“This is my function here today” – Ibrox Day 5 SUN @ Comm Games

July 27, 2014 By skyeloneragan in All kinds of queue Tags: artists in public, Australian poet, Commonwealth Games, counter number tickets, Creative Scotland funded, Cultral Programme 2014, Flags for sale, Glasgow, Glasgow Commonwealth Games, Ibrox Stadium, National Lottery funded, performance, performance poetry, Poet, poetry, poetry in queues, public art, public art engagement, queue poetry, Scottish public art, Skye, Skye Loneragan, Skye videos, spoken word, Sydney Poetry Prize, writer/performer Leave a comment

Sunday, in-queue– what if my national identity sells out? Flags flapping, helpers and hi-five, (take a look at the absolute resilience of this volunteer!)

We had a happy b-day in-queue, where as they waited, the whole of Copland St joined in to sing, Happy Birthday! I gave him a birthday present of a poem that could move with them. If not move them.

Lovely to actually be asked by someone next in line to please share another.

NEXT (STORY) TELLER PLEASE

And to actually share

THE REASON YOU RUCK

“it disappears this muscle clutch

in a grinding muffled roar

an elastic snap second

a blink-less swallow…

your rising determination

thrusts me back

till I’m swinging

nestled in your hooked elbow

egg-cold and tightly stitched

brushing your heaving chest

till I’m spinning

seed-giddy, through a held breath

hurtling between seven intentions

knocking teeth loose in a tackle

at a rugby sevens line up.

Where do you think they are from? Stewart asks, of those wearing a green and gold t-shirt, boasting AUSSIE, carrying an inflatable kangaroo & clutching a curling colonial flag. Maybe there is something in a stereotype because we bonded rather quickly, and I shared the poem about the sea and Sydney-

“the bridge yawns gracefully above

houselights huddle on a stolen headland

camped conversations silenced by distance

and the inky black spill of still ocean

the water is a kiss or a slap

against the city’s concrete rim–

I can’t decide”

We cut quickly to political agitation. The Brits were the first boat people to land on Australia, ah, “she knows our history” one of them chimed in. Lets not in Britain suffer from the same amnesia that Australia does when it comes to what actually happened to get us where we are today. Empire was, and did, and settlement wasn’t really so much that as invasion, and where I come from I’m not considered Indigenous and the first people were not the first to suffer a near genocide, and there is today a Commonwealth of nations in which there is rarely (each of us) a common wealth.

Wow, what a day! Despite the slight dribble of rain, the wind blowing my poncho into a portable ‘poet’ bubble, and the tube station hold ups, (long lovely queues) – there were smiles and spectator glee.

“softly surfacing pride”…poetry in queues dubbed ‘left-field’ entertainment in Oz media

July 26, 2014 By skyeloneragan in All kinds of queue Tags: ABC, ABC radio interviews, artists in public, Australian poet, Barbara Miller, Commonwealth Games, counter number tickets, Creative Scotland funded, Cultral Programme 2014, Glasgow, Glasgow Commonwealth Games, National Lottery funded, performance, performance poetry, Poet, poetry, poetry in queues, public art, public art engagement, queue poetry, Scottish public art, Skye, Skye Loneragan, Skye videos, SMH poetry, spoken word, Sydney Morning Herald arts, Sydney Poetry Prize, writer/performer Leave a comment

ABC audio interview – with Barbara Miller

Who decides it is a welcoming city? Day 4 SAT @ Comm Games

July 26, 2014 By skyeloneragan in All kinds of queue Tags: artists in public, Australian poet, Commonwealth Games, counter number tickets, Creative Scotland funded, Cultral Programme 2014, Glasgow, Glasgow 2014, Glasgow Commonwealth Games, National Lottery funded, performance, performance poetry, Poet, poetry, poetry in queues, public art, public art engagement, queue poetry, Scottish public art, Seeds of Thought, Skye, Skye Loneragan, Skye videos, spoken word, Sydney Poetry Prize, Tawona Sithole, writer/performer Leave a comment

The woman you hear was a warm voice to edge past in all the crowds and traffic congestion, the re-direction and the road blocks. She was tirelessly welcoming people,

“Hello and welcome to Glasgow!

And if you’re not from Glasgow, thanks for having us, for putting up with us”

I thanked her with a little tiny piece of poetry, and you’ll hear people passing and saying hi or a squeak of celebration.

Tawona pointed out too, that it is not up to the host to decide that they are the most welcoming city. It is up to the guests, and those that are visiting – or those that live here and haven’t always been welcome.

There is a cause uniting people- getting games traffic through, putting on a decent show in the face of some international attention and I feel folk are stepping across dividing lines a little more. Though it is hard to step across anything really with so many road blocks.

It was flotilla day, the ships were reportedly rolling any moment, so the eyes were gazing out across the Clyde. We caught up with those waiting on the bridge.

The Riverside was flowing in usual fashion -huge crowds but rarely a long line up to work within, and folk taking a break to sit and sip. We kept clear of the security barriers as requested, so the critical tension points were again out of our reach. It is remarkable though what a little bit of dialogue does to crack open a creative quest. You really can feel the butterfly wing begin to softly shake the Earth.

ABC Sport Pages online listing for a poet at the Commonwealth Games

July 26, 2014 By skyeloneragan in All kinds of queue Tags: ABC online, art in Oz, artists in public, Australian poet, Commonwealth Games, counter number tickets, Creative Scotland funded, Cultral Programme 2014, Glasgow, Glasgow Commonwealth Games, National Lottery funded, performance, performance poetry, Poet, poetry, poetry in queues, poets in media, public art, public art engagement, queue poetry, Scottish public art, Skye, Skye Loneragan, Skye videos, spoken word, Sydney Poetry Prize, writer/performer 2 Comments

Barbara Miller from ABC Online caught up by chance at the SECC – thanks to Jack Peck Sydney Word In Hand Poetry Master for tipping her off- and we are on front page of ABC online!!!

Pedalling Poetry & the Common ‘Weal’

July 25, 2014 By skyeloneragan in All kinds of queue Leave a comment

Stewart again has made a little magic in capturing what we’ve been up to-

note the reference to Scotland’s Paper for a vision of its own future, The Common Weal

Crossing from Emirates to Glasgow Green and on to the SECC, the visual text on our backs came to arouse curiosity as we pedalled past, or stopped at lights… either a gaffaw or a gleeful eruption of a driver’s face behind a windscreen at the wheel. P O E T. Look.

I find the idea that a poet can be a job description one that can delight and crack open a question all at once.

The Emirates Stadium & Chris Hoy Velodrome drove us up a hill, quite literally. The flow of spectators were being funnelled through so efficiently, we found ourselves on the little mound beside the security queues we weren’t allowed to engage with…simply sharing with those waiting. Waiting for friends, or family, waiting for the barriers to be opened, waiting for their tickets to arrive.

And then back at the SECC suddenly a queue, a Clyde-long queue formed in just a few minutes. I found myself sharing a poem with a cluster of fascinating women lining up to see the Netball, one of whom has written back to me on this blog and said thanks- and then a boisterous and energetic bunch of beautiful young women who heard my Glasgow poem (We’ve All Been Here Before) (& forgave me)..and voted to hear I WON, I, ONE – as well.

The media caught up with us Clyde-side, the Sydney Morning Herald and ABC (Aust) & I shared the poem about what I call the ‘lemon-ink apartheid’ that still exists in Australia despite so many people’s efforts to acknowledge our history: CONTRAST II.

The only qualification needed today for anyone to be offered a gift was that they were waiting, and that they wanted it.