finally!

I see that it has been 6 months since I last posted! I have , in that time, launched two poetry collections - "the spaces in between" and "the present tense", and am just working on my last EMA for the Masters before the dissertation stage. I missed posting this for Remembrance day but i think it is still worth putting it up, as we should be aware not just on one day of the sacrifices of war.

I went to the quiet fields of Flanders -

row upon row upon row upon row

the blankness of those faceless graves

strangely mocking of this weary world of words.

Unknown

Unknown

No name

How do we know who lies here?

Whose mother’s tears should wash this pure white stone clean?

It could be you -

It could be me who lies below -

our white bones are the same as his.

Yet with cold lips he kissed our mouths

his dying breath our living air.

The guns are silent now

no birdsong fills the space

No name

No name

No words

Silence

And we ourselves become mute.

Ephemeral History

Clearly I have been very distracted working on my next TMA on oral, printed and post colonial texts - ie the Bushmen, Robinson Crusoe and Derek Walcott. I have got another obsession for  Walcott's poetry. What a find! Here is a token poem to keep the spark alive but I look forward to the summer when I have a break from studying and can think creatively.

Ephemeral history

On the other side of the world

shaded by a canopy of thick green palms

another man sits,

watching  the history of his Caribbean  island

unfold around  him

mirrored on the shifting stage of the sea. 

While the searing sun throws

deceptive shadows over the cloudy waters

and sudden rain stitches stars in the sand

he catches images in his hand and

writes, pressing past into present.

For today, Carnival comes,

bringing history to life;

 it’s chaotic noise echoing down the years

 the chanting , the drumming, the singers,

the dancers, whose bodies move with ancient memory,

the vibrant colours which paint the sun soaked ground

with living graffiti.

And now it is gone

its essence lost to the annals of time,

only to be captured fleetingly in the poetry

of the solitary man

who writes its voice.

3 non consecutive, consecutive thoughts

Caught up with linking Shakespeare, Beethoven and Eliot's versions of Coriolanus which is a wonderfully complex study. These three vignettes came to mind inspired by Eliot's 4 Quartets.He was of the opinion that poetry can be difficult and abstract almost obscure and this is what i did with these  metaphysical poems:

I take a fragile line
and break it apart-
the grains of sand  in which it had lain,
deconstructed, until wholly re - formed
becomes complete again.

Time was then, as it is
 now, unstable
irrelevant,
a structured backdrop
on which,only in intervals, are we
alive.

The pendulum swings back
redressing the balance of opposites, until
 beyond the noise,
 beyond the music,
 the unheard silence
becomes the truth.

If you have eyes to see and ears to hear...

A quiet voice, unheard, hidden

under harsh notes 
of coarsely sharpened opinions,

smothered by thorns and strident whines -

the delicate sunset rose strives to bloom,

isolated, 
yet perfect
 in its completeness.

Happy Birthday Dickens

 

Been working hard on the Masters but must mark the bicentenary of one of my favourite authors! Just joined the world online Dickens conference to be held on 7 - 8th March so looking forward to that; also attending a talk by one of his biographers on Thursday at Blackwells which will no doubt be interesting.
On another note, I have been listening to the forgetten and newly found Harvard lectures by Jorge Borges from 1967 - the joys of technology. I share some of his thoughts from his first lecture,
The Riddle of Poetry - "Beauty is all about us";"poetry creates itself"; "Life is made of poetry if poetry is a passion";"poetry is a new experience every time as language itself is shifting" - to hear this gently spoken man of 70 discuss his thoughts on poetry is inspiring. Here is the link to his series of 6 lectures entitled The Craft of Verse.  http://thefunambulist.net/2011/08/18/literature-lectures-of-jorge-luis-borges-at-harvard-in-1967-68-on-ubuweb/