The Word -- Tony Hoagland

Guest poem submitted by Rachel Morarjee:

(Poem #1969) The Word Down near the bottom of the crossed-out list of things you have to do today, between "green thread" and "broccoli" you find that you have penciled "sunlight." Resting on the page, the word is as beautiful, it touches you as if you had a friend and sunlight were a present he had sent you from some place distant as this morning -- to cheer you up, and to remind you that, among your duties, pleasure is a thing, that also needs accomplishing Do you remember? that time and light are kinds of love, and love is no less practical than a coffee grinder or a safe spare tire? Tomorrow you may be utterly without a clue but today you get a telegram, from the heart in exile proclaiming that the kingdom still exists, the king and queen alive, still speaking to their children, - to any one among them who can find the time, to sit out in the sun and listen. -- Tony Hoagland

I stumbled across this poem today, in a book given to me by a friend in
Afghanistan, where I now live, and where the stream of news is endlessly
depressing. It was a reminder, that each one of us, whereever we live,
needs a gentle prod to remember that within the daily grind of modern
life, "pleasure/ is a thing / that also needs
accomplishing."

This poem is from Tony Hoagland's first anthology Sweet Ruin, and is
perhaps the most unalloyed and directly sweet poem he has written, in
contrast to much of his other work which addresses the bitter humour of
disillusion and the heart's struggle to clamber over the accumulated
detritus of disappointment -- and does it with a light humourous touch.

Sweet Ruin won the 1992 Brittingham Prize in Poetry and Hoagland has
since published two other books, Donkey Gospel, and What Narcissism
Means to Me. On the back of the last book it said he teaches at the
University of Houston, but I wasn't able to check online from here today.

Rachel.

The Old Fools -- Philip Larkin

Guest poem submitted by Radhika Gowaikar:

(Poem #1968) The Old Fools What do they think has happened, the old fools, To make them like this? Do they somehow suppose It's more grown-up when your mouth hangs open and drools, And you keep on pissing yourself, and can't remember Who called this morning? Or that, if they only chose, They could alter things back to when they danced all night, Or went to their wedding, or sloped arms some September? Or do they fancy there's really been no change, And they've always behaved as if they were crippled or tight, Or sat through days of thin continuous dreaming Watching the light move? If they don't (and they can't), it's strange; Why aren't they screaming? At death you break up: the bits that were you Start speeding away from each other for ever With no one to see. It's only oblivion, true: We had it before, but then it was going to end, And was all the time merging with a unique endeavour To bring to bloom the million-petalled flower Of being here. Next time you can't pretend There'll be anything else. And these are the first signs: Not knowing how, not hearing who, the power Of choosing gone. Their looks show that they're for it: Ash hair, toad hands, prune face dried into lines - How can they ignore it? Perhaps being old is having lighted rooms Inside your head, and people in them, acting People you know, yet can't quite name; each looms Like a deep loss restored, from known doors turning, Setting down a lamp, smiling from a stair, extracting A known book from the shelves; or sometimes only The rooms themselves, chairs and a fire burning, The blown bush at the window, or the sun's Faint friendliness on the wall some lonely Rain-ceased midsummer evening. That is where they live: Not here and now, but where all happened once. This is why they give An air of baffled absence, trying to be there Yet being here. For the rooms grow farther, leaving Incompetent cold, the constant wear and tear Of taken breath, and them crouching below Extinction's alp, the old fools, never perceiving How near it is. This must be what keeps them quiet: The peak that stays in view wherever we go For them is rising ground. Can they never tell What is dragging them back, and how it will end? Not at night? Not when the strangers come? Never, throughout The whole hideous inverted childhood? Well, We shall find out. -- Philip Larkin

The last two poems brought to mind this one. As in some of his other
poems, Larkin starts brashly, perhaps even offensively. But by the time
he is done we are given an intimate view of what it must be like to
"have lighted rooms / Inside your head" and "trying to be there / Yet
being here." The analogy of death with a "peak" is quite unusual (I am
sure I have never seen it before) and works perfectly with "the constant
wear and tear / Of taken breath." The last line is pure Larkin. It is
rather a long poem, but we are in good hands. Do read it aloud.

