Sunday 13 December 2015

Presents

Dear Reader,



This is the last blog and poem I am producing in 2015.  I will return on Sunday 3rd of January 2016, and hope you will all re-join me then.  Thank you so much for any reading of my poems, and my musings, that you have done since July when I started writing my blog, not really knowing whether it would be a success or not.  But with the incredible advances of technology I can see where you, the readers, are coming from - and you are far and wide, in fact from all over the world, and I am very grateful to you.  As I told you in my introduction, poetry is not a popular art, but that some faithful, and some new readers, seem to access my blog gives me enormous pleasure and makes me think I should continue posting it next year.  So until Sunday 3rd January, when I return, I wish you all a very merry Christmas and happy New Year, whatever you are doing and whichever way you celebrate this festival.                                        


                                                                              *

I posted this poem in July this year but think it is my most appropriate Christmas message, so apologies if you remember it, and for those who didn't see it, here it is.


Presents

I don't want presents
tied and ribboned.
Encouragement doesn't wrap
well in green tissue,
praise in paisley boxes
or love in thick gold paper.
I don't want guilt
compressed into an envelope
with cheque.

A parcel of thoughtfulness,
a parcel of interest,
a parcel of embracing,
a parcel of safety, were
the presents I hoped for
under the festive tree.
The presents I hoped for
which were not to be.
                                                                        *


I like this quote from Thoreau  and thought you might too:

                                                      If a man does not keep pace
                                                      with his companions,
                                                      perhaps it is because he hears
                                                      a different drummer.
                                                      Let him step to the music he hears,
                                                      however measured or far away.

Very best wishes,  Patricia

Sunday 6 December 2015

Que reste-t-il de nos amours?

Dear Reader,

Someone said to me a few weeks ago that I was an eccentric.  Now whether this is good or bad I am not sure, but I do know that in my family there was a true eccentric, my maternal grandmother, and  I thought perhaps that you might like to know a little more of her.  She was born into an Irish labouring family from Kilkenny, where her father worked on the land and her mother was a cook. She had nine brothers and sisters, all of whom had the same problems with bronchitis and coughs caught from the damp cottages they lived in.   So she was sent to Edinburgh to stay with an aunt who kept a boarding house, and here she met her first husband, a man thirty years her senior, a rich brewer.  She was very pretty with bright red hair and had a lively way with words, and she loved men and money.   After marriage, at the age of eighteen, she lived in great luxury producing two children, a boy and a girl.  The son was sent to Eton College and the girl was kept all her life as a companion. 

When her first husband died she was told that "widowers of wealth" went down to the south of France to drown their sorrows, staying in the best hotels.  So that is where Granny went.  Here she found my grandfather, a widower with eight children and a large house in Yorkshire.  I think she probably seduced him and he took her back to Yorkshire, much to the consternation of all those children, and married her.  She didn't like Yorkshire, or the eight stepchildren, and they bought a house in London's fashionable Mayfair where my mother was born.  After my grandfather died she retired to the Ritz Hotel in Piccadilly and lived there for eighteen years.  Eventually she was asked to leave the hotel because she told other guests that there were ghosts in the bedrooms, indeed that she had seen them herself.

She wore the most extraordinary clothes, always.  Her favourite coat was made of red velvet with a long train trailing along the floor behind her.  She wore this with a black hat and a transparent black spotted face veil under which were her round, tortoiseshell spectacle frames with blue glass lenses.  Going out with her in London, which I was frequently made to do, was embarrassing beyond belief.  She was, in very old age, extremely deaf so it was necessary to shout embarrassing answers to her excrutiating personal questions asked in the dining room of the Ritz Hotel.

Having said all this I was very fond of her.  Why?  Because she had the quick well known Irish wit, she was funny and she made me laugh.  Dear Reader, you will probably know by now that enjoying a joke, and generally having a merry time suits me very well, and I would like to say congratulations to Granny for having come a long way from the fields of Ireland with such spirit and tenacity.  No wonder she lived to the age of 98.

                                                                            *

Que reste-t-il de nos amours?

A kitchen somewhere in France,
a candle alight on a small round table
remains of supper not yet cleared,
two old women sitting silently,
listening to soft music.

"Que reste-t-il de nos amours?
Que reste-t-il de ces beaux jours?"

The two old women rise slowly,
start to dance,
gently holding each other close
crumpled hand in crumpled hand,
cheek brushing cheek,
no words spoken.

Is it of the once vibrant love
they had had together
that they are thinking,
or of other loves, or that life is short,
and each of us only has one turn at it,
that life is only made of moments
and that they have had their share?

