(Choose a Poem and click to view) (Click left arrow in toolbar to return to Home Page)
* BEDSIDE
BEELZEBUB * BELONGING
*
THE BOTTOM DRAWER
*
CHILDREN?
* CHILDREN'S MUSIC
*
EMMAUS *
THE FIFTEENTH OF APRIL
*
THE FIFTH OF SEPTEMBER
*
THE HARD CELL
*
THE
HOUR-GLASS *
IF
*
INFINITY
* LASER *
MEETING
(1) (2)
(3)
(4)
*
THE MERCHANT
*
MUSING HOME *
PROLOGUE TO THE SCHOOLMASTER'S TALE
* RESETTLEMENT REFLECTION
* SHOPS
*
THE SIXTH OF DECEMBER
* STANDING
UP
* STEEL HELMETS OF DEAD
MARINES *
THE THIRD OF JANUARY
*
TRAIN
*
TRIBUTE
*
TRIPLE ACROSTIC
*
THE
UNEASY STONE *
THE UNFORTUNATE KAZOO
Connoiseurs,
We meet at the spiritual exchange,
Cherishing pearls of great price
Folded in the black velvet cloth,
The gathered meditation, of silent worship.
With loving care we unwrap,
Quaking, we reveal,
The precious, priceless gems
Vouchsafed to human custody.
With awe we contemplate,
With tenderness we appraise,
With quiet joy we revere
What the spirit shall reveal.
We cast not before swine,
For each pearl is precious;
For that we also are precious,
Our meek souls not for rending.
And for the swine are precious,
Not yet in meet condition
For nourishment of pearls,
Yet meet for love and prayer.
Students,
We meet at the King's College,
Endowed by the Holy Spirit;
Enrolled in the Open University
Of the Holy City;
Matriculating in Bible Studies,
Freshmen lately welcomed,
Or candidates of promise
Nearing examination;
Earnest undergraduates
Seated in the seminar,
Learning from and with each other
At the feet of the Master
Who oversees each essay,
Guides each dissertation,
Inspires each tentative thesis,
Corrects each wayward error,
Recommends further reading
In the weighty book of life;
Presenting us to the Chancellor
As His tutelage bears fruit.
Swimmers,
We meet at the edge of the silence,
That pool of unfathomable depth,
Awaiting the baptizing Spirit
Who yearns for our total immersion.
Quaking upon the brink,
Watching for the Spirit to move,
Dare we take that plunge,
Trusting to be buoyed up?
Dare we encounter that nakedness,
That baring of the soul
Which is the lot of all
Who enter those clear waters?
Fearing lest we flounder,
Lest we cannot find the words,
We disobey the call to speak,
And find no rest nor ease.
Suddenly, the Instructor tips us in.
We find ourselves afloat.
He will not fail us, nor forsake,
If we but trust in Him.
Hams,
Consulting the Manual, we calculate resistance,
Preparing our circuits with care.
Plotting the impedance, doubting capacitors,
Conscious of inadequate power;
Seeking to tune out the outward clamour,
Avoiding the worldly interference,
Seeking to tune to the broadcasting Spirit -
To secure, by fine tuning, faithful reception.
The signal cleaves through the ether,
Encountering the aerials of prayer -
Flows through our turning condensers,
Gathered by corporate sensitivity.
Patiently waiting in the electric silence,
We hear, in due time, that inner voice
Which speaks upon our wave-length,
And to our condition.
Moved, unaware, one rises in awe -
An activated loud-speaking component,
Charge to give audible voice to the Spirit -
The Word made flesh to us here.
*Niets is kostbaarder dan de tijd,
Want hij is de prijs van de eeuwigheid.
Rapt in scarlet silence soft
The digit-demon lurks.
I hear no honest tick from his
Deep necromantic works.
Electron-imps cavort about
Each sizzling silicon-chip;
With quick quark-questing power, they hold
Old Time in grimfast grip
From eights carved out of two stark rhombs,
As never scholar penned,
His glowing inch-high cypher-shapes
Derive, deform, subtend, -
Subtract a half-line, two, or three,
To fashion ugly figures,
Eschewing comely curvatures
For electronic rigours.
In light, they glow the brighter, but
In darkness, self-subside.
This counterfeit coyness masks
His overweening volt-puffed pride.
In the night, if wakeful, I,
. To count the slow hours down,
My now long-pensioned eyeballs
Must distort with intense frown,
Compressing them to focus,
For I wish to make no stir
With rustling search for spectacles.
I must not waken her.
One and seven are easy,
Three and four, ungainly plain.
I struggle with the rest, decide,
And drift to sleep again.
The demon, never sleeping,
Works his spell without respite.
Careless of my gaze, his digits
Dart by day and night.
His destiny is written:
Obsolete, and scrapped, in fine;
But I shall have the better part;
Eternity is mine.
*Netherlands proverb -
Nothing is more precious than time,
For it is the price of eternity.
Lying on the beach,
Wet from the ebbing tide,
A glistening black eye,
Devoid of pupil,
Forlorn and sightless,
A monstrous presence.
At my nearer approach, I see
A veritable cannon-ball,
Big as my fist,
Smooth and round.
I stoop ,and pick it up,
A dead weight, heavy and cold,
Yet potent now with kinetic energy,
And with subtle influence.
Putting forth the power
Of its inner necromancy,
It transports me through pre-historic aeons,
To the moment of its creation.
I see
A thousand million years ago,
A glowing blob of fire
Belch from the planet’s molten core,
Shoot into the primeval sky,
Fall hissing into the cold sea,
And solidify into this.
I think to break it with my hammer
To see the flint within,
Reveal, perhaps, a fossil
Entombed in a gritty cavity
In the gleaming glass-hard core;
For once, I shrink from the sacrilege,
For wanton curiosity
To break what lay unbroken
For a thousand million years.,
I carry it home to my house,
Set it upon the hard smoothness
Of the Formica-topped kitchen table
Warily, lest it roll off
And bruise my foot,
And make a strange discovery.
By mere chance I have found
Thast one spot of its surface
Upon which, after vibrating,
It will stand firm.
For more than a long minute
It will rock, and lurch, and turn,
Wobble, and lean, and pitch,
Till at last, with a final shiver,
An expiring, trembling shudder,
It lies still.
What restless fossil-spirit within,
Denizen of the fiery regions,
Disturbs the Uneasy Stone?
Flint-hearted brother,
Fashioned, like myself, from atoms
Forged in the unimaginable heat
, At the heart of a long-dead star,
I am another such,
Sprung from the warm womb
Into the cold sea of life,
Imprisoned within my carcase,
Lurching twixt hope and despair,
Subject to juddering change,
Yet destined at last to rest,
My point of stillness found.
When morning comes, I look out from my window,
To verify the fond familiar scene;
The lawn, the tree, the fence, my neighbour’s garden,
The tree-tops in the Park, of various green;
The squirrel climbing high to seek her drey,
The robin singing in my apple-tree;
The blackbird searching there among the leaves;
The flowers, and the droning humble-bee.
I am in this Land, and on this Earth.
I am comforted, for all is well.
This is my place.
Here I belong.
When night falls, I look up and search the heavens,
To verify the star-shapes overhead.
Orion, with his two dogs at his heels,
Confronts the angry Bull, with eye of red.
Castor and Pollux watch them from below;
The Herdsman turns to face the lumbering Bear.
With outstretched neck, the Swan flies to the West;
All shine in their allotted places there.
I am in this Galaxy, this Universe.
I am comforted, for all is well.
This is my place.
Here I belong.
In time of quiet I use the inner eye
To view that state which lies beyond all time,
Where human space-time words shall lose all meaning,
And I from flesh to spirit shall sublime,
Free from need of self-defining space,
Of Sun and Moon, and sense of cold and heat;
But in the eternal glorious light of truth
To know as I am known, and be complete.