--
radhika.

A Winter Ode to the Old Men of Lummus Park, Miami, Florida -- Donald Justice

Guest poem submitted by David W:

(Poem #1967) A Winter Ode to the Old Men of Lummus Park, Miami, Florida Risen from rented rooms, old ghosts Come back to haunt our parks by day, They crept up Fifth Street through the crowd, Unseeing and almost unseen, Halting before the shops for breath, Still proud, pretending to admire The fat hens dressed and hung for flies There, or perhaps the lone, dead fern Dressing the window of a small Hotel. Winter had blown them south-- How many? Twelve in Lummus Park I counted, shivering where they stood, A little thicket of thin trees, And more on benches, turning with The sun, wan heliotropes, all day. O you who wear against the breast The torturous flannel undervest Winter and summer, yet are cold, Poor cracked thermometers stuck now At zero everlastingly, Old men, bent like your walking sticks As with the pressure of some hand, Surely they must have thought you strong To lean on you so hard, so long! -- Donald Justice

Donald Justice might be my favorite poet.  It's difficult to say for
sure, but I can say that his work has influenced me more than any
other's.  He is the "master of nostalgia", but I think that the intimacy
and elegance of his work are the major allures for me.  Here is one of
my favorites. It isn't anthologized as much as some others.

If anybody has ever used the word "heliotropes" with more effect, I
haven't seen it.  He slips that Latinate polysyllable in, but you might
notice it's a little lonely.  The simplicity of his language may be part
of what makes it feel intimate.  One of his more popular poems "Men At
Forty" is similar in this respect.

If you are interested, here is a short bio for Justice:
  http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/39

David.

[Minstrels Links]

Donald Justice:
  Poem #503: Anonymous Drawing
  Poem #1343: Poem to be read at 3am
  Poem #1647: Men at Forty

Hello In There -- John Prine

Guest poem submitted by Rama Rao:

(Poem #1966) Hello In There We had an apartment in the city, Me and Loretta liked living there. Well, it'd been years since the kids had grown, A life of their own left us alone. John and Linda live in Omaha, And Joe is somewhere on the road. We lost Davy in the Korean war, And I still don't know what for, don't matter anymore. Ya' know that old trees just grow stronger, And old rivers grow wilder ev'ry day. Old people just grow lonesome Waiting for someone to say, "Hello in there, hello." Me and Loretta, we don't talk much more, She sits and stares through the back door screen. And all the news just repeats itself Like some forgotten dream that we've both seen. Someday I'll go and call up Rudy, We worked together at the factory. But what could I say if asks "What's new?" "Nothing, what's with you? Nothing much to do." So if you're walking down the street sometime And spot some hollow ancient eyes, Please don't just pass 'em by and stare As if you didn't care, say, "Hello in there, hello." -- John Prine

I am  a little surprised not to see John Prine on the Minstrels. Hailed
by some on his debut as "the next Dylan " he has had many of his folksy
lyrics sung by other famous singers. As the developed world including
America ages, with larger percentages of older people in their
populations, this poem captures some of the increasing loneliness they
feel. The stanza contrasting old people to old trees and old rivers is
particularly powerful.

A John Prine bio is available at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Prine

Rama Rao.

To Virgins, to Make Much of Time -- Robert Herrick

Guest poem submitted by Nandini Krishnamoorthy:

(Poem #1965) To Virgins, to Make Much of Time Gather ye rosebuds while ye may, Old time is still a-flying And this same flower that smiles today Tomorrow will be dying. The glorious lamp of heaven, the sun, The higher he's a-getting, The sooner will his race be run, And nearer he's to setting. That age is best which is the first, When youth and blood are warmer; But being spent, the worse, and worst Times still succeed the former. Then be not coy, but use your time, And, while ye may, go marry; For, having lost but once your prime, You may forever tarry. -- Robert Herrick

I was surprised that Minstrels had not run this famous Herrick poem. My
first recollection of the poem is from "Dead Poets Society", Robin
Williams reading it to the students. It's one of those poems that stays
with you forever and a wonderful joy in re-discovering it.

