this is a
virtual
space

Current

August
AThe

Annie is launching the Boredom Project.

As part of a 3-year PhD research degree at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, Annie will work on a large-scale artistic project about boredom. Combining theoretical scholarly work and creative practice, the project is designed to explore the potential of boredom for activist art.

To fund the first year of the degree, Annie is also running a crowdfunding campaign to help cover some of the university fees associated with the project.

Find out more about the project at:

https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/the-boredom-project/
http://boredomproject.co.uk/
May
Adjacent

Annie’s poem “Walls” is published in the forth issue of the online journal Adjacent Pineapple.

Have a read at:

https://www.adjacentpineapple.com/issue-four
February
A

For one night only, Annie will be exhibiting some new work at the Old Hairdressers in Glasgow on 10 February 2018. As part of the event “A CUT ABOVE” there will be live music by local bands West Princes, Hairband, Tongue Trap and The Pale Kids, as well as an art exhibition. Next to Annie, Glasgow-based artists Iveta Smidt and Pablo Llopis will be exhibiting their work.

Saturday, 10 February 19:00-23:00 at The Old Hairdressers (20-28 Renfield Lane, G2 6PH)

Tickets are £4 / £6.

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/a-cut-above-feat-west-princeshairbandtongue-trapthe-pale-kids-tickets-41700737027
November
Seen

Annie was delighted to be invited to contribute to “Seen/Unseen”, a collection of an ekphrasis poems, prose and essays written in response to the ‘Hidden Gems’ exhibition at the City Art Centre in Edinburgh. Her poem which responded to Anne Redpath’s print “Corsican Village (Hillside Village)” was included alongside more than 40 other poets and writers from all over Scotland.

The collection is available for £6 at the City Art Centre gift shop.

The exhibition is still open until 13 May 2018.

https://www.edinburghmuseums.org.uk/whats-on/hidden-gems-0
February
One

Annie joins a fantastic line-up of poets, writers and musicians at the music and spoken word event in support of “One Day Without Us” on 19 February 2017. The event is designed to raise awareness about migration issues and celebrate Glasgow’s cultural diversity. Annie will be reading from her new poetic series “Similar Topics”.

Sunday, 19 February 2017 at 7:30pm at Kinning Park Complex in Glasgow.

https://www.facebook.com/events/675920259262907/
January
Scottish

Annie is excited to be shortlisted for the Scottish Book Trust’s 2017 New Writers Awards.

The New Writers Awards are awarded every year to outstanding writers committed to developing their career. It is a great stepping stone and Annie is delighted to be considered for the shortlist.

October
Women

Annie was invited to join fellow poet Theresa Muñoz and author Giada Gaslini at “Women moving abroad”, an evening of readings and discussions about the experience of moving to a foreign country. She will be reading from her new poetic series “Similar Topics” which explores concepts and emotions surrounding migration and citizenship.

Sunday 30 October 2016, 5:30pm at the Salisbury Centre in Edinburgh.

Tickets are free: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/women-moving-abroad-tickets-27691312461

https://www.facebook.com/events/649800158523210/
October

Annie was thrilled to present her performance “A is for Auden” on Tuesday 11 October 2016 at the 1A Poetry and Poetics lecture at the University of Glasgow. She followed an invitation by Dr Jane Goldman to perform her piece alongside fellow poet JL Williams in a lecture dedicated to the legacy of T.S. Eliot’s essay “Tradition and the Individual Talent”.

August
The Locale August 2016

The video poem “August 2.0” will be part of the Locale’s group exhibition “Moving On” at the Old Hairdressers in Glasgow. The collective connects the diverse practice of 24 artists working around the theme of “Place”.

Annie’s contribution will be a short video piece based on her poem of the same name. The piece uses holiday beach footage to overlay real and stylised experiences of place.

Wednesday 31 August 2016 at 7pm.

https://www.facebook.com/events/1729540853951515/
August
Radiophrenia August 2016

Annie’s sound pieces “a-shame-d” and “Straining my voice” have been selected for broadcast as part of this year’s Radiophrenia programme. Radiophrenia is a temporary art radio station based at Glasgow’s CCA. It will be broadcasting live from 29 August to 11 September 2016 on 87.9FM and online via livestream.