I am in this Genesis, this Cosmos.
I am comforted, for all is well.
This is my place.
Here I belong.
I had three little babies
Who kicked and cried and smiled,
And gripped my thumb in podgy grasp
And set my teeth on edge with rasp
Of baby teeth on metal spoon,
And banged about with tins; but soon
They slipped away.
I had three little children
Who played with toys, and romped,
And sat upon my knee with books,
And drank the world with wondering looks,
And pulled my heart when they were ill,
And slept in little cots; until
They slipped away.
I had three fine big children
Who gaily ran to school,
And dug in sand on holidays,
And filled the house with loud amaze
On Christmas mornings, early! when
Lay paper ankle-deep; but then
They slipped away.
I had three tall teen-agers,
More often out than in;
Music-lesson, paper-round,
Crusader-evening, football-ground, -
Choir or Scouts till nine or ten; -
They led such busy lives; but then
They slipped away.
I’ll have my sons, and daughter,
God willing, all my life;
Three grown-up people, fond and true,
And now they’ve homes, and children too,
And they are still a joy to me;
But Oh! the folk they used to be; -
They slipped away.
She was nicely plump,
As an English girl of twelve may be plump,
Not fat; and slim again at sixteen.
She had a lovely face,
As an English girl of twelve may have,
Not beautiful; but time for that at sixteen.
Keen to learn, - responsive, -
She brought joy to my recorder-group -
That joy which sweetens labour.
Praising her one day, I said,
“If you like, after school on Thursday,
We’ll practise in the Hall, with the piano.
Twenty minutes will be enough.
Ask your mother.”
Those eyes twinkled, and that lovely serious face
Lost its habitual anxious look,
And bloomed with smiling.
We played on Thursdays, occasionally,
A few weeks, perhaps.
Always eager, always shy,
Shyly proud to be making lovely sounds,
To be praised, to be encouraged,
She made her music.
The Summer Term brought summer weather,
Too good to spend indoors;
And, near the end, brought Parents’ Evenings,
By which time I had quite forgotten.
Her mother sat at my little table.
“I want to thank you,” she said,
“For helping Jenny with her music.
It meant a great deal to her.
. She said to me once, ‘Mum,
When I’m playing my recorder with Mr.Hill,
I forget that I’m fat and ugly.’ “
I knew. I knew at once.
She had an unkind elder brother,
Who made a different kind of music.
I wonder whether she still plays,
Still makes her kind of music,
On flute or clarinet, perhaps,
. Now she is slim and beautiful.
I am but an hour-glass.
These tiny glinting grains
Comprise my store of seconds,
My sum of joys and pains.
Thus much of time-bound life, no more,
Is my allotted span.
Measured and sealed within this space,
My cosmic run began.
This upper womb of glass contains
My dwindling stock of time -
My fast-decreasing future tale,
Or sordid, or sublime.
This lower holds the life now spent,
For better, or for worse.
Behold, among the lighter grains,
The darker intersperse.
Above, my sands are settling
In a hollow downward cone.
Below, a growing mountain forms
Of moments that have flown.
But though all motion ceases
With the fall of that last grain,
Yet never a particle is lost.
The whole life shall remain.
Beyond the grave, no gravity
Shall bow me down to earth;
Nor shall the weariness of time
Oppress my second birth.
Weightless in eternity,
Though new-turned by that hand
Which first set my frail vessel down,
I fear no run of sand.
Undiminishing, I abide,
From time and space set free;
At once to know as I am known,
And, knowing, joy to be.
TRIBUTE
My flowers lie on thy grave.
They make a goodly show.
In life, took I scant care
That thou my love should'st know.
Thou can'st not smell my flowers.
Oh Friends! Make no delay!
Make glad those whom you love.
Send all your flowers today.
(Click on line-number to see note. In Notes, click on R to return to line.)
That Saturday in Leytonstone
1
R
I took my two bright pence
2
R
Down to the Public Telephone
Across Church Lane, from whence
To call Queen Mary's Hospital
To ask about my wife,
In labour late on Friday night
To bring the world new life.
"A girl!" they said, "and both are well;
This evening, come and see."
A daughter, born of our true love,
Dear flesh of her and me;
'We two' become 'We three'!
And as I crossed that busy street
My heart began to shout,
And it was all that I could do
To keep from crying out,
"I'm a Father! I'm a Dad! I've got a little girl!"
I hurried home. The sky was dark.
20
R
A mist began to swirl.
Heavy with dirty smoke and soot,
A thick damp fog came down.
It clogged my nose with sulphorous smell.
A blanket, greasy brown 25
R
Was smothering London Town.
The 'pea-soup' fog which Dickens knew,
London no longer fears.
That spectral fiend, now exorcised,
Haunted a hundred years;
But then, this shapeless monstrous beast,
Alarmed by The Clean Air Bill,
Intent upon one final fling,
Put forth its clammy, chill
And grimy grip to choke the Town,
Stifling its very soul;
Having as fell accomplice still,
37
R
Conspiring in villainous role,
The black pit-dragon, Coal.
Two miles I drove to Stratford Town.
The street-lamps' fuzz of light
High overhead, was useless
In that ghastly man-made night.
I followed a groaning two-decked 'bus
By its faint rear-window glow,
Marking its paint with my tyre when it braked,
My progress sadly slow.
"The Margaret Lyle Ward? I said.
"Upstairs, mate, on the right."
As I went up, I blew my nose.
I saw, beneath the light,
Black stains upon the white.
She looked so lovely, lying there,
So happy, and so bright.
I thanked her, and I kissed her,
And I held her very tight.
She told me that she would not mind
How many more she had -
Not if they were as easy
As this one; and I was glad.
"Only four big pains," she said.
"I'm tired, but I feel well."
Much too soon, because there was
A great deal more to tell,
The Staff Nurse rang her bell.
Last to leave the ward, I said,
To pacify the Nurse,
"It's nasty, driving through this fog
Tonight. It's getting worse.
To get here on a motor-bike
Is quite a work of art.
"And to get you out again,"
She said, "Now, please depart!
"Downstairs - the Delivery-Room -
See Sister, in the Hall."
She brought our baby out to me,
Wrapped in a woollen shawl,
Snug and pink and small.
She drank the world with wondering look.
She turned her tiny fist.
She blew me little bubbles, as
Her tender cheek I kissed.
The fog was oozing silently
Beneath the outer door.
L:ike a creeping shroud of death
It swirled across the floor.
With two depending on me now,
I drove back home with care.
I saw a little podgy face
And wisp of curly hair;
But foul was all the air.
I went to tell the Registrar
On Monday, after work,
And even in his office hung
Some traces of the murk.
His cabinet had three deep drawers
With labels plain to see.
'Births', 'Marriages', and 'Deaths' they said,
And it came home to me,
A few years hence, our Julia Ann,
In that top drawer today,
Might come down to the middle one,
A tender bride in May
For me to give away.
Four long days across the Town
That deadly fog had lain,
And some, with chronic asthma
Or bronchitis, it had slain.
New babies, that December,
Had to fight to stay alive.
Of those born down in Stratford
There were ten did not survive.
The year was that notorious year
Of nineteen-fifty-two,
When London had its last great fog,
Smoke-charged from many a flue,
Which many lived to rue.
For babies who were premature
Like little Julia Ann,
With lungs not well expanded,
A most anxious time began,
And in a 'tent' with oxygen
She lay and fought for life;
A sad time for a husband;
Much, much sadder for a wife.
She could not hold her baby,
No, nor feed her at her breast.
The nurses went and fed her
With the milk which she expressed.
She was the more depressed, -
- That though she was not able then
To hold her, strangers were.