Nandini.

The Boy Who Laughed at Santa Claus -- Ogden Nash

Guest poem submitted by Firdaus Janoos :

(Poem #1964) The Boy Who Laughed at Santa Claus In Baltimore there lived a boy. He wasn't anybody's joy. Although his name was Jabez Dawes, His character was full of flaws. In school he never led his classes, He hid old ladies' reading glasses, His mouth was open when he chewed, And elbows to the table glued. He stole the milk of hungry kittens, And walked through doors marked NO ADMITTANCE. He said he acted thus because There wasn't any Santa Claus. Another trick that tickled Jabez Was crying 'Boo' at little babies. He brushed his teeth, they said in town, Sideways instead of up and down. Yet people pardoned every sin, And viewed his antics with a grin, Till they were told by Jabez Dawes, 'There isn't any Santa Claus!' Deploring how he did behave, His parents swiftly sought their grave. They hurried through the portals pearly, And Jabez left the funeral early. Like whooping cough, from child to child, He sped to spread the rumor wild: 'Sure as my name is Jabez Dawes There isn't any Santa Claus!' Slunk like a weasel of a marten Through nursery and kindergarten, Whispering low to every tot, 'There isn't any, no there's not!' The children wept all Christmas eve And Jabez chortled up his sleeve. No infant dared hang up his stocking For fear of Jabez' ribald mocking. He sprawled on his untidy bed, Fresh malice dancing in his head, When presently with scalp-a-tingling, Jabez heard a distant jingling; He heard the crunch of sleigh and hoof Crisply alighting on the roof. What good to rise and bar the door? A shower of soot was on the floor. What was beheld by Jabez Dawes? The fireplace full of Santa Claus! Then Jabez fell upon his knees With cries of 'Don't,' and 'Pretty Please.' He howled, 'I don't know where you read it, But anyhow, I never said it!' 'Jabez' replied the angry saint, 'It isn't I, it's you that ain't. Although there is a Santa Claus, There isn't any Jabez Dawes!' Said Jabez then with impudent vim, 'Oh, yes there is, and I am him! Your magic don't scare me, it doesn't' And suddenly he found he wasn't! From grimy feet to grimy locks, Jabez became a Jack-in-the-box, And ugly toy with springs unsprung, Forever sticking out his tongue. The neighbors heard his mournful squeal; They searched for him, but not with zeal. No trace was found of Jabez Dawes, Which led to thunderous applause, And people drank a loving cup And went and hung their stockings up. All you who sneer at Santa Claus, Beware the fate of Jabez Dawes, The saucy boy who mocked the saint. Donner and Blitzen licked off his paint. -- Ogden Nash

It's a bit too  early for Christmas [not any more it isn't! -- ed.], but
I had to send this one in -- it is one of Nash's real gems. I'll not say
much about it -- a light, witty ditty, showing Ogden Nash's typical
flair for nonsense verse.  I'll let your readers chuckle over its silly
simplicity, without my analyzing or philosophizing over it.

Firdaus.

Brown Penny -- William Butler Yeats

Guest poem submitted by Jessica K. Schnell:

(Poem #1963) Brown Penny I whispered, "I am too young," And then, "I am old enough"; Wherefore I threw a penny To find out if I might love. "Go and love, go and love, young man, If the lady be young and fair." Ah, penny, brown penny, brown penny, I am looped in the loops of her hair. O love is the crooked thing, There is nobody wise enough To find out all that is in it, For he would be thinking of love Till the stars had run away And the shadows eaten the moon. Ah, penny, brown penny, brown penny, One cannot begin it too soon. -- William Butler Yeats

This little poem was recited by Christopher Plummer in the 2005 motion
picture  "Must Love Dogs," and a part of the reason for my submitting
this particular selection.  It seems all too rare that poems are found
in modern culture, and always a wonderful surprise when quoted in films
(another popular W. B. Yeats one is Poem #597).  And, as always, I
delight in poems that encourage one to carpe diem and be run away with
love.

