved Chicago.

Very beautiful...enjoy.



An interview where Stevens touches on the influences of fiction...

An early performance of John Wayne Gacey. What strikes you most, after Stevens himself, is the subtle but telling reaction of emotion from the person holding the camera to what they are recording.

Trees by Mick Rooney - Chapter 1 (Exclusive Release)

This is the first chapter released from Trees, my current novel under submission to publishers.

The elders and wise men sat in a circle in a small clearing shadowed by the giant trees. Each one slowly closed his eyes and thought about the dreams they had during the night. Though each man’s eyes were tightly shut, they could still see the shape, texture and colour of every leafy creature surrounding them. Through their noses, they could still breathe the fresh smell of the forest, and through their ears, they could still hear the wind in the branches of the trees. However, this morning, one of the wise men was not thinking of the trees, nor was he thinking of the dreams he had during the night. He was thinking of his son.

When the men left the clearing and returned to their stone huts, the father could not face his work in the fields, nor could he sleep. Before sunset, one of the wise men came to the father’s hut, and the father knew the wise man’s words would not be good words, because wise men who become fathers know these things instinctively. The wise man stood at the doorway of the hut and spoke to the father who sat beside a small wood-fire.

“My friend, I saw your son in the mountains today. I think he was in The Palace of Dreams.”

The father was silent for some moments. He shut his eyes because he knew his friend would see his tears. He thought about the many days Carlos had left the hut in the morning and went into the mountains. He could see his son secretly reading through the many books in The Palace of Dreams, and in his soul, for the first time in his life, he knew the burden knowledge can bring a wise man who is a father.

The wise man saw the darkness in the father’s soul, and it made him uneasy and sad to see his friend seated in silence beside the wood-fire.

“My friend, I cannot see your face in the dimness of the hut. Your fire is growing hungry. It is time for you to rise up and feed it.”

The wise man turned in the doorway of the hut and shut his eyes. He had seen the father’s tears, and he knew the father was thinking about his wife and the memory of trees. The wise man could see the sadness in the father’s eyes like never before.

***

The boy loved the secrecy of trees. The moon shone brightly. He knew it was late. Each leafy cathedral cast its own shadow in the forest. Above, the canopy of growth protected the boy from the cool wind of the evening, but he knew it also hid the starry ocean of the heavens from him. His instincts guided him in the right direction home to his village. His mind still raced and gushed with adventure and magic. He had been to The Palace of Dreams again.

The boy’s imagination was first captivated by The Palace of Dreams after his mother’s death. His father was inconsolable for weeks and their stone hut was endlessly filled with people. The boy felt young, weak and helpless around his father and the wise men of his village. They often talked with his father about The Palace of Dreams, describing it as a place of eternal answers, but the boy did not understand the words the men spoke, or the stories the men wove sitting around the wood-fire. The boy wanted to be wise like the men. He wanted to read all the books they had read in The Palace of Dreams. He wanted to help his father grieve, but he could not. He wanted to go to The Palace of Dreams, but the traditions of his village forbade a young boy to go there, not until he could understand the memory of the trees. The boy had never disobeyed his father, or the traditions of his village, but he wanted to help his father, and he believed if he walked for long enough in the forest, the trees would see he was truly good and honest, and they would reveal the memory of trees to him. For weeks his father grieved for his mother, and the boy walked in the forest studying every tree, its size, its shape, the texture of its bark, and the many varieties of leaves and fruit. He visited every tree and knew them like a friend, but they did not reveal the memory of trees to him. Finally, the boy had grown impatient with the trees, and it was only then that he decided to go to The Palace of Dreams in the mountains.

He had not expected to get into The Palace of Dreams so easily. There were neither high walls, nor gates surrounding the simple log building. At first, he was a little disappointed, but he had not sampled the richness, the beauty, the knowledge in the many volumes of books which lined each wall, from floor to roof. He had felt sure when he read enough, and the time was right, he would go into the forest, and the memory of trees would be revealed to him. The entrance to The Palace of Dreams was never guarded, and though the boy believed he was often seen hiding in the shadows inside the large building by the elders and wise men, he was never disturbed once while he read from the books, nor was he removed. He had started to feel safe there.