Annie’s pieces will be airing on Monday 29 August at 1pm ("a-shame-d”) and Sunday 4 September ca. 1:30pm ("Straining my voice").

http://radiophrenia.scot/
June
Outside-in / Inside-out June 2016

Annie’s poetic performance “A is for Auden” was chosen to be part of the “Outside-in / Inside-out” Poetry Symposium and Festival scheduled to take place in Glasgow from 5 to 7 October 2016.

Inspired by the recently published fifth volume of Jerome Rothenberg and John Bloomberg-Rissman’s Poems for the Millennium, Barbaric Vast & Wild, the festival will focus on the role of Outside and Subterranean Poetry. Talks, performance and readings will take place at University of Glasgow, the Glasgow Centre for Contemporary Arts (CCA), and the Glasgow Women’s Library.

The festival programme will be announced soon.

https://outsidepoetryfestival.wordpress.com/
April
Hidden Door April 2016

Annie is extremely honoured to be part of the Invited Poetry and Spoken Word Programme at Hidden Door festival in Edinburgh. The festival will take place at King’s Stables Road from 27 May to 4 June 2016 and presents an eclectic mix of music, art, theatre, cinema, spoken word, poetry, bars, and street food.

Annie will be presenting her newest poetic performance “Surper” on 30 May 7-7:30 pm.

Tickets for the night: £10

http://hiddendoorblog.org/
April
After Gertrude April 2016

After Gertrude is now complete. For one year, Annie wrote two poems a week in response to the 103 poets included in the Norton Anthology of Postmodern American Poetry. Visit the blog to see the results of this challenging poetic journey.

http://aftergertrude.blogspot.co.uk/
December
Raum Poetry Magazine December 2015

Annie’s poem “August” is included in the second issue of the poetry magazine Raum, which is now available online and at a range of retailers in Glasgow and Edinburgh.

http://raumpoetry.com/
November
Caesura Edinburgh November 2015

Annie will be reading at Caesura #35 in Edinburgh on Friday, 13 November 2015.

Caesura is an eclectic night of experimental and engaging performances focusing on poetry and the avant garde. The event will include readings and performances by MacGillivray, David Keenan, Ciaran Healy and Annie Higgen.

19:30 - 22:30 at Summerhall, 1 Summerhall, Edinburgh, EH9 1PL. Tickets: £5.

http://www.summerhall.co.uk/2015/caesura-35/
November
Bread and Memory at bakery47

As part of the CCA’s Cooking Pot community project, Annie and bakery47 are organising their second poetry event: “bread & memory / poetry & potluck”. The event will take place on Monday, 2 November 2015 at 7:30pm at the bakery café on Victoria Road and will include poetry readings by Calum Rodger, Katy Hastie, nick-e melville and Annie Higgen.

Tickets are available via the bakery, £5 per person, BYOB.

http://www.cca-glasgow.com/programme/5612683b888e62cf6800000d

August
The Local at McCune Smith

The sound piece “Managed Perceptions” will be part of the first group exhibition of The Locale, a cross-platform network of creatives working around the theme of ‘Place’. This work explores notions of public space in the context of Glasgow’s continuing redevelopment.

The exhibition will run from 27 August to 28 September at McCune Smith in Glasgow.

http://thelocale.co.uk/
August
Second Space (August 2015)

Annie will be part of the “Second Space” poetry event at Safari Lounge in Edinburgh on Friday, 7 August 2015.

The event brings together a number of local poets in a mixture of readings, films and music.

8pm to midnight, at Safari Lounge, Cadzow Place, London Road, Edinburgh, EH7 5SN.

https://www.facebook.com/thesafariloungeuk
July
Pizza & Poems at bakery47

Annie is organising a poetry event in cooperation with Glasgow’s bakery47. “Pizza and poems” will take place on Monday, 20 July 2015 at 7pm at the bakery café on Victoria Road: an evening of delicious pizzas and poetry readings by Tom Docherty, Annie Higgen, Molly Miltenberger Murray and Molly Vogel.

Tickets are £10 per person, BYOB.