Jessica.

The Year -- Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Guest poem submitted by Jeffrey Sean Huo:

(Poem #1962) The Year What can be said in New Year rhymes, That's not been said a thousand times? The new years come, the old years go, We know we dream, we dream we know. We rise up laughing with the light, We lie down weeping with the night. We hug the world until it stings, We curse it then and sigh for wings. We live, we love, we woo, we wed, We wreathe our prides, we sheet our dead. We laugh, we weep, we hope, we fear, And that's the burden of a year. -- Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Ms. Wilcox was introduced in Minstrels, Poem #911 ("The Traveled Man");
this poem I think speaks for itself.

Thank you, and happy holidays,
  -- Jeffrey

[And a very Happy New Year to all our faithful Minstrels subscribers!
  -- Martin, Thomas and Sitaram]

Topography -- Sharon Olds

Guest poem sent in by David Grabill

(Poem #1961) Topography After you flew across the country we got in bed, laid our bodies delicately together, like maps laid face to face, East to West, my San Francisco against your New York, your Fire Island against my Sonoma, my New Orleans deep in your Texas, your Idaho bright on my Great Lakes, my Kansas burning against your Kansas your Kansas burning against my Kansas, your Eastern Standard Time pressing into my Pacific Time, my Mountain Time beating against your Central Time, your sun rising swiftly from the right my sun rising swiftly from the left your moon rising slowly from the left my moon rising slowly from the right until all four bodies of the sky burn above us, sealing us together, all our cities twin cities, all our states united, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. -- Sharon Olds

             (published in "The Gold )

Here's another poem on a flying theme that a friend gave me before I took a
long flight a few years back.  Sharon Olds is a master of transforming
mundane airplane flights like this and common garden slugs [Poem #1003],
into sensual feasts. This one's an outrageous mix of metaphors that kept me
smiling for a thousand miles or more on that flight, and continues to
enchant every time I reread it.

David Grabill

[Links]

Biography:
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sharon_Olds

The Day Flies Off Without Me -- John Stammers

Guest poem sent in by Hemant Mohapatra

(Poem #1960) The Day Flies Off Without Me The planes bound for all points everywhere etch lines on my office window. From the top floor London recedes in all directions, and beyond: the world with its teeming hearts. I am still, you move, I am a point of reference on a map; I am at zero meridian as you consume the longitudes. The pact we made to read our farewells exactly at two in the afternoon with you in the air holds me like a heavy winter coat. Your unopened letter is in my pocket, beating. -- John Stammers

I love the quiet strength of this powerful piece. It speaks volumes about an
unrequited love in a way that is neither sappy, nor reflective. It just "is"
and seems to convey "This is how it is, and that is so". Every once in a
while, a poet creates something so heartfelt that all his/her other poems
pale in comparison. This is one of those pieces. 'nuff said.

Hemant

[Links]

Biography:
  [broken link] http://uk.poetryinternationalweb.org/piw_cms/cms/cms_module/index.php?obj_id=6964

Day Flight -- Jack Davis

Guest poem sent in by Cornelius O'Brien

(Poem #1959) Day Flight I closed my eyes as I sat in the jet And asked the hostess if she would let Me take on board a patch of sky And a dash of the blue-green sea. Far down below my country gleamed In thin dry rivers and blue-white lakes And most I longed for, there as I dreamed, A square of the desert, stark and red, To mould a pillow for a sleepy head And a cloak to cover me. -- Jack Davis

Les Murray's strong poem while he was musing aboard an airliner reminded me
of another Australian poet - Jack Davis - and his lovely poem DAY FLIGHT.
You can almost hear the mighty beating heart of Australia in his lines.
Only an Aboriginal poet could have written this one.  He doesn't own the
land.  The land owns him.