When he returned home each day, he continued to see the sadness and loss in his father’s heart, but each day passed, and still the trees would not reveal the memory of trees. He felt sure one day he would be able to tell his father how he understood the memory of trees, and his father would be proud of him, and they would be able to speak of wisdom and the love and memories they shared for the boy’s mother. Maybe then, his father would no longer grieve. Though the boy loved the trees, and the secrecy of trees, his heart still yearned for the memory of trees.

The boy was eager to reach home quickly because he knew his father would be worried for his safety. But he also remembered his father’s warnings about the dangers in the forest during a heavy rainstorm. The wind alone can snap off the thickest of branches and send them crashing to the forest floor. A sudden rainstorm can unnerve and madden some creatures as they race for cover. He stood for a moment on the trunk of a fallen tree, turned his face into the wind, and listened to the sound of the trees. The evening wind gushed through the tips of the trees above him. The thickest of branches lower down the tree trunks creaked and strained under the force of their master. His father had taught him the signs of a violent and sudden rainstorm. He knew he had to find shelter quickly. He searched frantically around his immediate surroundings. He could see an old rotting oak about twenty feet away. The tree was so badly rotted, that a large, gaping wound had formed in the thick bough. He ran to the old tree, and as he ran, he felt the first icy-cold drops of rain sting his bare back. The opening in the bough afforded him just enough room to squeeze into the cavity. He tucked his knees tight to his chest, closed his eyes, and listened to the trees. It was a cold place in the cavity of the tree, but it was safe, and he knew his father would want him to be safe. Because of this, he felt his father would forgive him for being home late.

The boy could hear the storm outside. The heavens opened with a thunderous clap. He loved storms because of the fearful, yet, exhilarating feelings they stirred inside him. He wanted to listen to the sounds it made when it battled with the trees. He felt he understood the strength of the trees. While he thought about the strength of the trees, he grew more tired. Finally, he slept soundly, and he dreamed about The Palace of Dreams.

***

The boy could see his father walking slowly outside their hut. His head was bowed and the wind blew the dirt about his feet. The storm had taken longer to pass and the boy had slept for some hours. He knew that dawn was not far off. His father had seen his son reach the hut and stand in the doorway, but he continued to walk slowly round their hut, making no effort to greet his son. The embers of the wood-fire smouldered and cooled. The boy could not see any trace of flame from the embers of the fire. He knew this was not good. His father had not slept.

“We must go to the clearing in the forest, Carlos.”

His father was standing a few feet away from the doorway of the hut. He walked over to his father who placed a hand on his shoulder. They began to walk together to the clearing in the forest. The boy’s mind was empty because he was sad, and because he understood his father’s sadness more than ever before. They reached the clearing and sat together on large rocks. It was starting to get cold. They sat still on the rocks in silence for some time, but they could not feel the cold wind. The boy looked at his father. He was staring at the trees, and the boy knew his father was thinking about the memory of trees. The boy looked high above him. The storm clouds in the sky were clearing.

“Have you been to The Palace of Dreams?”

“Yes, father, many times.”

“But you know about the traditions of our village?”

“Yes, father, but I was fascinated by The Palace of Dreams and I wanted to know about the books. I wanted to know wisdom. I wanted you to be proud of me.”

The father shook his head and began to stare at the trees again. The boy was not sure if his father was thinking about the memory of trees now. The wind rustled the leaves around them. The boy was sure his father could hear the sound of the wind on the leaves too. Right then, he wanted his father to turn and look into his eyes, so he might somehow understand the memory of trees.

“Did the others in The Palace of Dreams never see you when you were there?”

His father spoke without looking at him.

“No, father, they were too busy reading, and I’d hide in the shadows with my book.”

His father shifted his weight on the rock and looked into his son’s eyes. The boy saw nothing in his father’s eyes, except sadness and loss.

“The Palace of Dreams contains every word ever written in this world. The books there are the most important things to our people. They’re our words and history. They contain every dream and desire known to man.”