The nurses, kind, but strangers still,
Could touch and handle her.
"That lovely little girl in there!"
Some said as they passed by.
We never doubted she would live,
Nor feared that she would die.
We felt she must grow stronger, just
With every passing day.
We did not take alarm from what
The Sister had to say,
Nor ceased to hope and pray.
But, as it were, to call the utmost
Power of Heaven to aid,
We had her christened by the priest,
146
R
And so with him we prayed
That she would fight off evil,
And look to Christ for life.
When he was done, the 'tent' was closed.
I comforted my wife.
Abundant milk she had. Some went
To help those who had none.
The evil fog seemed thinner now.
Dispersion had begun.
We glimpsed the wintry sun.
Upon that Friday evening
Which now seemed so long ago,
I had been out working
In the back yard, down below.
She, in our first-floor kitchen
Was scouring out a pan.
I had climbed a ladder
With a heavy empty can.
Suddenly the big can slipped,
And, falling from that height,
Made a loud crash on the stone.
Fear gripped her stomach tight.
Pale, she peered out, trembling,
Thinking to see me dead.
She seemed to have recovered
Long before we went to bed.
After just an hour or two
I found she had awoken;
Her nightdress and the sheet were wet.
The 'waters', then , had broken.
I telephoned the hospital.
They said, "We'll have her in.
We'll send an ambulance, for soon
Her labour should begin."
Out side, the mist was thin.
Six pounds and six ounces, -
For eight months, a good weight.
The sixth day of December, -
A fine auspicious date, -
The feast-day of the children's friend -
Santa Claus the Good.
Most lovingly she thought of me
And, as and when she could,
She wrote detailed house-keeping notes
To help me shop and cook
And manage on my own at home
With one food-ration book.
Great care she also took -
- That I should have sufficient rest,
And, writing every day,
Recounted all her routine there,
And never failed to say
That she loved me with all her heart;
For she was very sad
That other mothers in the ward
Had lost the love they had.
They talked of marriage slightingly.
"Its joys soon fade," they said;
But we held to our promise true,
Made the day we wed,
To follow where love led.
She wore two 'shells' to catch the milk
209
R
But, wrap round as she might,
She generated so much milk
That always, in the night,
They overflowed, and every night
She regularly awoke,
As through her nightdress and her sheets
The wasted milk would soak.
Wards seemed always far too hot
For comfort in those days.
Life was made of sudden rushes
After long delays, -
Pills, and mealtime trays.
Two weeks' stay in hospital
Was common practice then.
As the days went by, we wondered
What would happen when
The day for her discharge arrived,
If little Julia Ann
Was not considered well enough
To leave, and we began
Considering these alternatives,
Both of which were bad, -
To leave her, or be parted longer,
For, if choice we had,
The choosing would be sad.
Sister Burgess, on night-duty,
Said that she could leave
On Friday next, if she were well,
And led her to believe
That she could bring her milk each day
Till baby could come out,
But next day, Sister Garboe
Crossly left her in no doubt
That this was quite impossible, -
Expressing her dismay
That night-staff should tell patients things
They really should not say,
Upsetting them this way.
Nevertheless it happened
Just as Sister Burgess said.
The doctor found her fit, and so
Her discharge went ahead.
Daily she expressed her milk.
Her heart-ache none could tell;
But into the basin in her lap
Full many a tear there fell.
Late on the Tuesday evening
A knock came at our door, -
A young policeman with sad news, -
'We three' were two once more.
259
R
We knelt down on the floor, -
- Together, by the kitchen table,
Closely grieving there,
Committing little Julia and
Ourselves into the care
Of that Almighty Giver, who,
Sometimes, must take away.
The message was, that we should go
To Stratford Town next day.
We reached St.Mary's Hospital
A little after nine.
They wished to hold an autopsy.
There was a form to sign.
I felt her hand in mine.
To stop the flowing of her milk
They gave her an injection. 275
R
Back home, we found more Christmas Cards, -
Intensified dejection.
On Christmas Eve, again I sought
The Registrar, and saw
Our baby Julia filed away
In that deep bottom drawer.
Certain little knitted garments
Filled another drawer, -
For us, though heart-breaking, a sign
Of distant hope in store
When skies should clear once more.
The undertaker said delay
Was certain in this season.
A date nine days ahead was set.
We had sufficient reason
To wish the limbo sooner ended,
That we might attain
The blessing of a deeper peace, -
An easing of the strain.
Our folk invited us away.
Within we seemed to know
Their soulful looks would make our grief
Too often overflow.
We knew we could not go.
Thus it was, on Christmas Day,
We two alone were able
Quietly to welcome to our home
The Child born in a stable.
Four days after Christmas,
On a day of driving sleet,
I took our empty pram back
To the shop in Silver Street.
307
R
On January the second,
A Friday, clear and bright,
All in a small white coffin, which
One man could bear, so light'
She was taken from our sight.
312
R
If I am fated to perceive
The near approach of death,
I may be comforted to think,
As I take my last breath,
I go to see my little girl
Who left me long ago.
How changed in form we both shall be
Is not for me to know;
But we shall know each other in
That sempiternal clime
Where sadness falls away, replaced
By peace and joy sublime,
Set free from space and time.
The marriage vows pledge faithfulness
'Until death do us part',
And, very likely, one of us,
Bereft, with heavy heart,
Must somehow learn to live on here
A half-life, till that day
Of blessed sweet reunion, where
All tears are wiped away;
And that one will draw courage
To endure the allotted span
From knowing that the dear one,
Cherished since our love began,
Is with our Julia Ann.
NOTES
Line 1 Saturday 6th December 1952
R
Line 2 Newly-minted copper coins were always put into circulation
at Christmastime,
and appeared in 'Christmas Stockings'.
R
Line 20 19 Church Lane - a flat above a
butcher's shop. R
Line 25 Reginald Hill's diary for December
8th.: 'Fog thick in morning,
sun in City 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., then dark again. Buses stopped
running.'
On Friday 5th December 1952, about 4,000 people died in London, victims of
a massive dose of sulphur dioxide.
R
Line 37 December 11th - At the Old Bailey,
Craig (16) and Bentley (19) were found guilty
of murdering a Policeman. Craig fired the shot, but was too young to
hang. Bentley was hanged.
R
Line 146 Tuesday 19th December.
R
Line 209 Glass. shaped like letter C.
R
Line 259 Tuesday 23rd December, aged 17
days. R
Line 275 Probably stilboestrol, plus tablets
and tight binding. R
Line 307 Edmonton.
R
Line 312 City of London Cemetery, Manor
Park. R
Victorious, I
Vanquished the
Venetii.
Eagles
Imperial were
Invincible'
Nations
Defered to
Caesar.
I came.
I saw.
I conquered.
Life is a walk into the sun,
Journeying till our day is done.
What do we seek, and what shall we find?
Cares of the world may make us blind;
Yet we walk on into the sun,
Passing the milestones one by one;
Childhood and youth, maturity, age;
Travellers, every one.
We will know times of joy and peace
When love and kindliness increase;
We will know times of doubting and care,
Saddened by failure, near despair;
But Christ is with us all the way.
Hear Him - He comes again to say,
"Foolish, and slow of heart to believe, -
I conquered Death for you."
If we will pause upon our way,
Stopping to listen, and to pray,
There in the silence, His voice we hear;
Look up, and see our Saviour dear.
His Spirit, like a light within,
Spotlights the truth, floodlights our sin;
And, as we walk in that steady light,
We shall grow strong in Him.
So, as we break our daily bread,
We shall remember that He said,
"This is my body, broken, you see.
Each time you do this, think of Me."
If we but ask, we shall receive.
If we but seek, then we shall find.
Our hearts will burn within us to know
He was there, all the time.