Con O'Brien (Cornelius)

[Links]

Biography:
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Davis_(playwright)

The International Terminal -- Les Murray

Guest poem sent in by Steve Forsythe

(Poem #1958) The International Terminal Some comb oil, some blow air, some shave trenchlines in their hair but the common joint thump, the heart's spondee kicks off in its rose-lit inner sea like an echo, at first, of the one above it on the dodgy ladder of love -- and my mate who's driving says I never found one yet worth staying with forever. In this our poems do not align. Surely most are if you are, answers mine, and I am living proof of it, I gloom, missing you from the cornering outset -- And hearts beat mostly as if they weren't there, Rocking horse to rocking chair, most audible dubbed on the tracks of movies or as we approach where our special groove is or our special fear. The autumn-vast parking-lot-bitumen overcast now switches on pumpkin-flower lights all over dark green garden sites and a wall of car-bodies, stacked by blokes, obscures suburban signs and smokes. Like coughs, cries, all such unlearned effects the heartbeat has no dialects but what this or anything may mean depends on what poem we're living in. Now a jet engine, huge child of a gun, shudders with haze and begins to run. Over Mount Fuji and the North Pole I'm bound for Europe in a reading role and a poem long ago that was coming for me had Fuji-san as its axle-tree. Cities shower and rattle over the gates as I enter that limbo between states but I think of the heart swarmed around by poems like an egg besieged by chromosomes and how out of that our world is bred through the back of a mirror, with clouds in its head --and airborne, with a bang, this five-hundred-seat theatre folds up its ponderous feet. -- Les Murray

Here is another poem on a different aspect of flight - it is almost the
opposite of Walcott's poem [Poem #1957]: anticipation vs. completion, the
anxiety of departure vs. the expansive consciouness of Walcott's being in
flight, almost formal vs. free-flowing verse. It captures well all the
emotions evoked by the beginning of a long journey. The depiction of the
actual takeoff ("Now a jet engine...") brilliantly evokes the final physical
and mental rush.

Steve Forsythe

[Links]

Biography:
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Murray

Official site:
  http://www.lesmurray.org/

The Dead Wingman -- Randall Jarrell

Guest poem sent in by Aseem

(Poem #1957) The Dead Wingman Seen on the sea, no sign; no sign, no sign In the black firs and terraces of hills Ragged in mist. The cone narrows, snow Glares from the bleak walls of a crater. No. Again the houses jerk like paper, turn, And the surf streams by: a port of toys Is starred with its fires and faces; but no sign. In the level light, over the fiery shores, The plane circles stubbornly: the eyes distending With hatred and misery and longing, stare Over the blackening ocean for a corpse. The fires are guttering; the dials fall, A long dry shudder climbs along his spine, His fingers tremble; but his hard unchanging stare Moves unacceptingly: I have a friend. The fires are grey; no star, no sign Winks from the breathing darkness of the carrier Where the pilot circles for his wingman; where, Gliding above the cities' shells, a stubborn eye Among the embers of the nations, achingly Tracing the circles of that worn, unchanging No - The lives' long war, lost war - the pilot sleeps. -- Randall Jarrell

I was planning to send in this poem for the flight theme anyway, and a
comment on a recent post made me even more determined.

William Pritchard, in his introduction to Randall Jarrell's Selected Poems
(FSG 1990) bemoans the fact that one poem, the justly celebrated 'Death of
the Ball Turret Gunner' has eclipsed all of Jarrell's other accomplishments
as a poet. The truth is that, coming out of World War II, Jarrell wrote a
number of poems about flying in the war - poems like 'The Dead Wingman', 'A
Pilot from the Carrier', 'Losses' and 'A Front'. These are not poems about
the 'lonely impulse of delight', rather they are poems about isolation,
about the helplessness of suffering; the people in them having more in
common with the disillusioned crew of Heller's Catch 22 than with Yeats'
Airman. There is no balance. There is only death.

