# data[].attributes.body
eye in my pocket
a take
by mistake
a quiet journey
i didn't mean to tell
that beats
like valves opening
atriums and ventricles
bits and bobs
bobbing along
pushing on
pulling inward
from my innards
seeing something
half of something
half blind
but totally seeing

# data[].attributes.body
Cyclops: Polyphemus

# data[].attributes.body
flick
flip
i could go on
i could go numb

# data[].attributes.body
one two
one two
stride and tide
coming and going
towards the level that's unlevel
and righting again
a constant one two
as all resloves
above and below
to come again
til out of my depth
one two
one two
checking
one two

# data[].attributes.body
red raw
salty skin
salty sting
thinking of chips
salt and vinegar
in a brown bag
that crumples and sags
wrapped in newspaper
no more
on the wall
nudging granite bumpts
as i sit here
prickle
spark
the itch
of salty grains
the smooth of cold
shadow cold
cold cold
numb cold
move
to crumple
to rub
sand between my toes
to friction heat
my feet
my shins
up to my knees
fresh
stingy
alive
alive -o

# data[].attributes.body
Sirens

# data[].attributes.body
Planctae: Wandering Rocks

# data[].attributes.body
from my basket
front of bicycle
bumpy ride
foreground and distance
coming in and out of focus
the beat of basket
against
surface
like drum
or bodhrán
as a sound to call
to action
to dance
a sound to gather
an ancient sound
of ancient people
but
heard
in this place
at this time
in this body
and
this basket

# data[].attributes.body
screach
skid marks
thud on the sand
tide marks
as steady rhythm
blending
patterns of my passing
against
patterns of water's passing

# data[].attributes.body
(03.04.21)

# data[].attributes.body
Scylla and Charybdis

# data[].attributes.body
travelling
back
or
backwards
towards
through this grubby pane
heading
backing
returning
towards
the familiar
the city
the calm
of knowing this place
again
before i am eaten
by all the things
i have to do next

# data[].attributes.body
(03.04.21)

# data[].attributes.body
Lestrygonians

# data[].attributes.body
dart
morning
going south
my 5km radius held
another way in
another way out
another angle to be
another rhythm to move
all quiet
entering the sound
between land and sea
facing forward
going forward
dead calm
on this morning
on this day
at this hour
in this body
seeing outside
at a distance
as all is inside my head
all the same
being here
not there
as mover
as shaker

# data[].attributes.body
the warrier`
me here dry
you there chasing the wet
a mere substance that divides us
me safe in my dryness
you happy in the newness of being wet
wet footstep sounds gather us
as a unit
i could be brave
i could be braver
only
a question of suitable clothing
or no clothing
to make a warrier out of me
for all the new things that this would bring
next time
i will be braver

# data[].attributes.body
(02.04.21)

# data[].attributes.body
Aeolus

# data[].attributes.body
lens and lensless
camera running
in my pocket
left alone
to uninterfere
with my walking -
bright sun
sand patterns
of what went on
i amble out
from city edge
to waters edge
from waters edge
to city edge
my own thoughts
things i don't notice
things i do
my own filter -
the light
the sounds
traffic
voices
gulls
the surface
pattern underfoot
but through the lens' filter-
the changing horizon
my up and down
the sun white
my body crossing the lens
my shadow
what filters through
what has a voice
what story surfaces
from this place below

# data[].attributes.body
a place know
i think i know
ihalf recognise
half bewildered
muddled
from this place
beneath
there it is again
something i recognise
landmarks
sun and horizon
guiding me
from beneath
to the light
above always there
in some way

# data[].attributes.body
(31.03.21)

# data[].attributes.body
Hades

# data[].attributes.body
to all my future heres
hidden and eaten by the water
i am sure i'll be back
but for now
its time for lunch here
or
head home
for that scone that sits
by the fridge

# data[].attributes.body
i am here
and
then
i am not here
should i be
somewhere
else

# data[].attributes.body
(30.03.21)

# data[].attributes.body
The Lotus Eaters

# data[].attributes.body
morning
time again
never again
this
i walk
i pass
i watch
i am
passing
with a story
this voice
that no one heard
that some saw
that transformed all
the futures of all i passed

# data[].attributes.body
tide
coming in
quick
my coming and going
my marking
how
it came and went
i came and went
... gone

# data[].attributes.body
(28.03.21)

# data[].attributes.body
Calypso

# data[].attributes.body
morning
slow
traffic
lapping
voices
others
more others
faces
a dog pants
relics
a shell for my pocket
to love and to hold
to tell
of this here, in this place, in this body, at this time
does it  matter
who matters
i am gone

# data[].attributes.body
(19.03.21)

# data[].attributes.body
(13.03.21)

# data[].attributes.body
(27.03.21)

# data[].attributes.body
i
was
here
was
i
here
here
i
was
here
was
i
was
here
i

# data[].attributes.body
grians
there and now here
grains
scattered
all these heres
are future theres
transported...
the visible
and invisible
all these actions
are my future actions
all this material
my future matter
contact
to contact
this place my future place

# data[].attributes.body
taken
from one place
to another place
changed
from this to that
can matter be created
or destroyed
or changed
from one form
to another form

# data[].attributes.body
some kind of proof
or record
someway
to remember
to retell
somehow
to say that i was here

# data[].attributes.body
without camera
taking this place
home
carrying it
inside
sand on my shoes
matter
does it matter
that i am here
in this place
at this time
in this body

# data[].attributes.body
Proteus

# data[].attributes.body
not that late
not too dark
not sure

# data[].attributes.body
can't see everything
can't say everything
can hear though
right here
or wrong

# data[].attributes.body
screaching
gulls
traffic
voices
hum of the generator
not sure what i heard
saww the colours underfoot

# data[].attributes.body
As the term suggests, my cycle of episodic visual poems along the tidal flats of Sandymount Strand is not conclusive but continues to tell the story of this place, at this time and in this body – perhaps an endless story of turning and returning.