(My elder son's birthday)
D ay of days in all the year,
A s Autumn brings its gold;
V elvet leaves fall gently down
I n russet colours bold;
D arkening then to mould;
J ust when we turn fond thoughts to
you,
A nd pray the passing days
M ay likewise, fully lived, yet fall -
E nrich your destined ways -
S uffuse life's common clays -
R eplenish that subsoil,
O f which, through mortal toil,
B y grace of god alone
E ternally new-sown,
R oses still may grow
T o cheer you here below.
H ere now be nourished by our
love
I n which you took your
birth.
L ong may you greet this day with joy;
L ong flourish in this earth.
(with apology to Rudyard Kipling)
If you can keep your whom when all about you
Are losing theirs, and blaming it on who;
Disappointed but not devastated,
No mere surprise incredible to you;
If you can help, but never be supportive,
Your record independent of a track;
If you succeed, but never need to make it,
Return, and never need to make it back;
If you are pleased with things, but never made up;
Yet don't say if you was, but if you were;
If you don't use scenario for background,
And don't confuse your imply with infer;
If you suggest ideas which none come up with,
And start without much getting under way;
Responding when the ball is in your court,
And ask not if you can, but if you may;
You don't resign as leader, but from leadership,
Your post available, not up for grabs;
Can start work, without putting it in hand,
And oversee it, without keeping tabs;
If you accept, but do not take on board,
Reliable, needing no safe pair of hands;
Can reach, but never need to make it to;
And your 'plane never touches down, but lands;
If your cash is available, not up front;
Your cargo never air-lifted, but flown;
Back words with deeds, no money where your mouth is,
Your chances sometimes squandered, byut not blown;
Not mixing on behalf with on the part of,
If you can suffer loss, but not lose out;
Your name considered, but not in the running,
And don't refer to influence as clout;
If you can talk of time, and not of time-scale;
Refuse to join up with, but simply join;
Refuse to put in place what you establish,
But quote a well-known phrase you did not coin;
Your railways carry passengers, not customers,
And guests are never checking out, but leaving;
Your hopefully meaning with hope, and not I hope;
Nor talk of making when you mean achieving;
You do not call fair terms a level playing-field,
Nor call for pate when you want some paste;
Nor say less people when you should say fewer,
Your premises inspected, but not cased;
If you can verify but not check out,
And never fog that word with never ever,
Avoid this moment in time when now suffices,
Not speak of a topic or aspect as an area;
Never different to, or different than,
But always differing from when need arises;
And call fantastic the impossibly unreal,
And not that reality which is merely surprising;
And what is more, by disciplined use of language,
Your utterance being clear, and not obscure,
Your clarity of thinking is improved,
And grasp of argument is made more sure.
Your words not trapped in wads of cotton-wool,
In twenty words, you'll utter more plain sense
Than those about you manage in two hundred,
Whose talk is foggy, and whose verbiage dense.
All are but parts of one stupendous whole
Whose body, Nature is, and God the soul.
(Alexander Pope, Essay on Man. 1, 267/268)
Our Universe consists of Suns
Surrounded by orbiting planets.
My every atom consists of a nucleus
Surrounded by orbiting electrons.
Are my atoms Galaxies?
Am I a universe?
No Earth-eye has seen an electron,
Not even with an electron-microscope.
Is there life on one of my electrons?
Are there people inhabiting it?
Then how small must their atoms be, -
And their atoms, -
And their atoms, -
And their atoms!
Are my unaccountable twinges
Explosions of their nuclear weapons?
Does the final explosion of their sun
Give rise to my fever, -
Initiate my ulcer, - my cancer?
Is our galaxy a molecule
In the body of a giant?
Are our thermo-nuclear explosions giving him pain?
Is our giant a god,
Whom our radio-active sins are distressing?
Does he distress his god, -
And he, his, -
And he, his, -
And he, his?
The Ultimate God, whose mighty finger
Set them all a-spinning, knows. *
We have done those things
which we ought not to have done,
and there is no health in us.
The well-beloved Son did not distress His Father;
His Father was well-pleased.
The well-beloved Son said,
"I am in the Father."
"You must abide in Me."
Is our galaxy a molecule?
Am I a universe?
* J.W.Dunne - An Experiment with Time.
(after John Donne)
O do not look too often in your glass,
For it may happen that your glance may glance
From one glass to another, and so pass
With growing power to and fro; which dance
With glittering steps shall so step up its force
That soon it shall become a mighty gleam,
Thus concentrated from its beauteous source
Into a penetrating laser beam,
And, striking through me when I meet your gaze,
Burn up my soul with scorching grievous heat,
And all my sense and mental powers amaze,
And leave me standing transfixed in the street.
My pulse shall like a pulsar seem to throb,
And be detected deep in Outer Space.
A radio-scanner, turning slow his knob,
Shall warn the rulers of an alien race,
And rockets launch toward the Earth in fear,
Quick to investigate new mystery;
So look not often in your glass, my dear,
But rather save your loving looks for me.
Unfortunate Kazoo!
Oh, how I pity you!
A tube of hollow tin,
A little screw-cap in;
A gauze, and buzzy paper
To grace the ungainly caper
Of childish clod-hop feet
A-dancing in the street.
Vouchsafed no power to speak;
Constrained to lend your squeak
To each fool who can hum,
What depths of woe you plumb!
Denied voice of your own;
Compelled to add your tone
To that of your tormentor,
Curse, now, your mean inventor.
No canny embouchure,
Or expertise obscure;
No mouthpiece but a hole;
No reed awakes your soul.
For you, no fine-tuned string,
Nor grace of ivory ring;
No finely-measured bore,
No dense black-noted score;
No encomia Hudebrastic,
Though you shine in yellow plastic;
No bell, all brassy-bright
Reflecting every light;
No shank of silver shining,
No case with velvet lining;
No catches chrome, with locks,
Adorn your cardboard box;
No gleam of varnished beauty,
No diapason fruity;
No elegance of line,
Or convolute design
Of tubes, with valves a-flutter,
Authentic tone to utter.
You've never even known
A pitch-key of your own.
Existence quite ignored
By The Associated Board;
Of concertos, not a bar;
No cherished repertoire.
Virtuoso never lingered
To caress you, nimble-fingered.
No fret, no bridge, no bow;
No instrument so low.
And am I a Kazoo,
That can no better do
Than ape another's song,
And meekly buzz along
With every tune I hear;
A prey to slavish fear,
Not daring to be me,
Nor to set my music free?
"- and furthermore,
In planning to commit this horrid crime,
This dreadful deed of cowardly violence, -
Planting a bomb to kill and maim the innocent, -
You first did violence upon your self, -
Smothered in your self that spark of Man
Which elevates the man above the beast.
Yet since you are no beast, but our dear brother
In whom that spark can never be quite dead,
We seek to fan it into fuller life
By certain means our technology affords.
We sentence you to forty days' Compassion,-
And may the Lord have mercy on your soul."
"No! No! Not that! No! Anything but that!"
He screamed. They led him firmly from the dock.
"Don't I get some clothes?"
"When you come out.
When you have seen your self as you are, -
All of us as we are.
Lights out in ten minutes."
A whirr. A sliding panel opened.
Wash-basin filling from a hidden pipe.
Toilet. Soft soap. Towel. Charged toothbrush.
Etched large on the mirror, -
"COMPASSION -
SHARING IN THE SUFFERINGS OF OTHERS."
A bunk with a duvet fastened down one side.
Nothing else.
Suddenly, darkness. Tired, he lay down.
The panel had closed. The cell was silent, warm.
Silence. Silence. Silence.
Out of the silence, sobbing, crying, moaning;
Softly at first, broken, rising,
falling:
Words, murmuring, calling, mounting in terror;
Shouts - "Help me!" "Help!" "Somebody!" "Help!"