To book a ticket get in touch with Annie via annie.higgen [at] gmail.com or use our contact form.

https://www.facebook.com/bakery47
June
Time to Change Art Project

The sound piece Straining My Voice, which reflects upon the political discourse around the European Union in the UK, will be part of the Time To Change Art Project. The project is design to analyse feelings and perceptions about the European crisis in a number of art exhibitions. The first exhibition will take place at Tent Gallery in Edinburgh from 13th to 20th June 2015.

http://www.timetochangeartproject.com/

https://asnse.wordpress.com/tent/

May
Molly Miltenberger Murray: The Atelier Project

Annie’s poems "To Built A Habit", "To S." and "To Write" appear in the The Atelier Project: Conversations about Creativity, edited by Molly Miltenberger Murray.

The volume is currently available for preview on Issuu and will shortly be available on Amazon.

http://atelierproject.net/2015/05/14/atelier-project-on-issuu/
April
Radiophrenia

Annie’s sound piece The Letter will be broadcast by temporary art radio station Radiophrenia on 18 April 2015:

http://radiophrenia.scot/

The piece was also included in the preview selection for the project on Soundcloud:

https://soundcloud.com/radiophrenia

March
The Locale

Annie is excited to join The Locale, a cross-platform network of creatives exploring the theme of 'Place.'

http://thelocale.co.uk/

The Artist

Annie Runkel

Annie Runkel (formerly also known as Annie Higgen) is a poet and sound artist who works across different media and art forms. Her practice aims for an interdisciplinary approach to contemporary art and frequently incorporates forms of political and social activism. In her work, she alternates between more traditional forms of page-based poetic writing, digital media, and sound works.

Her practice is influenced by a wide range of sources including contemporary music and sound art, new media theories, conceptual art, and experimental literary movements. All of these fuel her decidedly 21st century notion of art as part of a necessary dialogue between areas of life which have previously been seen as separate or even opposing. Her work thus seeks to incorporate and draw connections between technical and scientific developments on one side and social and political discourses on the other.

She is particularly interested in exploring concepts of place within social and political frameworks and she has developed audio works, net-based pieces, book works, and performances in relation to a number of sites in London.

Annie graduated from Royal Holloway, University of London in 2014 with an MA in Poetic Practice. She previously studied musicology in Hamburg, Germany and moved to poetry and more experimental sound art after years as a singer and song writer. She has published her poems in art and poetry magazines.

CV Download

Paper

February 7th

February 7th is based upon the diary of Queen Victoria. It is a collection of event scores in the tradition of Fluxus, presented in the format of a calendar. The score for each day represents her account of every February 7th in her life since the age of 13 (when she first started her journals). The brief and simple form of the Fluxus event scores, juxtaposed with the grandeur of the origin of the source text poses questions about the status of royalty and highlights human empathy and the mundane, repetitive nature of everyday life. Just like every event score they also invite performance – Pick a day, be the Queen of England.

See the scores here.

February 7th 1 February 7th 2

Revealing/Concealing

A hand-bound photo album interlaced with a poem, Revealing/Concealing deals with the topic of autobiographical memory. In its use of photography and writing and their function in creating memory the piece reflects in particular upon the relationship between identity and memory, drawing attention to phenomenon like childhood amnesia and false or concealing memories.

Please get in touch if you would like a copy.

Revealing Concealing 1 Revealing Concealing 2

Trees

Trees is an ecopoetic work which draws on the ancient story of Erisicthon in Ovid’s Metamorphoses (8.738-878). In this story Erisicthon cuts down a tree inhabited by a nymph and is consequently punished for his actions by insatiable hunger. To satisfy his appetite he repeatedly sells his daughter until, at last, he devours himself.

Trees uses this old legend as a starting point for an exploration of the relationship between trees and humans today, negotiating the effect and possible consequences of human interventions into the realm of nature. The poetic work uses found material from guidebooks on gardening and news stories alongside Ovid’s text. The ancient Greek text has in turn been subjected to chance operations, thus reflecting the role of chance in nature and evolution. The particular mixture of images and text produced by this procedure creates a stunning network of references and interrelations which draw attention to the fragile relationship between humankind and nature and asks questions about the power dynamics between the two.

