Christmas
In two days’ time…
*| A poem *|
Category: Poetry
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Elizabeth Windsor
Amen, we say, God bless you, ma’am
Reigning on the throne 70 a yarn
Serving steadfast and steady, and so calm
Our queen has made the record book
All eyes to her this day will look
Celebrate our world-class monarch
Head of the Commonwealth lands
Sovereign of the Garter, and
Supreme Governor of the Church of England
750 holiday cards issued every year
1,500 puddings to employees far and near
Philanthropic activity beyond compare
Her first corgi was called Susan by name
A lover of horses and the equine game
And owns unmarked mute swans on the Thames
Her Royal Highness and Majesty
Is also a lover of photography
And taking pictures of her family
To Scottish dancing she is partial
Hosting balls at Balmoral Castle
And Highland cuisine as traditional
Christmas message broadcast on the day
Telegram message on your 100th birthday
And media message honouring citizens – hooray!
Serving steadfast and steady, and so calm
Reigning on the throne 70 a yarn
Amen, we say, God bless you, ma’am!
A few years ago I was online scanning the concert listings at a world-class venue in London. On this particular occasion I was looking for small scale music-making. The Baroque era is a favourite of mine, and I chose a recorder and theorbo programme.
On the day of the concert I was early, and so decided to spend some time in a book shop. Afterwards, I went to the concert hall and started my packed lunch. Before I could finish it was time for the concert to begin.
During the concert sometimes the instruments played together, sometimes they played solo. For one recorder solo, the recordist played two recorders simultaneously! When the theorboist played solo pieces, one of them was introduced as a passacaglia – which, to my amusement, collected philistinic giggles. If only the pictures of musical aristocracy on the walls of the concert room had ears of flesh!
This poem, The Known Great Composer, is about the concert. Head and shoulders above, one composer and his music made my whole time in London memorable. Memorable for the right reason – music.
No prizes, but if you can guess the Great Composer I don’t mention, you are a winner! Clue: Imagine the accompanying music in this clip being played two octaves lower on a solo cello…
“The Known Great Composer”
“The window blinds close
The stage lights are adjusted
Two musicians walk on stage
And we welcome them warmly…”
On the way home, I happened to see someone I knew. We talked for a while, and I expressed that I would be writing a poem about the concert. By this time, my mind had already begun putting the poem together.
Furthermore, before arriving home, I visited a local art gallery and talked more about poetry to the exhibiting Artist, referencing the couple of books I bought earlier that day written by the Poet Laureate.
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This is the Month – Eastertide
This is the month
When they say that it rains and pours
Down come the showers
From heaven’s open doors
But in-between the cascades
There are beams of sunlight
Shining through clouds
Heavy laden and fluffy white
This is the month
When the daylight grows longer and longer
With the sun rising earlier
And setting later and later
There is also a change
In the quality of light visible in the atmosphere
This phenomenon only happens
Once in the northern hemisphere
This is the month
When spring is well and truly here
It’s time for leaping of the lamb
And the young deer
Buds are prising open
Seeds and bulbs germinate
O’ the splendour
Of nature’s natural nascency about this date
This is the month
That brings high tides to our shores
As the moon orbits closer
And waxes more and more
These signs are where
The Jewish people take their Passover
And from where Christians
Take the major holiday called Easter
There is nothing like Eastertide
Celebrating a fantastic event
It happened 2000 years ago
And I, in a sense, was present
The most spectacular display
Of God’s agape love
Crucifixion and Resurrection
The only plan from above
On a Friday God laid sin on His Son
The sin of men nailed to a cross
He crucified the sinless Lamb
And took away our dross
On a Sunday Christ is raised
And we are raised with Him
This same Resurrection Power
— The Spirit — is at work within
And now we can live righteously
The old has gone, the new has come
Spreading the Good News Gospel
Of what Jesus Christ has done
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‘The Sky, The Sky’
When you look at the sky, what thoughts go through your mind and what feelings do you experience? Could you put words to any of this, or not really? In many respects the sky is nebulous, which implies that it can be described in a multiple of different ways.
And the imagination…
Maybe try this as an exercise:
- Go to the sky
- Close your eyes momentarily
- Open them and write down the first thing that comes to mind
Many years ago on my walks around a large office complex, I felt drawn to look out the windows at the sky. I cannot necessarily put it into words, but it did me good; her other worldliness, her perceivable yet unperceivable character, her secrets and mysteries, her colour spectrum…
In my first poem about the sky, I use a mono-rhythmic tercet scheme:
‘The Sky, The Sky
The sky, the sky in all its many shades of blue
Spectacled scientists tell us it has to be this hue
Much praise, I think, to them is certainly due…’
(verse 1)
Here is the first verse from my videobook: The Sky, The Sky
The music in the video is J. S. Bach’s Minuet in G.
The ‘Lightbulb’ Moment…
Approximately eighteen months ago I was checking my emails whilst listening to the radio. One email was from the Globe Theatre in London and I happened to be looking through their linked, online catalogue. The radio station was BBC’s Radio 3 and a musician was talking about their preferred recording of a Wagner composition.
At that time, I had been a Wagner enthusiast for a few years – even seeing part of one of his compositions at the BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall… A thought occurred to me…: “What would it be like to hear the whole piece performed by German musicians and singers…?”
Anyway, back to the ‘lightbulb’ moment. As I was looking through said catalogue and deciding how to use my discount code, floating over the airwaves came Wagner’s ‘Ring Cycle’. And, almost simultaneously (I think), my eyes landed on the theatre’s ‘Shakespeare Dictionary’. 💡 How about combining the two? This could be a world first: The Ring Cycle written in Shakespearean language!