"I - can't feel my legs!" Voices, wavering,
Mounting to screams, shrieks, ghastly wailing;
Unearthly, disjointed, agonized, scarcely intelligible.
He covered his ears, in vain. The sounds came
From all directions at once,
Close, loud, louder each second, deafening -
Till he was screaming himself.
Sirens, - nearer, nearer, nearer,
Screeching of brakes. Running feet.
Shouted orders. Confusion of voices.
Vehicles speeding away, sirens blaring.
Silence. Silence. Silence.
The whirr of the extractor fan. Breathing easier.
A voice surrounding him. "All over now, John.
Go back to sleep. There may not be any
More bangs tonight. Can't say for certain.
You never gave any warning, did you?
Except a devilish, bogus warning,
Timed to kill some of the helpers.
Try to sleep, now, John; if you can."
Returning, he found the bunk gone, -
Silently retracted into the wall,
From which now protruded a flat board
At seat-level; higher, a deep tray
Containing breakfast. Plastic cutlery.
He finished; stood up. Seat-board and tray
Slid back, end-on, into the wall.
A bare cell. A seat-block
Plumb in the centre, rose from the floor.
The dark glass blazed with colour.
A photograph of a little girl.
"This is Brenda, at the age of two;
Look at her sturdy little legs.
Here she is on a sea-side donkey."
He watched the clip from the home movie, -
The child bouncing, laughing with joy.
"Here's Brenda in her Brownie uniform;
And here she is with Daddy in a boat on the lake."
For half an hour he watched the pictures,
Cine and stills, as Brenda grew up.
School, holiday-snaps, Christmas, birthdays;
A long-legged beauty in a white bikini, -
A sweet girl dancing with a handsome youth.
"Brenda loved going to dances,
But here she is on the operating-table.
You took her legs off above the knee.
Here's the surgeon tidying up her stumps.
Here's Brenda smiling bravely from her wheel-chair.
She'll never swim nor dance again.
"What would you do, John, if you were engaged to her?
Would you marry a legless cripple?
You ran away; but Paul is going to marry her,
Paying love double because of your hate.
They'll think of you often, in the years to come,
And you'll think of them, now, won't you, John?"
A long silence. From all four walls
Brenda smiling bravely from her wheel-chair.
Rhythmic dance-music in searing sterophony.
The door-panel slid. "Ten minutes, John."
A welcome relief. He would stay in there,
Escape from the pictures, if not from the sound;
But, after a while, his bare feet
On the metal floor began to tingle.
The charge stepped up till he was driven out.
The panel slid shut. The treatment recommenced.
So it continued, day after day,
Morning, afternoon, evening, night.
The explosions came at any time;
High in the ceiling, out of reach,
The cartridges ready in their tubes.
Day or night. He could never be sure.
Whole days without, then two, or three.
His victims' life-stories, the barmaid, the fireman,
Policeman, ambulance-man, seeking to serve;
Their plans and their hopes, their everyday cares.
Funerals in the rain; the face of bereavement,
The widowed, the orphans, the empty chairs;
Many a photograph on many a side-board.
One day, a new twist. His own life reviewed.
A baby, a toddler, a child on a swing.
His first essay. His handwriting book;
The Lord is my shepherd -
Yea, though I walk -
School groups. A choirboy. Youth-Club days.
Stones to throw from the barricade.
Bottles with twists of rag.
Shots over a coffin. Berets and masks.
Daily the mirrors and screens shewed him
His naked body and naked soul.
After one week, knowledge. After two, certainty.
After three, acceptance. After four, he was ready.
Madness threatened, but they were watching,
And the pen and the writing-pad saved him.
He wrote many letters, with great labour,
Tearing, re-writing, and learning thereby
How to imagine the feelings of others;
Partaking thereby in his own treatment.
Letters to Brenda, the soldiers, the barmaid,
His parents, and his former associates.
His victims' replies cost him many a tear,
And many an hour upon his knees.
The treatment continued, but differently now.
They helped him with all human culture affords, -
Great music, great paintings, great poetry;
The Messiah in six parts,
Spread over six nights, before bedtime;
With pictures, and words in caption.
Injustice, he learned, remains to be fought.
Justice needs champions and sacrifice,
But the human way is to sacrifice self,
Working for justice with humanity.
They watched him still with yearning love,
And the light in his cell one morning revealed
A pile of new clothes. A promise kept.
I sell death.
It's a good living.
My customers are never satisfied;
Never satisfied, because they always want more;
Never satisfied, because what they buy is soon obsolete;
And I make sure my customers are dissatisfied;
I look after them.
Come to Fine-Fire Supermarket!
Come to Vicious Values!
I do enjoy the news. It's my compulsive viewing.
What will the Serbs do next? What are the Afghans doing?
How goes the Intifada? When will the Iraqi balloon go up?
Look at that lovely sight!
A soldier high in a helicopter
Blazing away with a machin-gun into the trees of the jungle.
Look at all those empty cartridge-cases,
Falling too thick to be counted.
I don't suppose it hurts the trees,
And I'm sure there's nobody down there;
But it makes the soldier feel tough,
And it's ever so good for business.
Look at that lovely sight!
More shooting in the Falls Road;
Pity about that child;
Still, you can get killed crossing the street;
His mother shouldn't have let him out.
Look at that lovely sight!
Three-day Army exercise;
All those thousands of blanks -
(They'e not blanks in my bank-account)
And live ammunition too,
All banging away for nothing,
And the rake-off comes to me.
Look at that lovely sight!
Huge arms-dump blown up;
All those bullets and shells and bombs,
Brand-new, never been used.
I wonder if they were insured?
My profit's safe, thank the Lord.
Now they'll have to come to me for more.
I'd rather they went that way, really.
I'm a humane man at heart.
It cheers me up to think
That nine-tenths of my high-quality merchandise
Misses its mark, and hurts nobody.
Sometimes the softies moan at me and insult my honest trade.
Well, I'm not my brothers keeper, and I've three answers ready-made.
"If I didn't sell the stuff, somebody else soon would."
They can't deny the truth of that;
It's usually enough to knock them flat.
The idea that this kind of argument
Would serve a burglar just as well
Never occurs to them.
"Thousands of jobs would be lost."
That gets them on the raw.
They never stop to think
How precarious arms-trade jobs are,
And that those skills could be turned easily
To useful production.
But if they try the feeble line - "It's evil, therefore I should stop",
Then I bring in my final clincher:
"Men have always fought, and always will fight.
If I didn't sell them bullets and guns,
They'd be at it with bows and arrows and clubs,
Sword and spears, and bare hands, too.
"Tell me the truth, now, - if you had the choice,
Would you rather be shot with a nice clean bullet,
Actually sterilized in the barrel,
Or stuck into with some unhygenic sword?"
They don't like to answer that, you know,
Because they'd either have to lie,
Or else admit that I'm a kind of public benefactor,
Saving so much unpleasantness.
I know I'm on to a bloody good trade.
National pride being what it is,
The nations will never agree to stop war.
National pride! The way it is now,
They're ready to start a good old scrap
When their silly football team loses a match.
Out come the bottles and knives,
And all over a game of ball
Between one set of professional entertainers and another.
Rea it in the Sunday paper;
It's just like Waterloo!
"Billy-boys shot exploded into the back of the net, -
The Wolves were out for blood;
Power, massacre, annihilate, -
Slaughter, - obliterate, -smother."
No wonder they have injury-time!
They'll never abolish war.
You can see it any day,
In any school playground.
He spits on my anorak, so I spit on his;
He spits agsain and somebody else gets it by mistake.
'Friends' join in.
In five minutes, every anorak in sight has spit on it,
Every body is suspicious of everyone who approaches,
Everybody is miserable.
