In this final episode of Season Three, Stephen Sawyer discusses Jorie Graham's poem 'Time Frame' in relation to his own poem 'What We Did Know We Had or Running Thin'.
Together, we explore Jorie Graham's journey as a poet. Stephen provides a concise biography, and then goes on to explore how her writing-focus has changed over the course of her career. He spends time, in particular, on Jorie Graham's techniques and approaches as a poet, eschewing linear narrative and the idea of the 'clear' ending, and also concentrates on her attention to climate change, and articulating the consequences of the Anthropocene. We discuss the poem 'Time Frame' at length, reflecting on the 'instabilities' in the text, on the narrative voice, on time itself, the 'American project' and the disappearance of the fortune teller as the poem progresses.
We then go o...
In this final episode of Season Three, Stephen Sawyer discusses Jorie Graham's poem 'Time Frame' in relation to his own poem 'What We Did Know We Had or Running Thin'.
Together, we explore Jorie Graham's journey as a poet. Stephen provides a concise biography, and then goes on to explore how her writing-focus has changed over the course of her career. He spends time, in particular, on Jorie Graham's techniques and approaches as a poet, eschewing linear narrative and the idea of the 'clear' ending, and also concentrates on her attention to climate change, and articulating the consequences of the Anthropocene. We discuss the poem 'Time Frame' at length, reflecting on the 'instabilities' in the text, on the narrative voice, on time itself, the 'American project' and the disappearance of the fortune teller as the poem progresses.
We then go on to explore Stephen's poem. He 'unpacks' his own techniques and how Jorie Graham has influenced his ways of communicating in his own work. He talks about the idea of why the poem is right justified, for instance - in relation to Graham's own practice. He ruminates on the rise of the notion of 'climate crisis' over the past fifty years - from his childhood experiences on the north-west coast of England to now. He reflects on the role of the poet, and finding an audience. What moves him to write long poems?
You can read Jorie Graham's poem 'Time Frame' here (with an audio reading by the poet) in the London Review of Books archive. This poem comes from the Collection To 2040 (Carcanet, 2023), which you can read about here.
You can read about Stephen's book - There Will Be No Miracles Here - following this link. You can read about (and order a copy of) Carrying a Tree on the Bus to Low Edges here.
What We Did Know We Had or Running Thin
It’s a shock I know
the drowning sea,
fishes floating
between sharp stems
in the slowing current
at the water’s edge,
the disturbance of
our parting. Don’t worry,
it’s still the past, the fast
and furious, furious,
the utter, instant now,
the later-human voice,
fishes breaking camp,
unsettled in their skin,
hastening remorselessly,
as arrows in a free flow
diagram to the zero-
point. Are you the seventh
generation staring back at me
as me. What we did
know we had. I remember
the sea touching the clouds
in the voice of the rain,
net curtains nailed up,
a single yellow daffodil
in the garden next door.
If the worst should befall us.
Aren’t those the garden steps
where Rhianna, your neighbour,
shone her torch? What is it you know
about me, I don’t.
Which part of the body am I.
Which part of which body am I.
How many self-destructive parts
of now? To whom am I not listening.
The wind is a wounded creature.
The sea is a wounded creature.
I feel so much more
and less than a mental bird
in a mental cage hastening
to that rip in the fabric
at four hundred and forty parts
per million of atmospheric CO₂.
Companions will be found for you,
a reflexively contrarian shadow text
→Choose Gospel→Cloud Tech
→AI Systems→Species→Menu
and ‘I’ was to think ‘you’
thinking ‘me.’
Tentacles! Six ‘personal others’
between you and me,
a set of suckers, jet propulsive,
high-fiving that bottle-backed
bubble-headed, giant frog.
How much of us have gone.
Remember me, says Sea-roar.
What it was to run
after that orange Trophy football
on Ainsdale village green, bent
double, gasping for laughter,
our one thousand odours
of salt, the boat is lurching
purple waves claw the sails,
small as grains of rice. Remember,
the valley of dormant smokestacks,
the man in Y-fronts on his drive
way unabashed by your appearance
at the gate, “So beautiful … they
see nothing,” says the failing light.
Who is the ghost,
who is the ghost’s
ghost? a ghost asks.
Is this a now.
Am I still in minutes.
Can all this happen in reverse.
Butterflies were giants once.
Elvis waved rain from the sky
so his friends could play racquet ball,
before projecting himself to the stars,
wearing trainers and a guru scarf,
The Leaves of Morya’s Garden
Volumes 1 & II tucked under his arm.
You feel it before you know it.
I can’t hear them
screaming, weeping, see
them doubling down
on Nettleham Road.
Is that are they drums
drones, tanks? Hurry,
→Hurry, Faster, Faster
Do you prepare? How
do you prepare
for the Venus effect.
Some people scuba dive, cruise
and fly. I keep looking for left-
over signs, hieroglyphs,
jutting spikes, a human hand finger-
shaking on a red background.
Please, don’t follow me to the right
hand margin, I am the temporary.
“How’s your portion
of the crisis?” Rhianna would say,
wielding her pruning shears,
bindweed flows mindlessly,
“ What do the readings say?”
Bone and ice density, breaking
lines, torn cables, loose voices,
chinos and chunky watches,
punch-lines like loose stones.
Are we still here. If you can
read this, time is not late.
Your guest is waiting for you
to grunt, drum, click,
use the wrist-plate, sub-pen,
bridle and saddle a sea horse,
with a light touch. Hold on.
Before completing an M.A. in creative writing at Manchester University, Stephen Sawyer worked as a naval rating, bartender, painter and decorator, actor, stand-up comic and, most recently, as a university lecturer in the social sciences. His writing reflects the sharp edge of the north where he was born and raised. He lives in Sheffield and teaches creative writing and English skills in the community. Stephen has had poems published in magazines and anthologies. His first collection, There Will Be No Miracles Here, was published by Smokestack Books in 2018. Carrying a Tree on the Bus to Low Edges, was published by Smokestack Books in 2024.
You can follow me on Bluesky - @cwjoneschris.bsky.social for more updates on future episodes.
You can find out more about my own writing through my website - chris-jones.org.uk - or on my Substack Swift Diaries.
The end music was composed and played by William Jones.
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