"Que reste-t-il de tout cela?
Dites-le-moi".

The two old women dance on,
gently swaying,
to soft music no longer playing .....
                                                                      *

I wrote this poem after seeing the film "Iris" about Iris Murdoch's later life.


With very best wishes,    Patricia



Sunday 29 November 2015

Farm Portrait, 1880







Dear Reader,


Dormice, which live mainly in trees or shrubs, have been having a bad time crossing roads and railways of late.  This has had a very detrimental effect on the dormouse population being able to breed.  So various organizations such as "The People's Trust for Endangered Species" and "Wildlife Bridges" have thought of a way to help them.  They have built arboreal bridges, made out of ropes and poles, stretching across the roads and railways to allow the dormice to scuttle from one wooded area to another.   Where these bridges have been made, the results seem to have been very successful, and the dormice are now having a good time.

*

Farm Portrait, 1880

That's me in the painting, a potato-picking wife,
dressed in clogs, a woollen shawl, a woollen shirt.
I stand on stony ground with my riddle and my knife,
put potatoes in my apron, worn over muddy skirt.
And that's my husband, wearing an old cloth cap
over pale face and wistful eyes, digging with our son,
while coughing Sarah holds within her lap
the swaddled, crying babe, until our work is done.
Our house is cold, dark and full of mice,
the grind is hard, the winter weather harsh,
damp oozes from the walls, and we have lice,
the lonely peewit calls from the eerie marsh.
But, at dawn today, I heard a blackbird sing
and hope arose with thoughts of coming spring.


With very best wishes,   Patricia



Sunday 22 November 2015

The Perfect B and B

Dear Reader,


A Linnet

Since we have have all been distressed this week with terrible world news I thought I might share with you quotations from two authors from other, gentler, times. We have had the first frosty nights this week in the Cotswolds, for which I was very glad, not liking the warm unseasonable weather we had been having.

So on November 13th, l872, Thomas Hardy said in his Dorset journal:

 "The first frost of autumn.  Outdoor folk look reflective.  The scarlet runners are dishevelled: geraniums wounded in the leaf, open-air cucumber leaves have collapsed like green umbrellas with all the stays broken".

And Jane Austen said on November 17th, 1798 writing from Hampshire:

"What fine weather this is!  Not very becoming perhaps early in the morning, but very pleasant out of doors at noon, and very wholesome - at least everybody fancies so, and imagination is everything".

Ah, Jane Austen, we miss you.......

I must say I find the weather a very interesting subject, as most English people do, probably because it is ever unpredictable and baffles us all, much of the time.

                          *                                              


The Perfect B & B

Soft red brick, covered in roses,
the hall floor Cotswold stone,
the doors and furniture
applewood, mahogany, old pine,
chintz curtains in pretty bedrooms,
thick woollen carpets
and large white towels,
long and lovely views of distant hills,
sweet smells of lilies and lavender,
fresh asparagus for dinner,
duck and strawberries.

On the garden table,
its soft green feathers
ruffling gently in the wind,
lies a dead linnet.

                                                                       *

Very best wishes, Patricia

Sunday 15 November 2015

Small Moments of Warmth

Dear Reader,

                                                                 
                                                                   
                                                                      A Tilly Lamp

We have had in the last few weeks, months, and years, warnings about when and how we should dispose of our food, according to their "sell by" dates.  So I was very interested in the following two tales.  When a man helped his grandmother to move house in 1980, she prepared a delectable lunch from various tins,  and both the tin of Heinz vegetable soup and the tin of Libby's corned beef were  bought before the war.  Another man found in his great aunt's attic a presentation gift of a large slice of the royal wedding cake celebrating the marriage of the Prince of Wales and Princess Alexandra of Denmark, on 10th March, 1863.  Despite having been baked 117 years earlier it was, apparently, delicious.  So I think if it looks right and smells right, eat whatever it is with a merry heart.

*

Small Moments of Warmth


I remember a little warmth,
Joey trotting the family through Norfolk lanes,
the small yellow trap swaying in the sunshine.

I remember picnics on Yarmouth beach
with enough blue sky "to make a sailor's trouser".
We ate cucumber sandwiches.  Penguin biscuits.

I remember dark evenings,
the small warm flame from a Tilly lamp
lighting the kitchen, and sometimes for supper
we had chicken, chocolate mousse.

I remember a warm holiday in France
squeezed into the back of a car,
singing old thirties love songs.

But will these small moments of warmth,
at the end, be enough to heat and split
the heavy stones that circle the human heart,
allow salt tears to trickle through the cracks?