Why don't they ALL STOP?
Why won't even ONE stop, hoping the others will see sense?
Some hope! They'll never stop.
They even enjoy the excitement,
In a twisted sort of way;
And when they're older,
Spitting will not satisfy them.
That's where I come in,
Just to supply human needs.
Supply and Demand, you know,
Laws nobody can change;
And every corpse on the screen is a pound in my pocket.
Who am I? I am your Government. I am you.
High on the curving Downs, at Salvington,
Sat seven friends, to watch the setting sun.
Black against the red, the distant trees
Fingered the Sussex fields, and one by one
Old and young fell silent, as the clouds,
Far-streaked with gold, absorbed all mortal sight.
They felt the earth, slow-turning, back and back,
Carry them ever eastward into night;
And none stood up.
Bill, my father's old school friend, was there,
And with him, both his children ,and his wife,
And I was there, with mother and my father,
Departed now, but then in prime of life.
All at once the magic moment came;
Majestic in fire the great orb slipped away.
"It's gone!" said Bill. Saddened, bereft, resigned,
Accepting loss, six found no more to say;
But one stood up.
My father, he stood up, still looking West,
Hoping thereby to see the sun again!
And how we laughed at his fond foolish hope,
Nonsensical, ridiculous. How vain
To think his three-foot gain in altitude
Might give his eyes, at ninety million miles,
New sight of three feet of the sun's huge disc!
Yet thus, at first oblivious of our smiles,
He alone stood up.
Fifty years on, and I have stood up too,
And now perceive the way my father saw,
Keeping hope ever alive, hoping against hope,
Hoping when all around would hope no more.
Disappointed sore by life's false dawns,
Frustrated by circumstance and fate unjust,
Destined to see the sun set on his hopes,
And cherished dreams oft crumble into dust,
Yet he stood up.
He never enjoyed a robust constitution,
But 'suffered with his chest' from earliest years,
And was, with 'irregular action of the heart',
Low-graded amongst the Army volunteers.
Employed in intricate and tiring work,
He worked long hours, and brought home work to do.
'Bad heads' afflicted him throughout his life,
Yet to the call of duty he was true,
And still stood up.
He served as one of the earliest Scout-Masters,
Helping poor Cockney lads to grow up straight.
He served unpaid as Hospital Savings Secretary,
And for the 'Tenants Welfare' on 'The Estate'.
He was a qualified St.John's Ambulance-Man,
And Air-Raid Warden, on call night and day
In Kent, beneath the Battle-of-Britain skies.
He shouldered whatever duty came his way;
And he stood up.
In later years, with sadly invalid wife,
And burdened too with many a household chore,
Yet still, as Treasurer for 'The Silver Threads',
He answered the call to service as before.
His hopes then centred on his three grand-children,
And glad he was to see them happily wed.
With quick keen mind he followed world affairs,
Forseeing where each new departure led;
And still stood up.
At last, when he was scarcely longer able
To serve the daily needs of his dear wife,
His staunch consort for more than fifty years,
She peacefully departed from this life.
He, after grief, rejoiced in hope fulfilled,
In being spared to serve her to the end.
Eight more years he lived, and being free
From care of her, his strength began to mend,
And he stood up.
Paul propounded three eternal virtues,
Calling Love the greatest of the three;
And Faith and Hope have come to be neglected,
Dimmed in the blaze of Love's priority.
Faith and noble Hope partake of courage.
My father knew times of doubting and despair,
Yet he held fast to Faith, and dared to hope,
Confronting dark horizons with a prayer;
And he stood up.
Now he has gone, and I am left to mourn him,
Thankful for the example that he set
Of cheerfulness and courage, faith and hope,
Of charity and generosity to all he met;
Of patience and loyalty, tireless spirit of service,
Fortitude and endurance, come what may.
My true hope is, that I may have the grace
To learn from him, that I may come one day
Where he stands up.
I see you there, my brother,
In the seat which faces mine
Aboard the jolting train
Which speeds us both to Heidelburg.
I also see that you
Are of an age with me,
And therefore served, as I did,
In the War.
I do not have your language,
Else would I grasp your hand
And tell you, I am glad
That I did not kill you, -
That you did not kill me;
You, below in the U-Boat, -
I, above, in the Destroyer,
In the War.
In our mutual gladness,
Our talk might come to rest;
But there I cannot rest.
There is no hope of rest;
For next to you I see
Our brother, whom I killed;
And next myself, you see
Our brother, whom you killed.
Whither now our thoughts,
As our train speeds on to Heidelburg?
Whither now our souls,
As the jolting train of life
Speeds both you and me to Judgement?
RESETTLEMENT
REFLECTION
February 1946
You say I have come back;
Back from the War, back from the Far East,
Back to my home, and back to my friends,
Back to civilian life;
But how 'back'? Why 'back'?
In what dimension of time is this 'back'?
Is it possible to go backwards in ultimate time,
Except in the fact of memory,
Or in the hypothesis of fancy?
Is it possible to start in nineteen-forty-two,
And go back to nineteen-forty-six?
Surely truth says 'No'.
Rather have I come forward,
Forweard from the War, forward from my travels,
Forward to home and to friends;
Not backward from present and future grace
To past sin,
But forward to present and future wisdom
From past follies.
You say I am one of the lucky ones;
Lucky to be home, lucky to have finished my service,
Lucky to have left strangers, lucky returned to friends,
Lucky to be a civilian;
But how 'lucky'? Why 'lucky'?
In what dimension of fortune is this 'lucky'?
Is it possible to judge me lucky by comparison with the dead,
Except in the sparing of temporal grief
And the wearying tears of bereavement?
Is it possiblle to assert that he whose task is still new
Is more fortunate that him whose task is done?
Surely truth says 'No'.
Rather are the departed lucky,
Lucky to be sharing that fuller life, lucky to rest,
Lucky to have received their crowns, and their reward;
And yet not lucky, but deserving,
Having laid down their lives for their friends;
Whilst I must be deemed but happy,
Having been spared to serve.
(There is a pun intended in "Reflection", in that the two stanzas are almost exactly the same in point of lines and construction, and strictly so in punctuation. I had particularly in mind my friend Donald Stevens. We were never close friends, but we started at our Infant School on the same day, and were progressively always in the same class until we left Grammar School some twelve years later. We were choristers and servers together, and founder members of the Youth Fellowship. He volunteered as a pilot in the Royal Air Force, and was accepted and given deferment, but became impatient when he found I had joined the Royal Navy, enlisted as an Air-Gunner, and was reported missing after an R.A.F. raid on Leipzig. For years I could not believe he was dead, and used often to dream of meeting him in various gatherings.)
(February 1950. Walking
home from Bruce Grove Cinema to Courtman Road, Tottenham,
having seen Robert Donat in The Cure for
Love.)
(To see Notes, click on the figure. To return to the line, click
on the R.)
As the romantic comedy film
Draws with growing music to its close,
I glance from the ascending sequence
Of characters and stars
Sideways
To note the scuffling fuss
Of those patrons always so irritatingly eager
To be up and away at the first inkling
Of a closing scene.
The seats to my right and left
Have long been empty, and
As I gather up my bundled overcoat
From my lap
And stand for the National Anthem,
I feel,
Dimly through my re-adjusting consciousness,
Alone, conspicuous, yet assertive;
And the Union Jack
In glorious technicolor
Flaps in a celluloid breeze
Unimaginable in this still warmth.
I discern below me in the stalls
An amorphous dark mass diminishing
At each exit,
And a few shapes moving along curved rows.
Now the lights creep up
As the curtain whirrs across
And I am mounting the littered tiers
And heaving into my coat.
Slowly jostling along the carperted corridor,
Speculating on the personality and social position
Of those around me,
I feel absently for my pipe, and pouch,
Put them away again,
And find the portraits lining the stairs
Pleasant and reminscent.
