Air

deconstructing Moving Mountains

After the stunning section titled ‘Water’, which opens the anthology Moving Mountains, comes ‘Air’.

At the end of a migrainous week, my apologies if this post isn’t as articulate or poetic as the last. I’m hoping to capture something of the richness of content in the collection by unpacking a little of how I put it together.

Right now, all I can think of are clumsy sayings and phrases connected with air, all of which feel not quite right…’coming up for air’…’breath of fresh air’…’change is in the air’…they feel somehow inadequate in portraying what it is I want to say.

Elsewhere, I’m also writing about the Victorian medical recommendations for ‘a change of air’, of ideas of ‘good air’ and ‘bad air’. The ‘good air’ being found at the seaside and up mountains, far from still damp places, where the ‘bad air’ lived. These were often, coincidentally, where mosquitos and water-borne infections thrived, the source of many illnesses. While we might know more about bacteria and parasites today, aspects of so called ‘nature cures’ remain steadfast in society.

I feel like I am increasingly being told to ‘get outside’. And that’s great, when I can, but often (like this week) I can’t. This week I have been pinned to my bed or the sofa, grateful to be able to lift my head let alone get outside. One of the threads in the Introduction I wrote is of this tension - the well intentioned advocacy for sick and disabled people to benefit from fresh air and sunshine, the ‘great outdoors’, when this is not necessarily possible or always desirable.

For some people ‘nature’ does not offer sanctuary or comfort. For others, getting outside is fraught with barriers. Living with energy-limiting conditions, it’s often my own body that poses those barriers, in addition to the ones imposed by society.

I am at risk of spouting a lot of ‘hot air’, using ‘air quotes’ and filling ‘dead air’. My hope is that ‘change is in the air’.

[Short film of reeds at the edge of a canal blowing in the wind, grass either side and sheep beyond, beneath a blue sky.]

Each person breathes around 35lbs of air each day, around 11,000 litres or 2,000 gallons, that’s 22,000 breaths. Air and water are two of the things we all share amongst us around the world, recycled through our bodies. Each breath has something of other people’s breath, something of the trees and plants that have expired oxygen. We are all connected, human and more-than-human, by the air we breathe.

The contributors included in the section ‘Air’ are poets Hannah Hodgson, Cat Chong, Dillon Jaxx, and Louisa Adjoa Parker, as well as an essay by Louisa and another by me. The pieces refer to the sky and everything that isn’t on the ground or in the water. Cat’s piece went on to become their pamphlet, 712 Stanza Homes for the Sun, published by Broken Sleep Books. I can’t remember the first time I encountered Cat’s work, it was probably online at a poetry reading, but I do recall being enthralled by their pamphlet Plain Air: An Apology in Transit - also published by Broken Sleep. I feel an immersion in their work, similar to being in water but in air - it is hard to keep hold of and carries me through, absorbing the atmosphere they inhabit and whipping away with the wind.

Dillon’s and Hannah’s poetry is similarly captivating and powerful. Hannah has a run of accolades with several collections published [Where I Watch Plastic Trees Not Grow and 163 Days] and Dillon is increasingly becoming recognised as the powerful, talented, and skilful poet they are [winning the Brotherton Poetry Prize and the Rebecca Swift Foundation Women’s Poetry Prize].

Louisa Adjoa Parker is a well-established author and poet based in the English West Country. Of English-Ghanaian heritage, Louisa writes about her experience of ME/CFS as a Black woman and a mother in Moving Mountains. Exploring how she navigates the many complexities of misunderstanding and medical misogyny in addition to the multiple familial roles and griefs experienced. Twice shortlisted by the Bridport Prize and highly commended by the Forward Prize, she is also an engaging and sought after speaker. Alongside her poetry, Louisa works as an Equality, Diversity and Inclusion consultant, and, along with Louise Boston-Mammah, is co-director of The Inclusion Agency. She is a sought-after speaker on rural racism, black history, mental health and marginalisation. Her forthcoming coastal memoir is due to be published by Little Toller, who also published an essay from 2020 Where Are You Really From? on The Clearing.

My own piece in the anthology, titled ‘Things in Jars’, also offers something of the element of air and of how I, like others unable to go outside, might catch or capture fragments of the natural world rather than immersing ourselves in it. Last year I joined the Festival of Nature for a creative writing workshop, during it I shared some of the objects I’ve collected and brought home from walks - and everyone else did the same. Things that reminded us of the outside world when, like this week, I’m unable to go out and walk. My house is filled with beach finds and pebbles, bits of crab and egg cases. My shelves have sticks and shells perched on edges, mermaid purses propped up. Along with my Tiny Oceans (something I’ve written about in Moving Mountains as well as elsewhere), it can sometimes feel as though my life is being lived in the confines of a jar - a regular ‘change of air’ a necessity. At other times, the jar I live in can feel like a terrarium, another Victorian creation, where the inhabitants have all they need, self-sustaining in their small glass house.

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I am due to run another workshop this year for the Festival of Nature and am thrilled that this time I’ll be joined by Abi Palmer [check on the ‘events’ page for details].

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Moving Mountains is now out in paperback and is due for release in the US and Canada on 6th May, and in Australia in June.