                                                                              *

Very best wishes, Patricia



             

Sunday 8 November 2015

Thanks, Private Norfolk

Dear Reader
So many words have been written about wars and their consequences by others far better qualified than I am.   So I just thought I would write a word or two about my own father.  He fought in the First World War as a major serving with the Royal Army Service Corps.  He was three times mentioned in Dispatches, and I have a letter written in January 1916 congratulating my grandparents, from a Colonel Harrison and other Officers, on their son's distinguished conduct and gallantry.  So today I am thinking of you, Dad, and am thanking you for doing your bit, and am sending you my love.

                                                                        *

Thanks, Private Norfolk


You left singing, with your pals,
marching for good and glory.
You hadn't yet dug a trench,
killed an unknown soldier,
seen dead bodies, smelt their stench,
heard comrades' last sickening cries.

You gave your life with generous heart,
believed the lies
dispatched by loftier ranks.
And so to you, dear Private Norfolk,
I give my salute,
and my deepest thanks


for swapping your mauve rain-skies,
your white-breast beaches, and beckoning sea,
your level fields of ripening corn,
to fight in foreign fields, for us,
for me.


                                                                          *

Very best wishes,  Patricia

Sunday 1 November 2015

Crosby

Dear Reader,

Do you remember how during this summer we all read about the strange aggression being shown by seagulls swooping down on people enjoying their sandwiches on the beach, or just walking along eating, annoying nobody?  Then there was a peacock who threw himself at his own image  that he saw in a car's door, scratching the paintwork and causing considerable damage.  Apparently he thought his image was a rival for his lady friend.  Now there is a new danger from hitherto gentle animals, the wild ponies from the Quantock hills.  Apparently they have taken a liking to sweet sugary leftovers from people's picnics, and their behaviour has become violent and aggressive in order to satisfy their desire for sweet things.  They have even butted and bitten a walker, and broken one woman's leg.

I must say I feel quite nostalgic for the days when I happily picnicked on a beach, undisturbed by seagulls  who didn't want to share my sandwiches, watched peacocks peacefully strutting about in ancestral gardens, and walked in the Somerset hills where the ponies didn't give me so much as a glance.                    

                                                                        *

I wrote this piece of Poetry/Prose after I had seen photographs of Crosby Beach.  Crosby Beach has 100 cast iron, life size figures,  stretching out to sea,  sculpted by the artist Antony Gormley.  I think they are very beautiful, magnificent even.


CROSBY

I pick up white shells from the beach and put them into the pocket of my dress.

They stare out to sea.  Tall and dignified they stand, all weathers, undisturbed.  Gulls perch on them, sea salt encrusts their faces, the tide laps at their ankles, and in winter fog obliterates their forms.  I wonder, do these statues whisper in the wind to each other?   Talk of important things?  Do they run along the beach when the crowds have gone or have a swim at midnight?   Perhaps, after dark, they stare out to the horizon, star directed, seeking eternity.  And, are they ever lonely?

I walk back to the car park wondering again, about what is real and what is not.


                                                                          *
Very best wishes, Patricia

Saturday 24 October 2015

Dorothy's Dilemma

Dear reader,

Thought for the Week.

I have had a really bad cough this week and  so I have had few interesting thoughts  except for how to stop coughing.  But I did think about  an 18 year old girl from Bangladesh.  Shumi Akhtar had been the victim of an acid attack from a man who had proposed marriage, which she had refused.  He then attacked her.   Her face was completely disfigured and she had lost her sight. But after eight months in a hospital she, very bravely I thought, decided she would go into the town and sit in a cafe knowing people would laugh and stare at her.  And they did.  So bravery is what I have been thinking about.  Whenever I read about someone being brave I am full of admiration, and  wonder how brave I am myself. Until we are tested we cannot know, but I am not sure how I would be.
                                                                         *




The Dorothy in the next poem is Dorothy Wordsworth, taken from something she mentioned in her journal.



Dorothy's Dilemma

Dorothy slowly rode the hill,
eating potted beef and sweet cake,
she glimpsed, growing in green moss,
three primroses in full bloom.

Should she pick them?
December primroses in a jar
adorning the kitchen table
was a temptation, a pretty picture.

She pondered long, then left them
to enjoy the fecund earth,
their natural home,
their rightful place.
Days later, she saw with joy, nestling in the moss,
her primroses, flourishing,
uninjured by cold or rain
or human hand.

Very best wishes, Patricia


Sunday 18 October 2015

Safe Harbour


Dear Reader,

Thought for the week.