# data[].attributes.body
I took my camera on most of my wanderings, using still and moving images to explore, to gather and to document. Occasionally, I felt that the camera was over-mediating my experience and opted to leave the camera behind. In this camera-less state, I took to writing on the sand in an impulse to mark that I was here. I repeated this on other days and let my camera record the seawater erode  all I had written. Occasionally, I left the camera running in my pocket, in my bicycle basket or attached to my ankle so that it would not directly filter my experience yet would record my presence there. With all my camera work, I deliberately included the presence of my body in these processes – my handheld camera shake, my shadow crossing the sand, my reflection in the window through the train window, my feet kicking the sand and seawater before me, my unfocused blurs in the dark. Attached to my body, the camera facilitated my phenomenological approach, where the body is the primary site of knowing the world which cannot be disentangled from its thinking consciousness (Merleau-Ponty, 1945). As artist Charlotte Prodger states -

bodily systems are always enmeshed with the camera (in Luke, 2018).

# data[].attributes.body
The more times I returned to explore these tidal flats, the louder I heard echoes of this strand’s literary connections – dérives of other kinds: the fictional footsteps of Leopold Bloom and Stephen Dedalus along Sandymount Strand in Joyce’s Ulysses (1922), the Epic Cycle of Greek legend and travels of Homer’s Odyssey (800 bc), upon which Joyce structures his Ulysses. These literary connections to the tidal flats suggested a structure where each of my wanderings functioned as episodic poems that built into a narrative cycle of its own - threading together my disparate experiences. In contrast to the male protagonists of these literary traditions, this became a personal cycle – a story made up of my episodic poems about this place, at this particular time and in this particular body: a phenomenological approach (Merleau-Ponty, 1945), from my unheroic and female point of view. These episodic poems took on many forms and media – combining still images, moving images, voice and text. Indeed, words seemed to become part of my gathering and experience of this place – written and unwritten, said and unsaid and in the word ‘poems’ that had begun to form.

# data[].attributes.body
nighttime
fast approaching
nightown
i change my direction

# data[].attributes.body
towards land
unfamiliar
mechines of noises
noise of my own breath
watching
just watching

# data[].attributes.body
can't see
won't go
want to go

# data[].attributes.body
My approach to exploring these tidal flats was intentionally very organic. Rather than arrive on the strand with preconceived ideas, I wanted to allow the place to suggest itself on each visit – stirring whatever ideas or ways of working that came to mind and into focus. Increasingly, this involved gathering still and moving images, accompanied by the text and word ‘poems’ as responses.

# data[].attributes.body
Nestor

# data[].attributes.body
a returning
a turning
a cycle
a repeat
an again
around and around
again and again
a spin
a little at sea

# data[].attributes.body
heading

out to sea

i see

all at sea

feeting

nevermind

# data[].attributes.body
As a tidal area, this place transforms depending on whether the tide is in or out. Sometimes I can walk for hours before I get my feet wet, at other times there is little space to walk the strand before I am paddling or navigating space between other walkers. Like my footsteps, the ebb and flow of the sea leaves traces of its passing on the sand. Facing due east, the passing of time and the sun’s movement also transforms this place from bright expansive mornings to dark forbidding nights. One side of this tidal area is made up of reclaimed land - landfill produced from the waste of Dublin city, upon which sits the now defunct twin Poolbeg chimneys and Dublin Waste Incinerator, humming as it emits a constant flow of white smoke. These cycles of sea, sun, human industry and waste, seem to connect somehow with my repeated coming and going along these tidal flats.

# data[].attributes.body
Living in Dublin, Sandymount Strand is about 4km from my home and, as such, is within my restricted 5km radius that I am permitted to travel within, during the current phase of Ireland’s current Covid-19 lockdown measures. Within these restrictions, Sandymount Strand has taken on a new significance in my daily routine – a place that seems to expand my confines by offering a distant horizon and a place that extends my sense of the familiar, as I return there again and again.

# data[].attributes.body
Using the literary structure of a cycle, these episodic poems involve my various dérives which occurred on different days, at different times and in different ways, yet all centre on the same set of characters: me and these tidal flats as protagonists in these disparate narratives.

# data[].attributes.body
This is a collection of episodic visual poems in the story of my coming and going along the tidal flats of Sandymount Strand – a low-lying, tidal area on the edge of Dublin city and the southside of Dublin Bay.

# data[].attributes.body
half sea
half sand
half in
half out
half something
half something else
half heard
half way there
totally hungry
half now
half later
half captured
half forgotten
half here again
half somewhere else
that said
half said
only
half joking

# data[].attributes.body
Telemachus

# data[].attributes.body
tide inching
in
bit by bit
more
bitbybit
continuous
towards me
my soggy shoes

# data[].attributes.body
liquid border
inbetween
defining where
changing
ea to land
land to sea
shifting
moments
changing
positions
gone
altered
the map
the line that contains
the line between
this or that
one or the other