I am thinking that it was a good film,
And how happily he and she finished together.
I am wishing it would be neat and nice
Like that, for me.
But I feel it will not. Never mind,
I hope she will tag along with me
Until she finds someone worth while.
I hope she will find it is I,
But that would be an ending
Only found in films.
I am thinking that it was a good film
As I pass a frame of All Next Week stills,
And how real and homely the characters seemed to be, -
And perhaps, -
But no, things don't happen like that.
I am passing a growing huddled queue,
Expectant eyes turned resignedly down the road
To the corner where the awaited trolleybus will appear.
I decide
That the choices, the problems,
The events and the outcome
Were all too simple, plausible.
I do not decide
To walk home,
But am walking, striding, rejoicing
In the cold clear February air
Which burns in my nostrils,
Tingles in my chest,
And cools my calid face, and hands.
I try myself for being sentimental,
And am aquitted.
After all, the thing is real enough, present enough,
God knows.
I am passing a couple
Walking in timorous concatenation,
And am passed
By the promised trolleybus -
A silent speeding box of light
And faces.
I am passing
The withdrawn castle
With both its clocks' dull gold hands nearing eleven,
And am passed
By a stream of forgotten thoughts
Which carries me ten minutes nearer
Death.
I wake again, and glimpse the glow,
Dimly through drawn curtains seen,
Of the cardboard-grilled back
Of a radio in a bay-window.
I am passing
A straight row of plane-trees,
Each great flaked trunk appearing
Through a square hole in the pavement.
With their branches pruned
Of last year's yard-long shoots
They stand like a row of giants
Brandishing knobbled arms,
Or like the surreal shapes
Of Mexican giant cacti.
The wind drives a thin scattered rain in my face,
And a memory across my mind
Of Gribaud, poor Gribaud;
1
Spindle-necked French chessmen,
And the Red Pitcher, -
Pimpled terra-cotta
Vessel of freedom, yet
Unwelcome, horrible.
I turn to enjoy the rain in my face
And am surprised
By a gust from the opposite quarter, -
Sudden, illogical, impossible at sea.
I grimace as the rain pelts thicker,
And find that my pace
Has quickened, of itself.
Now I am at the two-lane Arterial,
And stand on the central island
As a cosy coupe purrs to Cambridge.
I catch sight of relaxed and pensive faces,
And on the shining macadam
An inconsiderate cigarette-end
Bounces in a shower of sparks
Almost in the path of a trudging cyclist.
His stare is fixed to his front wheel,
Seen in his headlamp beam,
A spinning arc, a whirling quadrant
Of black rubber tread, -
Black like the road, a-gleam,
And shooting a thin spray forward
To the music, the undulating buzz,
Of his dynamo.
The brim of his sou'wester is slighty turned up,
And he looks like a fisherman out of his element.
The pattering rain on his cape
Replenishes a small slopping pool
In the hollow between his hands,
Which are invisible beneath the cape
Draped over his handle-bars,
Kept taut by the wind.
I can see inside his mind
A vision of journey's end,
And the bumping and awkward progress
Of man, machine, and cape
Through front gate and back gate and shed-door;
The sighing, disrobing, and mopping and drying
Which will make those last few moments
Keeping him from supper
Seem longer than the ride.
I have crossed the road and the cycle-track.
On my left, on that central no-man's-land
Between the two banked-up cambered car-lanes
I have seen dispassionately
A dead cat.
It lies under the stunted dusty
Mud-plastered bushes there,
With fur queerly matted
And bedraggled in the wet.
The upside-down head
Has a quaint crescent mouthline, -
Strange, unlooked-for, with blood at the corner.
Upside-down head.
Porroh cat.
2
As I look up at the street-lamp,
With my eyes half-closed
Against the driven rain,
I recapture a phenomenon
Familiar in my childhood;
The strange spokes of light which I can see
Radiating from the lamp,
Stretching as far as I want them to stretch,
And moving when I move my head,
And vanishing into an ordinary glow
When I open my eyes wide again.
The lamp is by a tree,
And its wet bare branches
Are licked by silver light
In a circular pattern
On one side only.
Just ahead of me a 'bus has stopped.
Disembarked from dryness to the damp
Dissolves a little huddled knot of people.
Towards me comes the heavy-coated father,
His baby son held sleeping in his arms.
He passes, and I see over his shoulder
A placid podgy jogging face appearing,
With thumb in mouth and eyes shut tight
In the halo of a cheeky pixie-hood.
Behind him follows mother, much encumbered
With many sorts of baggage
And the arm of patient anxious Grandma.
Round behind the 'bus and slanting across the road
A couple, forward-leaning,
Have closely walked beneath a shared umbrella.
I am turning right, into my road,
And behind me the throbbing'bus
Groans into gear for Edmonton and Ilford.
In the tops of seven poplars
A wind aloof from me
Roars to a whisper, and is still;
Whilst the glistening black-green leaves
Of the hedge, hardly stir.
How can she enjoy my company?
I am not her sort at all, -
I am not...
I have trod the cracked and puddled tarmac
I have opened my front door
I have hung my coat up
And stood for some moments
Before my thoughts retrieve my body
And my spirit is incarnate once again.
I would like to imagine that journey
Which my spirit has just made,
From where I left it by the poplars
To this place; but I cannot.
Can it have been real, -
The flight of that lonely ghost
Cleaving the air and rain
To its prison once again?
Can it have been visible
To an eerie occult eye?
I don't know.
I am in the living-room,
And have shut the door
On a world of wind and rain and walking.
I do not believe any more
In such a world outside
Of darkness and lamp-posts.
This door is the end of the world, the inside world,
The world of light and warmth
And cocoa slowly sipped.
The rain can patter
On the hidden window-pane
Behind the blind.
I am not listening.
The wind can murmur in the chimney
And rattle the back door
And make the fire burn bright.
I am not listening.
I can turn my wet shoes
On their sides in the kitchen
And forget where they have been,
Why they are wet.
I am not remembering.
I can take a crumpled half-ticket from my pocket
And throw it into the fire
And wonder, to see it flare,
How it came there.
I am not remembering.
I am at that pleasant hour
When it is too late to be tired.
Here, there, and hereafter
Grapple in my mind
To win from me the stamp of reality.
Tomorrow is not real,
Never comes, has not happened.
Breakfast and work tomorrow
Are beyond the reach of experience, unreal.
Today was not real,
Did not stay, was not here.
From it I can keep only thought,
Pulses in the brain, indefinable, unreal.
Now is not real;
Just a fleeting ghostly moment,
Incommensurable quantity,
Quite untenable in memory or foresight,
Most unreal of all;
And since hereafter turns to here,
And here turns to there,
I see their unreality is equal.
But that clock frightens me.
Its omnipotent finger creeps and flies
Inexorably over the world's face.
It terrifies me.
There is reality.
Time, Tide, Heat, Light, Sound,
Power, Energy, Electricity, Love.
God.
Notes: (Click
R to
return to the line)
1. The Duke in Darkness - a play by
Patrick Hamilton. The Duke escapes from his long imprisonment by feigning
blindness and by a stratagem involving the body of his companion, Gribaud,
who has become mad, and has fantasies about being free and feeling once again
the rain on his face. The Duke's accomplice persuades him to administer
poison to Gribaud - the signal being the arrival of the Red Pitcher.
R
2. The Porroh Man - a short story by
H.G.Wells, in which a prominent part is taken by the ghastly appearances
of the severed head of a sorcerer, upside-down.