See the PDF here or order the book on Blurb.

Trees 1 Trees 2

Sound

The Letter

The Letter is a spoken-word piece about benefit sanctions in the UK. The work uses the original wording of letters sent out by the Department of Work and Pensions to trace the effect of this bureaucratic language on the lives of people in the UK. By turning the machine-typed messages into spoken text, The Letter aims to draw attention to the contrast between the impersonal technical terms and polite phrases of the letters, and the personal impact these have in the everyday lives of people. It also addresses the social stigma that is often involved.

The Letter was broadcast by the temporary art radio station Radiophrenia at Glasgow’s Centre for Contemporary Arts on 18 April 2015. The piece was also included in a selection of Radiophrenia submissions broadcast by Radio Panik: L’Etranger on 15 & 25 April 2015.

Senescence

Senescence is a sound exploration in relation to the taboo of aging and dying. Based on a lengthy poetic text which explores our society’s obsession with beauty and youth in juxtaposition with the increasing marginalisation and dehumanisation of the elderly, the sound piece is the result of rigorous censoring procedure. All of the words are cut from the sound work, leaving behind only sounds of the body itself: the breathing of the speaker, the little spits and hisses that remain unnoticed when hidden away between words. Subjected to tabooing, censored, silenced, robbed of a way to express themselves, the speaker emerges as a mere body; as the very body which is suffering the inevitable ageing processes society wants to ignore. By taking away language, the bodily reality emerges more dramatically, its truth hits more forcibly.

Sore

Sore is a poetic sound piece for headphones. Out of the harmless topic of a sore throat the piece builds a menacing multi-layered sound piece about sexual violence. The ambiguity of the text which is entirely sourced from medical texts and doctor’s jargon is gradually heightened into frightful explicitness as the physical constraint of the speaking situation grows more and more uncomfortable. The tension created by the victim’s use and limitation to the language of the patriarchal authority which suppresses her is central to the piece. With the help of these different constraints the piece is able to address topics such as the objectification of women and the silencing and shaming of victims of sexual violence in our society.

Site

Surper

Surper is a multi-media performance piece exploring contemporary city scape. Inspired by Victoria Road on Glasgow’s South Side, one of the city’s most multicultural neighbourhoods, the piece weaves together stories and histories in a journey both towards and away from meaning. The street’s flashy LED displays and weathered neon signs provide the backdrop for a poetic investigation into city life and the experience of migration.

Surper was originally created for performance at the Hidden Door Art Festival in Edinburgh in May 2016.

Surper

Marchland Park

Marchland Park is a site-specific audio work dedicated to the Parkland Walk in the borough of Haringey, North London. The piece takes the form of a poetic audio guide which is designed to be listened to on headphones while walking along the park. Grounded on several months of intensive site research, the piece presents a tightly knit network of text and sounds which draw together historical facts, ancient folk tales and poetic daydreams. Developed with a strong ecological agenda, the piece wants people to see and experience the nature which surrounds them every day in a different way by drawing attention to the historical and ecological development of the site and revealing the intricate conditions of human / non-human coexistence in the city.

The audio guide and additional information is available at http://marchlandpark.co.uk/.

Marchland Park

An Invitation to the Palace

In coordination with the online site-writing project This Is A Virtual Space, which was dedicated to the historic site of the Crystal Palace (1851-1936), An Invitation To The Palace was a poetic project in the streets of London in August 2013. In a series of thought-provoking posters dotted around the area of Crystal Palace in South London, the project intended to create flashlights of poetic encounters and invited by-passers to explore the space – both mental and actual that the palace has left behind.

Invitation 1

A Westminster Pilgrim

A Westminster Pilgrim is an experiment in site-writing, an exploration, a journey into and beyond site. Its starting point is Westminster Cathedral in London Victoria. Following the history and origin of the church’s unique green marble, the text lays out a network of disparate journeys, which paths cross, entwine, run parallel, break-off again and run in opposite directions, held together by a particular kind of motion connected to the church’s interior and its nature as the home of an international community of believers. New and unexpected connections emerge in a poetic pilgrimage towards meaning, creating a different kind of experience of a well-known, famous site.