The newspapers have been full of the horrors of the world, everywhere some sort of sorrow. Even the Bewick swan flying here from the Siberia wastes portend a long hard winter ahead.  So I decided to quote from Francis Kilvert's diary for 18th October, in the year 1878, for a bit of cheer.  "Five of us drove in the waggonette to Oxwich Bay ...We had a merry luncheon on the bank near the churchyard gate, and great fun and famous laughing.  An east wind was blowing fresh and strong, the sea was rolling in grey and yeasty, and in a splendid sunburst the white seagulls were running and feeding on the yellow sands.  A wild merry happy day".   The thought is then : have we progressed for the better since 1878?    In many ways of course we have, and in many ways we have not.  Something to do with the loss of innocence perhaps?


Safe Harbour

Old love settles for a safe harbour,
a place of quiet embracing
rocked in a gentle sea.

Young love is daring, dangerous,
rich in its fulness
sticky in substance, ripe with seed.

Old love has a slower pace,
enriched with years of touch.
No need to preen and strut the hour.

The rib cage joins,
the bone becomes one bone,
the breath one breath.
Calm waters still seduce.
                    ****


To all those Russian friends who have looked at my blog, many thanks.

Very best wishes,  Patricia

Sunday 11 October 2015

Recipe for Blue

Dear Reader,

Thought for the week.

This week I learnt that Colin Firth's wife feels that, should you buy yourself a new dress or coat or whatever, that you should wear it at least 30 times before discarding it.   This makes me feel very old indeed and behind the times.  I still have, and often wear in the winter, a coat I bought at Marks and Spencer in 1985, thirty years ago.   Lots of the clothes I still wear I have had for at least fifteen to twenty years and I imagined  they were fine, but perhaps I need to get out more and buy something new.  Well it is just a thought.......
              
                                                             +++

I was having tuition from a Professor of Poetry in East Anglia some years ago when she told me my poems were too ordinary, too unadventurous, that I was to try harder with something different.  I did my best and wrote " Recipe for Blue"  although what it exactly means I am not sure.  Still I got an  excellent mark for it ....

Recipe for Blue


Take blue from the mountain

and dye my bones,

crush lapis lazuli,

mix it in my hair.

Plunge my heart in forget-me-nots,

soak my maidenhead in blueberry juice,

add a pinch of larkspur.

Wrap me in the Blessed Virgin's dress,

shake over star sapphires,

fold in the clouds,

and bake slow.

                 +

With very best wishes,  Patricia

Saturday 3 October 2015

The Man from Middlesbrough

Dear Reader,

My daughter, Jessica, who is my blog advisor, has discussed with me the format for this poetry blog, and has suggested the following changes.  The first change is that I will write a thought or two at the beginning of the blog and then write the poem.  A little of the poem's message is lost if, straight away you read "the muse" for the week.   The second change is that I will no longer explain the poem in any detail. Since my poems are very understandable I feel it is unnecessary to, I suppose, bore you, explaining what is easily understood.  Do let me know whether you think these changes are an improvement.

A thought this week.

I have been thinking about all the parents who have said goodbye to their student children, perhaps for the first time away from home, and how sad some of these parents must be.  Their children's bedrooms forlorn and void, and a new and unwanted silence in the house.  If your son or daughter was a great friend, as well as being your child, your loss is unaccountable, your grief terrible.  My thoughts are with you, all you empty nesters, and may your days be filled with new and good things.


                                                                          ******
After I heard that the shipyard in Middlesbrough had closed  I wrote this poem:

The Man from Middlesbrough

ordered another cup of tea,
lit another cigarette.

He held his head
in his history-stained hands,
nicotine fingers clutching
tufts of dirty grey hair.
He stared, not-seeing, at
the plastic tablecloth,
his mind numb.

His father, his grandfather,
worked in this shipyard
watched ships lovingly grow
from steel plates to proud traders,
built to sail from the Tees estuary,
into the North Sea
and the world's great oceans.

In his head the man heard the noise,
music to him, of drag chains,
when a ship pushed along
the greasy slipway, slid into the sea.
And the man thought of his mates,
of shared experiences from schooldays,
first girlfriends, first kisses,
walks in the Cleveland hills.
And he thought of the old canteen,
warm with steam from the tea urn,
from brotherhood.

The man wiped his eyes
with the back of his hand,
ordered another cup of tea,
lit another cigarette.

                                                               ****

Very best wishes, Patricia

Sunday 27 September 2015

Bus Stop Princess


Dear Reader,

I was driving slowly down the Cowley Road in Oxford when I saw this unobtrusive person at a bus stop.  I looked at her and she looked at me and then she smiled. And that smile quite transformed her. The woman I saw was no longer Cinderella, but a princess, and a beautiful woman. 
Hence this poem.

