Now you see them, now you don't

Three Invisibles

The sea is invisible
under a sun-scatter of light.

What are you invisible under?
From what hard foreland of being

do I fail to see you?

I could put a boat
into that baffling glitter

that would tameit, that would slide
on the veriest water...

Inland, the mountains

withdraw

behind a beautiful blue haze.

I could walk through that haze

and reach those mountains,
I could measure them

with legs and lungs.

Is it your beauty

that comes between me and you?

Is what strips me

to my unwilling self

your closest shelter?

What wrong place am I in
who, of three invisible things,

love most the one

no voyage may take me to,

no journey will ever take me to?

Norman MacCaig, June 1964

I've been getting used to the idea of 'invisibles' over the past few weeks in Cumbria: all too often the mountains are hidden behind cloud that's not so much a veil as an overcoat. But, as MacCaig says, they can be measured 'with legs and lungs', and running in this landscape is always a comfort as well as a test.

Last weekend, I was performing at Latitude Festival in Henham Park, Suffolk and was thinking about that other sense of invisibility that MacCaig invokes in 'Three Invisibles'. The audiences in the poetry tent - which had a stunning line up this year, from the legendary John Cooper Clarke to Blake Morrison and Jacob Polley - were variable and almost tidal, sometimes a huge crowd at the back, sometimes a scattering of sleepy, hungover teenagers slumping on cushions at the front. One the one hand, that made it quite difficult to plan a set. On the other hand, I realised, we're always rehearsing for a kind of invisible audience anyway. There are always people in your mind when you practice and perform your poems who aren't really in the audience, who perhaps never have been or will be, but who shape your reading all the same.

Those 'significant others' are often there when we write too, and they can be a healthy influence as long as they aren't too much of a censoring, editorial presence. They're often the people who, ironically, probably wouldn't give a toss about our poems if they were here - old lovers, greater poets, disapproving relatives... - but they have a hand in them, like it or not.

However many 'invisibles' were in the tent at Latitude (insert jokes about invisible poetry audiences here), the festival was a thoroughly enjoyable experience, with highlights including Daniel Kitson and Gavin Osborne's mesmerising midnight storytelling by the lake. You can see a photosynth of me doing some poems from 'a pint for the ghost' in the poetry tent by clicking here. Note the er, stylish black dress and army shop wellies combination...

I'm now preparing to take 'A Pint...' to Edinburgh in August, where I'll be performing at the PBH Free Fringe from 4th-16th August in the Banshee Labrynth, including a special 'Utter Ghouls' event with the excellent Tim Turnbull on August 13th.