Michael Conley
I admit I am regularly awake until 3am on my phone watching clips of Extreme Caving videos. But when I say Extreme Caving videos I do NOT mean porn: it really is Extreme Caving videos and if you don’t believe me, why not ask me whether I’ve heard of the Nutty Putty Incident and let that be our shibboleth. It’s always a different man in each video of course, although in terms of all the types of men it’s really the same man: watching him makes my chest tight and I hate (love) him. I love (hate) how each clip always begins the same way: the man holding the camera above his own head, worming towards us, all elbows, forearms scratched, clothing sometimes all torn and he’s usually repeating over and over
deep breath now remain calm just need to remain calm
aah now, oh dear my belt loop is caught on a knuckle
(a knuckle is an uneven bit of rock which the man sometimes has to chip at with a hand axe) then after several minutes of this he emerges not as the viewer might expect into dawn light and pastoral idyll but instead just into a slightly less cramped part of the cave at which point the screen goes black and you just have to assume he survived (because who else uploaded the video) in the comments sections everyone’s like you’d never catch me down there not for a million dollars but increasingly I’m starting to think it might be the perfect (safest) place to sing my little songs, away in the dark, the blessing (reproach) of my own voice bouncing back off the rock, no danger of anyone ever (ever) listening
Michael Conley is a poet from Manchester, UK. His work can be found online at iamb, Interpreter’s House and others. His pamphlet is available from Nine Pens Press.
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