His father spoke clearly but louder than was necessary. He often spoke this way when he addressed the other wise men and elders of the village.

“Books are more precious to our people than even the tools we use to complete our daily work; as precious as the bonds between a mother and her new-born child, as strong and precious as the love we have for our women, because even a book of stories contains tiny fragment of truths, and truth is at the centre of our universe.”

“But father,” interrupted the boy.

He had got up off the rock and fell to his knees beside his father. The boy bowed his head because he did not want to see his father turn away from him and look at the trees.

“I couldn’t help myself, father. I had a yearning to know about the books and their stories. I thought they’d help me understand the memory of trees.”

The boy began to tremble because he felt his father’s sadness and grief, and he at once felt the burden of every word he had read in The Palace of Dreams weigh down on his back.

“Father, don’t be angry with me, I couldn’t control my yearning.”

The boy began to sob because he could not feel the touch of his father’s hand on his shoulder.

“You know about the sacredness of books among our people. Only the elders and the wise men may go to The Palace of Dreams and read the books of wisdom and knowledge.”

The boy continued to bow his head because he sensed his father was not looking away from him anymore, and he was too ashamed to look his father in the face. Though he could not see his father’s tears, he could hear he was crying, and the boy knew his father was thinking about the memory of trees.

“But father, I wanted to know the story of our world and our tribe, and I grew wild with excitement when I read about the distant lands and exotic adventures of great men and women.”

The boy looked up at his father and he knew his father was still thinking about the memory of trees, but that he was listening to the words of his son.

“You can’t understand such things, you’re only a boy, and you can’t know wisdom. Wisdom is not the thread which binds the mind to the heart. When a boy recognises his sins and weaknesses he comes to his father and seeks forgiveness. You didn’t.”

“But father, once I began the stories in the books, I knew I had to finish them. I read the words like a starving man eats scraps of food. I turned the pages of every book madly and quickly to see the journey ahead, the way a farmer hurriedly turns his shovel in the earth before the heavy rains of winter.”

“Tell me all the words of all the books you’ve ever read. Tell me their shape; tell me the sounds they make when one word whispers to the others.”

The boy grew more despondent and his heart sank deeply into his chest.

“But father, you know that not even the wisest men of our village can remember all the words of all the books they ever read. I don’t see their shape. I only see the people and places the words create in my head. I hear no sounds, father, only the rustle of the wind in the trees outside The Palace of Dreams. I read silently in the shadows of a corner because I fear I might disturb someone. You shouldn’t be angry with me, father. I can remember how every story ends, where every hidden treasure is buried. I know the answers to many complicated calculations.”

The boy looked up at his father to see his eyes. They were open and he could see no tears. But the boy could see no sign of forgiveness either. His father grew more agitated after hearing the words of his son.

“When the wise men and the elders read, they read only because the word is written, and great men and women have lived and died so that the word could be written. We read with a passion for each word as if the words were our sons and daughters, as if we were making love to our wives or lovers. We are together as one when we read, because the words show us the shape and colour and beauty of truth, and truth is at the centre of our universe, not wisdom.”

“But father, I understand the words and their meaning. I understand that a book’s first few pages are like the beginning of a journey, and the many pages which follow, bound tightly together by the spine of the book, are the backbone of all humanity. I know the final few pages of a book are the conclusion of a story, when all the paths of the journey merge together joyously like the melodic notes of an orchestra. Father, I believed with the wisdom I gained in The Palace of Dreams, the memory of trees would be revealed to me, and with this memory, we could share our grief and our loss.”

His father looked deeply into his son’s eyes and he knew the boy had seen the fragments of truth in every book he had ever read. But his father knew his son had not known that truth is at the centre of the universe.

“My son, there’s no beginning and no end to a story, nor a book. If you read just for the sake of wisdom in this universe, you’re a fool, like a man wishing his troubles could pass and fade away with the passing night.”

