David Noo­nan
Eight Line Poem

To drag every­thing into the space, to prop­er­ly scru­ti­nize. All placed del­i­cate­ly on sculptor’s blan­kets and hauled qui­et­ly around the room (the soft shush­ing sound of the mate­r­i­al as it is moved across the floor). Try­ing to find the most incon­clu­sive and con­ducive posi­tion, the most per­fect­ly inar­tic­u­late and refined estab­lish­ment of a prob­lem. Per­haps one cor­ner of the room rather than its cen­tre to cut down on options. Things need to be pared away at first and nat­u­ral­ly the light has to be just right. Prepa­ra­tion is prac­ti­cal mag­ic but then so is appli­ca­tion. All the sym­bols must be gen­tly teased out, con­sid­ered, re-bal­anced, put into and back out of place. The head of a sculpt­ed owl is rit­u­al­ly stroked three times on enter­ing the space, oth­er­wise noth­ing would work.

To lay every­thing out sim­ply and sep­a­rate­ly. Now just sit for a moment to con­sid­er it all very close­ly toprop­er­ly not make any sense of it and to do that, as well for­mal­ly. To think about the most inter­est­ing ways each sep­a­rate part refus­es to func­tion. Once the coor­di­nates are in order, refine not define. Do. Undo. The many recon­dite rit­u­als involved, most­ly unno­ticed, unher­ald­ed. These are repeat­ed, the cycles are played out, lay­ered, obscured, revealed and re-clus­tered, aban­doned, the move­ments become eas­i­er, eas­i­er again then much hard­er until final­ly the aber­ra­tion finds itself hunt­ed down and prop­er­ly mis­con­strued, cor­rect­ly unfor­mu­lat­ed.

It is like the lay­ing down of a per­son­al and com­plete­ly dys­func­tion­al tarot, one of obscure but sim­ple design where­in arche­typ­al mean­ings have grown free of their orig­i­nal func­tions. Lib­er­at­ed. For what use have we now for a King? The Queen of which realm? Exam­in­ing instead, think­ing as it is being thought, inquir­ing vague­ly into des­tiny as it over­takes, inex­plic­a­ble. All this in the turn of a cuff, a sleeve, the rake of that beard.

Paul Beck­er, 2025