R
THE PROLOGUE TO THE SCHOOLMASTER'S
TALE
(After Geoffrey Chaucer)
There was a worthy Schoolmaster also,
Attending at the week-end course at Bow
To study, with a keenness effervescent,
"The Problem of the Backward, Adolescent,
Dyslectic and Neurotic, Enuretic,
Delinquent, Mal-Adjusted, Schizophrenic
Pupil at the Secondary Stage" -
In other words, quite obvious in this age,
"The Problem of the Average English Child
Of Thirteen years and Over". He was mild,
Attentive, quiet, and very deferential
Toward those folk on whom it was essential
(In subtle ways, with marvellous discretion)
To make a highly favourable impression: -
Chief Education Officers, Inspectors,
County Organizers, Rectors
(As Chairmen of Committees) and Head Teachers.
He had perceived the three outstanding features
Important for a man who seeks promotion.
Of first importance was the vital notion -
'Attend all possible Educational Courses',
No matter how one's daytime absence forces
One's colleagues at your school to lose free-time,
Take double-classes, sink ideals sublime,
Fall far behind with marking, overloaded;
No matter, too, how seriously eroded
The work of one's own classes may become;
No matter how the local Rates may soar
To cover one's expenses, door-to-door;
No matter how one's children, and one's wife
May, almost every week-end of one's life,
Be destitute of father/husband's care,
Estranged because one simply isn't there.
The second vital notion, to acquire
The jargon which can powerfully inspire
Such confidence in the official mind,
And thus, with 'Science' listeners to blind.
Those key words freely sprinkled when debating -
'Challenging', 'Rewarding', 'Stimulating';
Those pseudo-scientific, hyphenated
Monstrosities, like 'Over-compensated',
'Child-Child Relationships, 'Work-Orientated',
'Audio-Visual', Socio-Motivated',
'Action-Space', 'Hand-Eye'; and all the mazes
Of gloriously mumbo-jumbo phrases, -
'One-ness of One, 'Two-ness of Two', 'Three-ness of Three';
In this, no Late-Developer was he.
The third most vital notion for attention -
Some bright new-fangled stunt - one's own invention -
On which to found a whole new 'school' or 'movement'
For stunning educational improvement.
He had to be original, - no mimic,
And, naturally, had his special gimmick.
'Working Models!' was his battle-cry.
In every teaching problem, he'd apply
His fertile mind to make such apparatus, -
No subject proof against his charmed afflatus.
His 'Moses in the Bullrushes' had power -
The children sat and watched it by the hour,
And mathematics lecturers would gaze
Spellbound on his 'Pythagoras' with amaze.
His 'Samson and Delilah' made some chuckle,
And, sooth to say, t'was rather near the knuckle;
And once, for an important exhibition
He reached a new high level of ambition,
And rushing in where angels would not dare,
Showed 'Wolfenden and Lady Plowden' there;
And so this worthy pedagogue thus slaved,
And fished for the promotion which he craved.
I have seen an old thatched cottage -
Two bay-windows and a door between -
White stone steps and a creeper-draped porch -
And a garden;
Selling cakes and fruit, loaves and groceries,
Milk and stamps, sweets and Postal-Orders,
And stationery;
But why do tobacconists sell walking-sticks?
I have seen a travelling oil-man -
Old patched barrow with a lino roof -
Grease-caked, mud-caked wheels and axles
Trundling;
Friendly vendor of kitchen sundries,
Paraffin, candles, wicks and flints,
And carbolic;
But why do tobacconists sell walking-sticks?
I have seen a licquor-store -
'Frisco down-town uniform shop-front -
Streamlined bar and juke-box blaring,
And pin-tables;
Stocked with fizzy weak bottled beers,
Mineral-waters, Scotch and rye,
And pretzels;
But why do tobacconists sell walking-sticks?
I have seen a Chinese food-stall -
Hong-Kong back-street kerbside venue
For rickshaw coolies and pavement beggars -
Dark and swaying canvas canopy -
Jar of communal wooden chop-sticks,
And dishes;
Selling mysterious strong-smelling sweetmeats,
Square-cut chickens, limb at each corner,
Native-fashion;
But why do tobacconists sell walking-sticks?
I have seen an Australian grocer's -
Spacious crammed conventional splendour -
Ponderous permanent pavement-canopy
Against Sydney sun;
Displaying a galaxy of colourful melons,
Chokoes and passion-fruit, peaches and persimmons,
And nectarines;
But why do tobacconists sell walking-sticks?
We bade our farewells to Australia on Friday,
And, borne by the R.A.F. Transport Command,
Left Sydney, Cloncurry, and Darwin behind.
The morrow saw Morotai and Leyte.
Landing at Leyte, we saw from the airstrip,
Strewn among paw-paws and palm-trees,
With torn aircraft tail-fins and buckled airscrews,
Steel Helmets of Dead Marines.
We collected our mess-gear, our blankets and nets,
And squelched through the puddles and mud
To seek out our sleeping-hut, then to proceed
In succession, to wash, eat, and sleep.
We found the great Mess-Hall, lined up for the 'chow',
And supped with our Uncle Sam;
And, in the ablution-hut, washed off our sweat
In Steel Helmets of Dead Marines.
They were fixed in a broad plank of wood, in shaped holes,
And some of the gang had a grouse
About the conditions, the mud and the rain,
And the 'wash-basins' there in the shed.
They had lost all their paint, and the straps were torn off,
And each bore the dent of a bullet.
I felt we all ought to be proud to wash
In Steel Helmets of Dead Marines.
We were all strangers, and not from the States,
But just stopping there for one night;
Yet those battered helmets spoke volumes to me
In the black of that Philippine night.
Next morning we took off at dawn for Hong Kong,
And as we climbed, circling, I wondered
How many Yanks might be too proud to wash
In Steel Helmets of Dead Marines
J oy and thankfulness had come
our way
U pon the good St.Nicholas' festive
day.
L ove's increase, our first-born, new
begot,
I smiled upon you sleeping in your
cot.
A little girl! We two become we three!
A las, our further joy was not to
be.
N o Santa Claus would take you on his
knee.
N o birthdays would our baby live to see.
H eavy our hearts, when on the
twenty-third,
I n spite of all our prayers, came the
word.
L eft to a lonely Christmas, our hearts
numb.
L et angels love and tend you till we come.
G one are the great mid-winter gala
days,
E agerly celebrated year by year.
O n Christmas Day the glad exchange of
gifts
F or sundry friends and those we hold most
dear.
F aded after Boxing-Day awhile,
R enewing then to mark the brave new
Year,
E nergy thereafter quickly flags,
Y ielding from a surfeit of good cheer.
M undane matters mark the ensuing
time,
A nd though, to Christmas, twelve days folk
allow,
R eckoning most of them of small
account,
T his Tenth Day of their Christmas they
endow
I n passing, with no special, honoured
place,
N or are they much aware that it has come -
A mid the other passing featureless
days
R egardless, adding quietly to the
sum.
T en Pipers Piping your True Love may
send.
H astening after them we send our
love,
U nhampered by a Partridge,, or French
Hens,
R ings of Gold, or cooing Turtle-Dove.
H appy days attend you, and good
health.
I n all you do, may fortune prosper
you.
L ong Man, long may you walk in grace and
hope.
L ove surround you, all your journey through.
W andering Feast, glad Easter, seldom
may
E nlighten with its grace your natal
day.
N umbered oft mid Lenten days of
fast,
Delighting else in Easter newly
passed,
Y our day may touch solemnity or joy.
J ust so, this life, ne'er free from
such alloy,
U nfolds before you. Time for your
employ.
D uly we pray, you may be given grace
I n all conditions, and in every
place,
T o keep faith with the true abiding
Light,
H olding fast to all that's just and right.
H ealth and happiness, and peace of
mind,
I mmeasureable blessing, may you
find.
L ove and joy surround you on your
way.
L ong may you live to celebrate this Day.