Cut off from earthly contact in the desolation of the air, the pilot in his
plane becomes a metaphor for the soul trapped in its body. There is no
question of anything or anyone bidding the pilot to fight because the pilot
has no real choice; the sky is his only reality, and the anguish he feels
surveying the world below him is thus an existential one. The plane, like
the war (for these are, in every sense of the word, war poems) is a
death-dealing machine, one that man is strapped into, an Ixionan wheel, a
negative womb ('A Pilot from the Carrier' opens with the line "Strapped at
the centre of the blazing wheel")

'The Dead Wingman' is my favourite of these poems - in part because of the
incredible way in which Jarrell captures the physical experience of a
circling plane ("Again the houses jerk like paper, turn, / And the surf
streams by"), in part because of the perfection with which Jarrell connects
the failing of hope to external manifestations ("The fires are guttering;
the dials fall") and in part because of the way the poem, starting so
restlessly ("Seen on the sea, no sign; no sign, no sign") ends on a note of
weary, circling resignation. This is a greasy, metallic and yet deeply
moving poem. And it takes a talent like Jarrell's to keep a poem like this
aloft.

Aseem

[Links]

Biography:
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randall_Jarrell

l(a -- e e cummings

Guest poem sent in by Pranesh Prakash , in yet
another take on the flight theme:

(Poem #1956) l(a l(a le af fa ll s) one l iness -- e e cummings

Comments:

This is a poem I immediately thought of when I saw the theme "flight".  It
is about the flight of a leaf as it is falling down from a tree.  When read
together without the line-breaks, it turns out to be

  l(a leaf falls)oneliness.

It links up the falling of a lone leaf (note the emphasis on "1" (the
numeral one) in the first line, as also the "one" in l"one"liness) to the
emotion of loneliness.

The most beautiful part of this poem is the way it is structured, which to
me seems to resemble the passage of a leaf through various points of time
from the half-horizontal "l(a" of the leaf on the tree, to the side-view of
"ll" when it is in mid-air to the final full-horizontal of "iness".

If you don't see that leaf falling, perhaps instead you see a large "L" in
the shape of the poem, or perhaps a large "1" (with a line underneath: think
of 1 in "Courier" instead of in "Arial".)  The imagery that Cummings manages
to evoke by saying so little is just beautiful.  And this is actually a poem
where the reason for abrupt and seemingly random line-breaks is clear
(though with different clarity to each person) after some thought, and goes
on to be really appreciated.  The poem is all the more beautiful for the way
the words are broken up.

Pranesh

[Links]

Biography:
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._E._Cummings

Here's an excellent essay on Cummings's use of typography and line breaks as
a poetic element:
  http://www.cyberessays.com/English/104.htm

And, since it appears to be a perennial misconception, an explanation of why
it is not "e. e. cummings":
  http://www.gvsu.edu/english/cummings/caps.htm

The Swing -- Robert Louis Stevenson

Guest poem sent in by Dale Rosenberg

(Poem #1955) The Swing How do you like to go up in a swing, Up in the air so blue? Oh, I do think it the pleasantest thing Ever a child can do! Up in the air and over the wall, Till I can see so wide, Rivers and trees and cattle and all Over the countryside-- Till I look down on the garden green, Down on the roof so brown-- Up in the air I go flying again, Up in the air and down! -- Robert Louis Stevenson

My first thought for the "poems about flying" theme was Randall Jarell's
devastating "Death of a Ball Turret Gunner."  I see Minstrels has already
printed it. so I went for the complete opposite in emotional impact.

"The Swing" was the first poem I learned about flying.  It just captures for
me so perfectly the lovely feeling of soaring which children have on swings.
I remember being quite small and my mother reciting it to me as she pushed
me higher and higher.  I did the same with my own kids.  So many of RLS's
poems in A Child's Garden of Verses sound so fresh and real today.  I think
that since his subject matter is often universal, the poems don't seem dated
in the way that some children's verse can.

Dale

[Links]

Biography:
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Louis_Stevenson

A Child's Garden of Verses:
  http://www.bartleby.com/188/

I Need Air -- Alan Lerner

Guest poem sent in by Zenobia Driver :

(Poem #1954) I Need Air I could see it wasn't worth Spending time with them on earth. There were fewer in the sky. I decided I would fly. I need air... Where only stars get in my hair: And only eagles stop and stare. I need air. Oh, the work is mad And I've had my share. I need air. I need air. I need air... There's not a sign of life down there. Just hats and grown-ups everywhere. I need air. Lots of cosy sky That God and I can share. I need air. I need air. -- Alan Lerner

     (from the musical 'The Little Prince', based on the book by
      Antoine St. Exupery)

I guess this describes the pilot who is not one of the gang, a loner, who
flies to get away from it all. A nice poem to read on days when everyone
around is getting on your nerves.