They were both silent for a while, and they both thought of the memory of trees. The boy’s father stood up, took his son’s hand in his, and gestured him to stand up as well. His father led him into the forest, and the pair walked for a few minutes through the trees before coming to a halt. His father released his son’s hand, and he leant over, so that their eyes were level with each other.

“Carlos, a father should know when to share things with his son, but sometimes this is difficult and painful. When the wise of our people know the pain of grief and loss, when they understand it, when they feel it, they come to the trees, because even though age is no mark of knowledge, trees are older, wiser, and greater than any man or kingdom. They listen to us, they grow with us, but above all, they help us deal with our loss.”

The boy looked into his father’s eyes, and he could see the same light as the approaching dawn light. It was weak to begin with, but it was there.

His father turned and pointed to the tree directly in front of them.

“Carlos, for me, this tree holds the memory of your beautiful mother.”

The boy remembered his beautiful mother, and when he looked at the tree, he recognised it as the tree he sheltered inside during the storm. He walked over to it and ran his hand along the bark and he saw the rotting cavity in the bough. A piece of the bark broke off in his hand.

“But father, I don’t understand. Why this one? This tree is dead.”

His father walked over and put his arms around his son.

“This tree once lived. Though it is now dead, it hides nothing from a wise man. When you needed protection last night from the storm, you came to her, didn’t you? She was here for you, and we’ll both never forget her for that. It’s because of the memory I have placed here. When I tended your mother during her long illness, she became the only thing in my world, and for a time, I believed I knew nothing in this world, only the illness, and nothing more. When the men of our village lose someone precious, they go to the trees and place their memory of that person there. Each tree in the forest can hold a single memory in its lifetime, but it will only ever reveal the memory to those who truly understand the value of memories.”

His father whispered softly into the boy’s ear.

“Carlos, my son, let it out.”

They were quiet together until they sensed the onset of a new day. Before they left the forest, and before the rotting tree was out of sight, the boy spoke again to his father.

“Father, aren’t books for learning and knowledge?”

“Yes, they are.”

“Then, should the young of our village not read the books of wisdom and knowledge?”

“Yes, they should.”

For the first time in his life, the boy knew his father understood the memory of childhood.

Although the boy did not want to leave the tree, he wanted to be with his father, and he felt in his heart he had always known about the memory of trees, but he needed to hear the words from his father.

“Father, what is the memory of trees?”

“Love is the memory of trees.”

“What is love?”

“Love is the sap which binds the mind to the heart. Love is the unspoken truth between two lovers.”

They walked back to the hut, but the boy was still thinking about his mother’s tree in the forest. They lit the small wood-fire and sat together through the dawn. It would soon be warmer outside when the sun rose properly.

“Father, can someone love a tree?”

“Yes, Carlos. Sometimes we can love trees.”

***

The wise men and elders of the village gathered in the clearing by the forest. It was a peaceful morning and the sun was just rising up over the tips of the trees. They seated themselves roughly in a circle and shut their eyes. The dreams of the passing night flowed back to them. Though their eyes were shut, they knew one of the wise men was missing, and so they could not continue.

The father and his son walked to the clearing in the forest. They could see the others had already begun. They reached the clearing and sat down in the circle. One of the elders opened his eyes and saw the boy with his father.

“The boy can’t sit with elders and wise men. He is young and can’t understand the things which must always remain unspoken between us.”

The other elders and wise men kept their eyes closed. They were thinking about the memory of trees. The wise man, who was a friend of Carlos’ father, was sitting next to the elder who had spoken.

He spoke quietly, but firmly.

“The boy should stay.”

“Why? He is not yet a man,” asked another elder.

“It’s because the boy understands the memory of trees.”

Soon, they were all silent. Their eyes were closed and they were thinking about the memory of trees again. They continued to keep their eyes closed and remained silent because they understood forgiveness.

The boy opened his eyes for the first time since sitting down. His eyelids were heavy and his eyes a little glassy. He could see all the men before him in deep contemplation, except for his father’s friend, who was looking over at the boy. He smiled briefly at Carlos and then bowed his head. Carlos took this to be a good sign. It was good because they both understood that the memory of trees is far greater than the knowledge of trees.