See the PDF here or order the book on Blurb.

Westminster 1 Westminster 2

Virtual

Annie’s most recent project is the weblog After Gertrude which is dedicated to the Norton Anthology of Postmodern American Poetry, edited by Paul Hoover.

The project wants to celebrate and remember the ground-breaking work of the different poets included in the volume, but it is also designed as a creative challenge. For one year, Annie did not only read the anthology and introduced its 103 poets on the blog, she also published two poems a week in response to their work. Taking the great variety of different poetics as a starting point for new work, After Gertrude explores mechanisms of inspiration as well as questions about personal style and originality and pushes the limits of the poet’s versatility. Through the rapid production speed of two poems a week, the project also hopes to mirror the one thing which Hoover believed united the diverse poets in his anthology: their understanding of poetry as “writing-as-process” rather than “writing-as-product”. In this tradition, After Gertrude presents experimental poetry pure and simple – open-ended, curious.

Visit the blog at aftergertrude.blogspot.co.uk

Some examples of the work produced as part of the project can be found below:

  • Hackney Pandora

    it’s not so much about
    curiosity
    as about               finding  someone
    to blame for all
    the         dog shit
    & take-away                      chicken
    bones & blue
    off-license plastic bags
    garnishing the   trendy                  side-
    walks     of artisan sourdough dreams

    sweeping            it                            all           up
    every morning at six thirty-five before
    we          catch
    the over               - ground to highbury     or kingsland
    as if        land                      -fill the fucking void
    or congestion
    charge

    just like the cats
    and sacks
    and that               weirdo schroedinger
    (or so they say )              when
    singed fur smell &            skunk                   fills the
    air
    & you can’t escape                           it
    forty hours are never                     enough
    in the shade of
    shards &
    restaurant                          bookies
    plain                      payday mockery

    most of us           (  living)                               in            a              box
    anyway
    with the mouldy bits
    &             three     weeks                   of rent                                 behind

    so all      they                       are concerned   about
    is to                                                        screw
    the lid back on
    screw
    the lid back on
    so that
    fucking laughing cynic

    hope                    remains

    (inspired by Paul Blackburn)

  • A Private Occasion in a Public Place 2.0

    (inspired by David Antin)

  • Melted

    I was taught to think of it as an aggregate. Collection of items that are gathered together to form a total quantity. Melted trees to wet concrete. The shiny glister of the drop on the flat surface: broken sunshine. It is June and I have gathered my quantities in shaky cupped hands. I was taught to think of it as the world. He poured me a Whiskey Sour on clear crystal ice cubes. That was yesterday; I am passing today. Running down the page like quicksilver. I am room temperature. Call me tepid. I cool a little more with each surface augmentation. I cool a little more with each plunge. I was taught to think of it as I sat on the steamy side of the window. I am liquid. Now approaching Airdire. Drumgelloch. Running down a diagonal path across our lives: downhill. Always subject to gravity. Slipping down the drain pipe with the withered leaves of last spring. I was taught to think of it as a light solution. Watered down toxic goo. I trickle. Syrupy contemplations. I was taught to think of it as little as possible.

    (inspired by Bill Berkson)

  • Choose a file to upload

    I am looking for the photo that would make all the difference in my life. It is at a certain height, at a certain angle. It catches the light in a certain way. It makes the scene. It stands out. It is me virtually. It shows where I am and where I am coming from. It displays how far I have made it up until now. It reveals my potential. It projects my path. This photo is my past and my presence. It lives my dreams. It reflects my soul. This photo holds meaning. It tells a story. It captures some profound truth. This photo sends a message. It shows a completely different side. It expresses the way I feel about you. It reveals my deepest secrets. This photo is a connection. It makes you think. It wants to challenge. This photo captures every little detail. It hides those embarrassing spots and blemishes. It erases scars. It cleans pores. It draws your attention to the beauty of the world. This photo gives you hope. It makes you laugh. It reminds you of love and sympathy. This photo makes you think about me differently. It says what I never dared to say to you. It wins you over. It makes me cool.