  I could see it wasn't worth
  Spending time with them on earth.
  There were fewer in the sky.
  I decided I would fly.

As good a reason to fly as any!

Loved the cheekiness in the lines:
  There's not a sign of life down there.
  Just hats and grown-ups everywhere.

Yes, I feel like this quite often.

Zen

[Martin adds]

It's surprising how many flying poems and songs have their essence captured
by Yeats's immortal line "a lonely impulse of delight". Today's is no
exception.

martin

[Links]

Biography:
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Jay_Lerner

The Little Prince [I really need to see this! - martin]:
  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071762/maindetails

from Midsummer -- Derek Walcott

Guest poem sent in by Aseem

(Poem #1953) from Midsummer The jet bores like a silverfish through volumes of cloud - clouds that will keep no record of where we have passed, nor the sea's mirror, nor the coral busy with its own culture; they aren't doors of dissolving stone, but pages in a damp culture that come apart. So a hole in their parchment opens, and suddenly, in a vast dereliction of sunlight, there's that island known to the traveller Trollope, and the fellow traveller Froude, for making nothing. Not even a people. The jet's shadow ripples over green jungles as steadily as a minnow through seaweed. Our sunlight is shared by Rome and your white paper, Joseph. Here, as everywhere else, it is the same age. In cities, in settlements of mud, light has never had epochs. Near the rusty harbor around Port of Spain bright suburbs fade into words - Maraval, Diego Martin - the highways long as regrets, and steeples so tiny you couldn't hear their bells, nor the sharp exclamation of whitewashed minarets from green villages. The lowering window resounds over pages of earth, the canefields set in stanzas. Skimming over an ocher swamp like a fast cloud of egrets are nouns that find their branches as simply as birds. It comes too fast, this shelving sense of home - canes rushing the wing, a fence; a world that still stands as the trundling tires keep shaking and shaking the heart. -- Derek Walcott

When I saw that you were running a flying theme, this was the first poem I
thought of. It is a poem that evokes so perfectly, for me, the experience of
being on a flight - the familiar cycle of staring out of the window, reading
the newspaper for a bit, thinking about distance and the world, looking down
again, seeing the tiny signs of human civilisation get closer and closer as
the flight descends and we come in to land. Walcott describes all of that in
lines at once ponderous and lyrical - that air of something restlessly
inventive but also classically ode-like that he renders so effortlessly.

There are several phrases in here that are permanently inscribed in my head
("The jet's shadow / ripples over green jungles as steadily as a minnow /
through seaweed") and the last eight lines are sheer genius. I could go on
and on about the clever, clever way that Walcott weaves the metaphor of a
book together with the experience of flight, but I'm not going to. Instead,
I'm going to suggest that you read the last lines of this poem again, and
experience once more that sensation of coming closer and closer to the
earth, the acceleration you feel an illusion, your heart waiting for that
final thwack of the wheels that will tell you that you're finally back.

Aseem

[Links]

Biography:
  http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1992/walcott-bio.html
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Walcott

Nice essay on Walcott and his work:
  http://www.english.emory.edu/Bahri/Walcott.html

A Newer Kingdom -- Anonymous

Guest poem sent in by Cornelius 0Brien

(Poem #1952) A Newer Kingdom The men who billow down the sea in ships Have earned these ages tributes justly high; But now is newly told on peoples's lips Of men in airy craft who seek the sky. Flung freely through their newer kingdom won, Clean wings describe the geometric arc, And hurtle down the starlight to the dark Or gambol with the spear-shafts of the sun. A newer kingdom and a newer race - They spurn with pride the lowly creed of earth, And glory in the boundlessness of space, Where worlds through aeons past have leapt to birth. Though mortal span is told in numbered weeks They brush eternity with youthful cheeks. -- Anonymous

Notes: I found this sonnet in the published memoirs of Gordon Fox. Gordon,
uncle of my wife Rosie, was a bomber pilot in World War Two. His memoirs,
written in diary form, were published privately about a year after his death
in September, 2001. His eldest son Kennedy Fox very kindly sent us a copy.
This sonnet ("A Newer Kingdom" is my name for it) was found by Gordon in an
anthology of air force poems. Kennedy says that neither he nor his father
had any idea who wrote the poem.

