Seasons Suite

Just a little quartet of seasonal poems, trotted off in one draft. I've re-read them since, but they are that rare thing in writing: a piece that unfolded as the writer intended. This is a further experiment with creating emotive and evocative effects with my choice of words that echo the seasons, as they are a nice and clear set of contrasting images.

Seasons Suite

Soft the heaven’s sigh settles sweetly on the hedgerows,

Warm summer’s bliss fills the woodlands and the fields,

For a short pause its trials and shocks rescinding,

And for a brief time there is peace upon the hills.

                *               *               *

Down, down, over the hills

The wrath of the thunder strikes,

The rampaging gales tear at the land,

A maelstrom of flying leaves.

                *               *               *

The world lies muted, constrained by a soft

Newly-set binding, and yet aloft

A voice is heard calling above silent swathes,

The herald of new life, still singing away.

*               *               *

Nascent life slumbers,

Awaiting sun’s touch,

To prompt an awakening,

An upwelling rush.

Wipers

A few years ago now, I went on a tour of battlesites and war graves in northern France and Belgium. It made a deep impression on me, that at the time I was unable to satisfactorily put into words. I'm still not entirely happy with it, but here it is, warts and all.


Wipers

I am standing in a foreign field, on a patch of emerald turf,

Above me are the high blue skies, around, the cultivated earth.

It might be anywhere, an innocent pastoral reverie,

The peacefulness belied by the incongruous sight in front of me;

Island amidst the gently canted fields, there stands a tended plot,

A strange sort of garden with granite walls, and grass so neatly cropped

It could almost be a bowling green, with parallel flower beds,

For the benefit of visitors to the unvictorious dead.

Beneath the unknowing, heedless sky lie the slain of two world wars.

Surrounded by the noise of birds and farms, there is a muted pause

In the diurnal humdrum that erodes the hours and days and years,

And with them dulls the immediacy of war’s many brutal fears.

So soon the lessons war has taught are buried, rushed to early graves,

In the efforts to forget the bad, the baby is thrown away

With the bathwater. To forget everything, to spit on these men,

And the sacrifice they made to stop this happening again.

Sassoonesque

There's not a great deal to say about this one - I was interested to see if I could write in the style of another poet convincingly, in this case the great Sigfried Sassoon.

Sassoonesque (or We Never Learn)

Now children of the Isle, arise,

To fight and die on foreign fields,

To seek triumph underneath foreign skies,

And find relief that only death yields.

Quails the breast of most stout-hearted

At their task; now they must fight

To finish that which others started,

For this they march on into night.

As tares are cast into the fire,

So cast aside are England’s sons.

Wasted, spent to feed war’s ire;

“Defeated, unvictorious ones.”

First Frost

I wrote this one sitting in a statistics lecture last week, and I must have been in a right old strop that day. Not the most subtle metaphor I've ever employed.

First frost

The First Frost always comes unexpectedly-
It is always anticipated, but never expected.
It invariably finds us unprepared.

We notice an extra chill in the air
But dismiss it, ignore it,
It may never happen.

The growing cold hints at the shock to come,
It offers to help us prepare, but denial
Is curiously pervasive.

The First Frost is the beginning of the end.

The end of living and the beginning of surviving,
Ancient priorities reassert themselves,
Falling further from angel, to beast.

We light candles and growl at the shadows,
Gather together to fight the darkness within,
And endure for a time.

The First Frost always comes unexpectedly;
The First Frost always comes.

From here it will only get worse;

As the title suggests, this was written with a view to concluding a collection, if I ever get around to putting one together. I like this poem, despite the fact it looks like something that belongs on an inspirational fridge magnet.

Epilogue

The first steps down the path now taken,

We lift our eyes to look ahead.

We hope to see our destination,

But all we see are our feet’s treads

That mark the route already taken,

Blind to all that comes our way.

We only view their inclination,

And guess directions we will stray.

Larkin

 In case anyone's interested, my favourite poet, and biggest influence, is Philip Larkin. I was introduced to Larkin at school, and unlike most of the rest of the prescribed texts I read in my formative years, he had a lasting impression on me. I can thoroughly recommend the anthologies 'Whitsun Weddings' (ISBN 9780571097104) 'High Windows' (ISBN 0571202756), or if you'd like to glance over a couple of his poems, 'First Sight', 'Home is so sad' and 'Dublinesque' are some of my favourites.

Lux

This one was written as a pair for Nyx. Nothing like as long went into writing it, but I think it's quite effective.

Lux

First luminous fingertips appear,

Heralded by a paling glow.

Re-created day draws nearer,

Its influence begins to show:

Tones and colours seep into daybreak,

Replacing bleached, anaemic shades.

The sun’s remembered day it remakes,

Recalling textures, forms and shapes.

Nature yearns upward,

Flowers unfurl,

New breath intaken.

Newly-made world.

Nyx

It's said that in songwriting, the words convey meaning and the music conveys emotion. I was curious to experiment with 'word painting' and see if careful use of words could convey not emotion exactly, but an emotive response, apart from their meanings. The result is below: judge for yourselves if it works. I'm quite pleased with it. (BTW, this isn't an arty post-modern thing. If anything it's written in a densely florid and symbolic style that's very old-fashioned.)

Nyx

Soft journey into welcome dark

Falls down the closing road,

As softer slows the striving heart,

In dimmer evening’s glow.

Down bends the blackn’d dawn’s remains,

Solemnent silence curled,

As marks of the west’s last golden chains

Leave a weary, calm-swayed world.

So settles Nyx’s mantle down,

As substance fades to grey.

Transcendent rise the souls of man,

And all else falls away.

Ode to a Bass

Not much more to say about this one - I wrote it in memory of a friend I used to sing with, Gerald. It follows a loose structure that is far more narrative than usual, and came to me more or less complete in one draft.

Ode to a Bass

(for Gerald Clarke)

Listening to a recording –

A proud moment, included

Not patronised.

Last December’s concert;

Its significance overcoming

The low quality, interrupted

Sound, someone coughs,

Rustles a programme –

The introduction is over,

The sopranos fade, a moment’s quiet;

The men’s entry.

Rich, roiling, deep yet pure,

An unmistakeable sound.

The choir joins, blends in,

Building and building,

Crescendos increase,

Peaking,

The final chord rings out,

Filling my head, as it filled the church,

Notes conjuring a scene.

Supporting it all, the Bass

Deep and true, resounding,

Resounding, the walls themselves

Rebounding the sound,

Triumphant, exulting,

Then silence.

First poems...

First up, here's one of poems I wrote last year, entitled 'Clouds'. It's one of my favourite poems, and the one I've had by far the most positive feedback for. It's also far more polished than most of my work, but more on that later. I hope you enjoy it.

Clouds

Above the land, the rolling billows

Of wind-dragged cloud cast fleeting shadows,

Flicking over grey-toned landscape,

In darker patches of ephemeral shape.

Scarce noticed by the sleepy crowds,

The awesome majesty of clouds;

Soaring mountains, and rapid fleets

Manoeuvre swiftly on wind-swept sheets.

Vast battles in the skies are fought,

Fierce thunderheads, determined cohorts,

Clash and rebound, and clash once more,

Forever above, the elemental war.

And yet, despite the heavens’ wonder,

Clouds met and merged and rent asunder,

Form and re-form, again, again.

Folk glance up. Mutter “looks like rain”.

Welcome!

Hello, and welcome to my blog. This will be (at least at first) a place for me to share my writing with others, along with my thoughts on them. Odds are, they'll be of little interest to anyone other than me, but you never know.