    (inspired by Maxine Chernoff)

  • Ready-Parts

    (inspired by Clark Coolidge)

  • old red sandstone

    a thick sequence of rocks in squares around me                  i am
    formed more than 350 million years old                       a migrant
    the earth’s teenage years maybe                   like this rock i have
    built my house from it                     travelled here from far away
    and many others all               come to rest now thick deposits of
    the way to                        sand and mud 11000 meters deep and
    america.                    often stained with red, slowly accumulated.
    thrust fault

    (inspired by Clayton Eshleman)

  • Requiem for a Season:
    How To Get Away With Murder S1

    There is a crack in this thing called trust where questions seep in until a pool of doubt has gathered. Dark and deep enough for someone to get all soaking wet. Better learn how to swim in it. Better hold your breath. Better keep paddling. Or hold on to someone or something that floats well. Unless of course, there’s a crack in this thing called trust where questions seep in until a pool of doubt has gathered. Dark and deep enough for someone to get all soaking wet.

    (inspired by Art Lange)

  • Can’t sing

    Can’t sing; worries about his job a lot
    and the economy; just followed his old uni friends
    into a spineless career; dreams about going to space
    some day or become prime minister; likes that
    weird indie folk artists that you were crazy about last year;
    tried to lose a few pounds in the last years to look better in
    the dark suit he has to wear to work each day even if
    that’s tailored and he always looks pale; cannot help
    but look awkward in front of the cameras and slightly
    helpless when he smiles; and still George stands for austerity
    and social injustice; doesn’t really care about
    macroeconomics or true change; won’t hand out money to anyone
    who hasn’t earned loads of it; is part of the club;
    considers dignity sacred, more so than life itself;
    wants you to work hard and earn and earn and earn
    so you can buy more; he wonders what his life would be
    like if things had gone differently back in Oxford; loves
    his wife and children, and his country; goes to bed, hopes
    for the best

    (inspired by David Lehman)

  • Economy pack

    1000s of uses. Repositionable without
    a stain. The nation’s favourite rhyme
    is a great alternative to pins
    and tape. Clean, safe and hugely
    versatile. You can use iambic pentameter
    at home, in your office or
    at school for fixing cards and
    posters, securing loose items and even
    tricky jobs like cleaning dirt from
    keyboards or fluff from your heart. The
    uses of verse are as unlimited
    as your imagination. Keep a collection
    of poetry on your desk or
    in your kitchen drawer – you never
    know when you’ll need it again.

    Recommendations and
    suggestions are for
    guidance only, as conditions
    of use are completely
    beyond our control.

    (inspired by Michael Davidson)

  • Poetry, a language thing

    neither rigid definition nor ideological certainty
    further the poem. “pronoun verb preposition
    conjunction verb
    conjunction preposition pronoun verb determiner noun
    preposition determiner noun.”

    The poem
    emerges somewhere between the written
    and the         read
    popularly drawn toward mystical half-meanings and evasive metaphor.

    The appearance of coherence based upon
    the cultural expectations
    of a (formal) pattern of white space
    around a string of symbols which
    in the lateness of the world
    encourage deciphering
    as formal and material aspects are suffused.

    A visual or sonic pattern or rhythm
    a play
    or puzzle reference intended for the
    well-informed poetic archaeologist.

    This is one line open to textual interpretation.

    A second: introduction of the disruptive techniques
    of postmodernism de-constructivism third-wave feminism
    or pop and collocation,
    creating an ever-expanding field of
    reference on
    the page,

    “literary signifiers of otherness and intrusion”,

    borrowing from those who wrote
    this first.

    (inspired by Robert Duncan)

  • Fable

    Everyday corn and grain--- The children played hide and seek among the billowing white sheets on the drying green in the back of the houses. Her eyes dancing with laughter again for the first time. “What else can you do?” he smiled wearily. She gave out a sigh of relief when she saw that the brown envelope was just about voter registration and quickly shoved it into the drawer with the takeaway menus and the spare keys. They started calling it “de-inflation” to take away the dread. It was the drawing of a wonky terraced house with a swing in the garden and a smiling sun. An ant passed by, bearing along with great toil an ear of corn he was taking to the nest. The refrigerator’s humming was louder on the nights he wasn’t home.