It is beautifully crafted, and to my heart and mind does what all good poems
do - draws pictures with words and stirs emotions in the reader or listener.
Yeats' "An Irish Airman Foresees his Death" could be a blood relative of
this lovely sonnet. I am also reminded of Wilfred Owen, although I cannot
really say why.

Cornelius

Impressions of a Pilot -- Gary Claude Stoker

This week, a guest theme run by Zenobia Driver :
poems about flying.

(Poem #1951) Impressions of a Pilot Flight is freedom in its purest form, To dance with the clouds which follow a storm; To roll and glide, to wheel and spin, To feel the joy that swells within. To leave the earth with its troubles and fly, And know the warmth of a clear spring sky; Then back to earth at the end of the day, Released from the tensions which melted away. Should my end come while I am in flight, Whether brightest day or darkest night; Spare me no pity and shrug off the pain, Secure in the knowledge that I'd do it again. For each of us is created to die, And within me I know, I was born to fly. -- Gary Claude Stoker

Some time ago, I was reading 'On Wings of Fire' by Dr. Abdul Kalam, and came
across a reference to a poem about Darius Greene. While trying to track down
that poem, I came across lots of other poems about flying and realized that
this was one topic that was not sufficiently represented in the poems we
read in school, college etc, or on the minstrels.

(A notable exception to this being 'An Irish Airman Foresees His Death' by
W.B.Yeats, which is reproduced and quoted everywhere, but that is not about
flying alone and it has only one reference to the 'lonely impulse of
delight' that 'drove to this tumult in the clouds'.)

So here are some poems that describe the joy of flying, the reasons for
flying, the irreverent attitude of fighter pilots and of course, the story
of Darius Greene. For those who want to read more quotes, poems etc about
flying, http://www.skygod.com/quotes/misc.html is one good site.

I thought I would start with a poem that describes the sensation of flying.
I loved the first paragraph - I can feel a plane rolling and spinning and
dancing with the clouds as I say the lines. Also loved the analogy of flight
as freedom.

The last paragraph was great too - wouldn't it be marvellous if you knew
exactly why you were on this earth, and you knew that you were doing exactly
that and you absolutely loved it?

Zenobia

[Martin adds]

As usual, contributions to the theme are welcome - send them in!

A Deep-Sworn Vow -- William Butler Yeats

Guest poem sent in by Kamalika Chowdhury

(Poem #1950) A Deep-Sworn Vow Others because you did not keep That deep-sworn vow have been friends of mine; Yet always when I look death in the face, When I clamber to the heights of sleep, Or when I grow excited with wine, Suddenly I meet your face. -- William Butler Yeats

This poem - taken from The Wild Swans at Coole (1919) - showcases the
maturity of Yeats' later work, and his distinctive brand of genius. With a
master conjurer's dexterity, Yeats tells a story in a six simple lines that
become breathtaking when put together.

Trying to express my thoughts on this poem leaves me feeling absolutely
inadequate, but I cannot let it go without a salute. So here it is.

The call of these few compelling lines is powerful and intimate, utterly
human and almost sacred. The reader is directly drawn into a deep
relationship with the narrator, yet one that is infused with the guilt of
having broken "that deep-sworn vow". But before one can fully assimilate the
impact, one is quietly brought face-to-face with the inescapable truth of
the final line. The inherent loneliness in this poem is ignored - it does
not rave or rant, or cry out. It simply is. The two aspects of this
relationship are not meant to be reconciled.

And because its soul-searing intensity must have came from the poet's
innermost being, I like to think that he remains immortal in this poem.

Kamalika