Anachronisms
On New Year’s Day, 1st January 2022, I officially started the research. I was excited and looking forward to penning the ‘Shakespearean Ring’. I had a couple of German to English translations — good… Simply use the Shakespearean lexicon, etcetera, instead of contemporary English — and everyone will understand… But will they…? Where’s my red marker!
Stabreim v Couplet
Wagner’s ‘Ring’ (or ‘The Ring of the Nibelung’ to give you its full title) is a seventeen hour opera. He, himself, sourced various versions of the epic poem, writing and re-writing the text in stabreim. He also composed the music.
Definition of Stabreim: (Ger.). A versification style based on alliteration, common in German and other north European poetry of the early Middle Ages. It was adopted by Wagner when writing his own librettos …
from: Stabreim in The Oxford Companion to Music (online)
This project will be a re-working into another poetic style, the couplet, and is based on research I conducted.
Definition of Couplet: two successive lines of verse forming a unit marked usually by rhythmic correspondence, rhyme, etc…
from: Merriam-Webster (online)
The first verse from part one penned recently:
The Ring of the Nibelung
📕 The Rhinegold
📗 The Valkyrie
📘 Siegfried
📙 Twilight of the Gods
Part 1: The Rhinegold From left to right by nature’s design Flows continuously the ready River Rhine Lighter turquoise evenly spread Becoming darker towards the bed Near the floor the water dissipates Leaving an increasingly breathable state This vaporific man-sized space Moves continuously and at apace Across the floor of the riverbed Where no man can naturally tread Are rough rocks and undercurrent tides And vertical caverns unimaginably wild…
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‘A Natural Virtuoso!’
I went to the National Poetry Library in London earlier this year. I was on a mission: to find out which magazines published similar poetry to mine. For the next two hours I looked at everything that was available. All, bar one, had absolutely no poems about music — not even remotely! In my first poetry book ‘Soaring Higher’ (see ‘books’ page) there are six full length poems with such tasty flavours!
This poem is about a musician — and no ordinary musician at that — but a Virtuoso. “But what is a Virtuoso?” I hear you cry. According to Grove Music Online:
“Virtuoso ( It., from Lat. virtus : ‘excellence’, ‘worth’ ) A person of notable accomplishment; a musician of extraordinary technical skill. In its original Italian usage (particularly in the 16th and 17th centuries) ‘virtuoso’ was a term of honour reserved for a person distinguished in any intellectual or artistic field: a poet, architect, scholar etc. A virtuoso in music might be a skilful performer, but more importantly he was a composer, a theorist or at least a famous maestro di cappella. In the late 17th and 18th centuries a great number of Italian”
“A Natural Virtuoso!”
“Just a few words I’ve penned over tea
That I hope will warm your heart and bless
Who in all the wide-world could it be?
An appreciative music lover no less…”
A piece of music that requires virtuosic technique is J. S. Bach’s famous showstopper: Toccata and Fugue in D minor. Fragments of the Toccata are included in a video of myself performing the poem.
For the full poem click here: A Natural Virtuoso!
This video is one of eighteen poems available in my VideoBook. Click here for more details: Soaring Higher (videobook)
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‘This is the Month – Eastertide
Facts around the writing of this poem:
In the Spring of 1990 I set about writing a poem about Easter with the intention of having it published in a journal that would be available at that time. When the poem was eventually finished, it was without ‘Eastertide’ in the title. Although I had virtually no church attendance since childhood, I found myself including elements of the Easter story.
Then, before summer was in full swing, some Christians started to befriend me. They were from a local church canvassing the area. I was eventually invited to a Sunday morning meeting and someone named Colin Spurdle was due to pick me up. However, for a good reason he forgot and said he would come the following week. That Sunday came and I was so eager to go that I decided to go by myself. I have now been attending the same church for thirty years, plus.
During my years at this church, the poem was redrafted, extended and finally finished.
“This Is The Month — Eastertide”
“This is the month
When they say that it rains and pours
Down come the showers
From heaven’s open doors…”
I hope you enjoy this extract: “This Is The Month — Eastertide”
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‘The Garden of Eden’
This rhyming poem is based on the Biblical events that took place in the Garden of Eden — and includes a reading of the future. When writing these verses, care was taken to adhere to the fidelity and the sequence of events as given in the Bible.
The music that goes with this poem is the Elizabethan Serenade by Ronald Binge. It is light and grandiose with such positive, live giving vigour.
“The Garden of Eden”
“God created the garden of Eden
A pure unspoiled paradise
An ordered beautiful landscape
That could grow and increase in size…”
For the first verse of this poem, click: The Garden of Eden
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‘Swaying, Swaying in the Breeze’
It was a windy May afternoon when I was walking down the garden path. I happened to notice, it seemed for the first time, an array of beautiful flowers in bloom. Maybe it was their swaying that caught my attention. Anyway, I stopped for a closer look and saw bumble-bees indiscriminately landing on them; one, then the other. To capture this nature in action, I made a video recording with my phone.
The following morning this scene, with words, was going round my head, and before breakfast the poem was complete.
The music I paired with the poem, Beethoven’s Pathétique Sonata, echoes the back and forth movement of the flowers. For added imagination, one could imagine dancing ladies instead of flowers.
“Swaying, Swaying in the Breeze”
“Swaying, swaying in the breeze
Dancing, dancing beneath tall tree
Moving another way in slight air
So handsome, so pretty, so fair
Hues and shades, rare and fine
What invention, what design…”
Click here for: Swaying, Swaying in the Breeze
Splashes of Ink 