“Upon Arrival” (Film-Poem)

From the window of my office in Holborn, I watch the changing light of the London skyline with fascination.

Yesterday, with the help of an iPhone app, I propped my phone by the window for several hours and set it to take pictures six times per minute. I composited these images into video at 24 frames per second using Quicktime, then looped the clip back-and-forth, adjusted the colour, and added a panning and zooming effect using iMovie.

Valerie and I collaborated this morning on some accompanying words and music, combining it all together into another film-poem.

Upon Arrival

Longing dabbles in shadows
as the day doubles back,

offering honey and vinegar,
wine to the already drunk.

Memory, that bricklayer, stirs
its slush with a trowel.

Glazed squares shriek their re-
flected light. It is never enough.

Crevices hoard the darkness,
and hiss: never enough.

We rub against newsprint
until our thumbs go black.

Steam chafes against its pane of sky.
We can never go back.

Watch all film-poems in order