The drawing pins have left their marks

Rusty rings

But the pictures now are faded

Faded far beyond nostalgic sepia.

At the far end of the church

A small groups conversation waxes and wanes

The organist is trying out some tunes

For a while fortissimo and then diminuendo

Made some of those changes and now have a line (2) to finish.

In the meantime, I want to develop this:

How one note melds into another,

... 

Is it a tune or a series of notes

A story or a series of scenes...

One note melds into another

Almost but not quite a tune

And these photographs

Too are disparate scenes

That...   (what?) 

The thumb tacks leave rusty marks

But the pictures themselves are faded

Faded far beyond nostalgic sepia

And at the far end of the church

A small groups conversation waxes and wanes

The organist is trying out some tunes

For a while fortissimo and then diminuendo

The thumb tacks have left rusty marks - is surely better?

Why 'but'?  Do I need 'themselves'?

Should I put 'drawing pins'  as being more English?

The drawing pins have left rusty marks

And the pictures are faded

- doesn't sound too bad.  I might want to make more of the shape of those marks. They impressed me with their outline.

Faded far beyond nostalgic sepia

I've always shied away from repetition except in a deliberate chorus kind of way but I think the repetition of faded is okay here.

The thumb tacks leave rusty marks

But the pictures themselves are faded

Faded far beyond nostalgic sepia

And at the far end of the church

A small groups conversation waxes and wanes

The organist is trying out some tunes

For a while fortissimo and then diminuendo

The thumb tacks have left rusty marks - is surely better?

Why 'but'?  Do I need 'themselves'?

Should I put 'drawing pins'  as being more English?

The drawing pins have left rusty marks

And the pictures are faded

- doesn't sound too bad.  I might want to make more of the shape of those marks. They impressed me with their outline.

Faded far beyond nostalgic sepia

I've always shied away from repetition except in a deliberate chorus kind of way but I think the repetition of faded is okay here.

(Don't ask me why the size changes here - I've tried to fix it!)

As I read what I have written, I see a theme emerging, or a repetition, at least. That of things coming into prominence and then fading. I wonder if I can make something of that. I can still hear the notes of the organ dying away. What to begin with?  The pictures, the sounds, the clouds?

The thumb tacks leave rusty marks

But the pictures themselves are faded

Faded far beyond nostalgic sepia

And at the far end of the church

A small groups conversation waxes and wanes

The organist is trying out some tunes

For a while fortissimo and then diminuendo

…  is that a fair start?

Some notes to begin with:

Here now at the other end of the church

With old drawing pins rusting leaving marks on the paper laminated

And the boards rocking gently but alarmingly as I try to press new thumbtacks in

And down the side aisle a group I do not know

I rarely come here why should !?

Yet they seem strangers too

One of them is playing he church organ, quite well

The others listen for a while, talk amongst themselves. Then fall quiet again

I press on, remove old notices and pictures

Typewritten captions and miscellaneous stuff

It’s better with some company

How one note melds into another, like the pictures fading  -  sepia scenes

Is it a tune or a series of notes

A story or a series of scenes

Outside the sun is trying to decide its next move though of course it is the clouds that are moving and fading

Whatever happened to this month?  I confess I have been idle on the poetry writing front, though I did write a couple of sonnets. However, we've had enough sonnets here for the time being.

I've been reading Billy Collins' poetry. I knew he was the USA's 'laureate' but had only read a couple of poems before. I'm glad someone lent me a collection, which I am reading slowly as one should eat a chocolate éclair, savouring it.

It's hard to describe his style, which lacks many of the usual markers of poetry such as rhyme or regular rhythm. Very conversational in tone they could be mistaken for 'prose in chopped up lines' except there is something quite unlike prose in them. 

Whether this will lead me away from the somewhat stricter forms I tend to use, we'll have to see.