wrought Iron fence

I was around ten years old, with Peter Gabriel’s ‘Sledgehammer’, coming from the black, square, one speaker dial radio, with a broken antenna. Painting my uncle Kevin’s wrought iron fences in my grandmothers back shed, in Ballymurphy, Belfast. The feeling of being covered in paint, the smell of turpentine as I washed my hands, arms and face. Splattered unplanned design of the black paint on my clothing. The feeling of the brush on the metal rods. Lines streaking down to a smooth finish. The silence in the action. My first mediative experience.

A selection of tools lay around a wooden desk. A counter top, covered in the scars of missed hammer blows. Metallic shavings dispersed from here to there, like galaxies catching passing stars. In the air the dampened scent of rotten wooden corners, with a phosphorous hint from the welded iron. A lingering sound of the electric contact weld, as from the ray guns of the alien machines, straight from War of the Worlds. Carrying the ornate twists and turns of the finished fencing outside onto the uneven sloping patio to dry. Standing back and admiring. I did that. I finished that.