    To the nest--- The queues were worse now than a couple of weeks ago but she had stopped paying attention. They tried to find another “p” in the bowl of soup to spell out “happiness” on a spoon and feed it to the baby. "I am helping to lay up food for the winter," said the ant, "and recommend you to do the same." He came over with a bottle of red but she was too ill to drink any. Rainwater had gathered in a welly one of them must have left out last time they went for a walk. It was hard to keep up with all these changes. Then the grasshopper knew: it is best to prepare for the days of necessity. She wanted so badly to tell him “you know nothing of our lives” but she didn’t want to embarrass the children and the parking ticket was running out.

    In that way?--- In a field one summer's day a grasshopper was hopping about, chirping and singing to its heart's content. The Beatles “Lady Madonna” on full blast in the bathroom. They had moved the worn part of the carpet under the dining table just in time before the doorbell rang. "Why not come and chat with me," said the grasshopper, "instead of toiling and moiling in that way?" The handle of the coffee cup had broken off a long time ago. She had circled the day in the calendar. An overflowing ashtray in the morning sun. But the ant went on its way and continued its toil.

    The days of necessity--- "Why bother about winter?" said the grasshopper; “we have got plenty of food at present." An ant passed by, bearing along with great toil an ear of corn he was taking to the nest. “You have to understand that these kind of jobs are extremely competitive”, his voice was matter-of-factly. There was a hole in the left pocket of her rain coat. "I am helping to lay up food for the winter," said the ant, "and recommend you to do the same." Someone on telly was talking about social justice but she turned away when the phone began to ring. The brochure advertised a bright and promising future. In a field one summer's day a Grasshopper was hopping about, chirping and singing to its heart's content.

    Hopping about, chirping--- When the winter came the grasshopper found itself dying of hunger, while it saw the ants distributing, every day, corn and grain from the stores they had collected in the summer. It felt good to open the windows on this first warm day of spring. An ant passed by, bearing along with great toil an ear of corn he was taking to the nest. They picked flowers in the long grass behind the old factory. In a field one summer's day a grasshopper was hopping about, chirping and singing to its heart's content. “You’re not watching any telly, are you?” she coaxed. But the ant went on its way and continued its toil. Then the grasshopper knew: it is best to prepare for the days of necessity.

    And continued its toil--- An ant passed by, bearing along with great toil an ear of corn he was taking to the nest. "Why bother about winter?" said the grasshopper; “we have got plenty of food at present." She waited until no one was watching. "Why not come and chat with me," said the grasshopper, "instead of toiling and moiling in that way?" Then the grasshopper knew: it is best to prepare for the days of necessity. But the ant went on its way and continued its toil. When the winter came the grasshopper found itself dying of hunger, while it saw the ants distributing, every day, corn and grain from the stores they had collected in the summer. She could not stand the way they had started to look at her.

    An ant passed by--- "Why bother about winter?" said the grasshopper; “we have got plenty of food at present." On that night they held each other tight. "I am helping to lay up food for the winter," said the ant, "and recommend you to do the same." In a field one summer's day a grasshopper was hopping about, chirping and singing to its heart's content. "Why not come and chat with me," said the grasshopper, "instead of toiling and moiling in that way?" When the winter came the grasshopper found itself dying of hunger, while it saw the ants distributing, every day, corn and grain from the stores they had collected in the summer. An ant passed by, bearing along with great toil an ear of corn he was taking to the nest. Then the grasshopper knew: it is best to prepare for the days of necessity.

    Then the grasshopper knew--- In a field one summer's day a grasshopper was hopping about, chirping and singing to its heart's content. An ant passed by, bearing along with great toil an ear of corn he was taking to the nest. "Why not come and chat with me," said the grasshopper, "instead of toiling and moiling in that way?" "I am helping to lay up food for the winter," said the ant, "and recommend you to do the same." "Why bother about winter?" said the grasshopper; “we have got plenty of food at present." But the ant went on its way and continued its toil. When the winter came the grasshopper found itself dying of hunger, while it saw the ants distributing, every day, corn and grain from the stores they had collected in the summer. Then the grasshopper knew: it is best to prepare for the days of necessity.

    (inspired by Lyn Hejinian)

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