She waited, unnoticed, invisible.
Her fluffy green jersey egg-stained,
uninteresting trousers and sensible shoes
inviting no attention.
She was a brown paper parcel,
loosely string-tied.

But she smiled at me
with such sweetness,
such a smile of goodness,
I saw her sensible shoes
become sparkling slippers,
her shabby clothes
turn into a ball dress
fashioned from sunlight,
stitched up with love.

Not then a story-book princess
but a real princess
glimpsed at a bus stop.

             *

My musings this week are on:      Oscar Wilde, Dorset and Schadenfreude.

Oscar Wilde once said: "other people's happiness is a trifle dull" so I will be brief in telling you that our holiday in Dorset this week was delightful in every way.
The sun shone for us, the sky was clear and bright blue, and the small hotel nestling in the Dorset hills was perfect.  However, it is well known,  that people would rather hear about your misfortunes than your good times. How, on your holiday,  it rained every day, the view from your hotel bedroom was over the dust bins, and that you and your partner were hardly speaking by the end of the break. So I was wondering this week what it is in us that gives us more satisfaction learning of others misadventures than learning of their pleasures?  It is called schadenfreude, if that helps.

Very best wishes,  Patricia

Sunday 20 September 2015

The House




Dear Reader,

I wonder if you have ever had a strange, rather sad feeling when you entered a house, or a building of some sort, or even on a country walk. Something you see or feel brings back memories and you are not sure why. But I think they must be something to do with childhood, something perhaps that upset you or touched you but that you didn't dwell on at the time. And in this particular place the feelings return.  I felt like this when I went to lunch with a neighbour in the small market town I live in.
This is the poem I wrote when I went home.

The House

Was it the sound of Chopin
filling the street air,
escaping from a large keyhole
in the weathered front door,
or the first glimpse of pale
stone flooring and a rocking horse
in the hall corner, or was it the
Easter lilies rising tall out of
white enamel jugs, and books
everywhere, everywhere?

Was it the ancient dog
in front of a small log fire,
protected by a staunch Victorian fireguard,
or the scrubbed table and gentian-blue
hyacinths peeking out of a copper bowl,
Rockingham pottery plates
each one different,
or the sculpture of an unknown woman
young, rounded smooth,
placed lovingly on a window shelf
catching a flicker of the January sun?

Or was it the smell of beef stew,
a nursery smell dredged from childhood,
or the sight of home-grown pears
floating in sugared juice?
Or was it the feeling of safety,
warmth and love
everywhere, everywhere,
that overwhelmed me?

                    *

A muse this week....

I have been thinking of stamina, The Queen, and myself.  The Queen has now been on the throne for sixty three years and, in her photographs, I think she looks marvellous.  And she is 89.  But what astounds me is her incredible constitution.  She never seems to have a cold or get ill like the rest of us, and I often think of her on that boat, going down the river Thames last year, standing in the cold and wet for four hours without so much as a cardigan round her shoulders. And then all those engagements she has to perform: astonishing.  So I conclude she must be made of quite different stuff, a better material,  to me,  who gets tired shopping,  going for a short walk in the afternoon, and cooking the supper. 
And I am only 75.

Very best wishes, Patricia

Sunday 13 September 2015

A Curse





Dear Reader,

I am always very distressed when I read about the bones of an ancient person buried with its special treasures, being disturbed, being violated, and then taken away somewhere to be dissected.  This I feel is an affront, something we simply should not do.  These bones are sacred and embody the spirit and soul of a human being, albeit they are no longer sentient.  They wished to be buried and to then to rest in peace, and rightly so.  But their peace has been stolen.

A Curse

on those who plunder the earth,
and violate sacred places....

A curse on those who disturb
and steal gently-bandaged skulls,
legs, arms, and finger-bones,
jewels: perhaps a pearl bracelet,
a coral ring, hair pins, or a mosaic plate,
set out lovingly with food
for the long journey home.
Who have lain there, at peace,
for many thousand years,
the sand, the desert winds, the rains,
nature's bed.

A curse on those whose
laughter and excitement
fills the air, stealing these remains,
transporting them to people
in white coats,
who dissect their dignity,
stick labels on them,
give them to museums
to enlighten an ice-cream-licking public.

                     *

Musing this week.....

Whilst  wondering which poem to choose this week, and choosing "A Curse",  I thought about Richard III and the finding of his bones in Leicester City in August 2012.  He was killed at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485 and was subsequently taken by the Grey Friars, to their friary church, and buried there.      Hundreds of years later Leicester Car Park was built over his bones and busy important people, knowing of his whereabouts, dug him up.   So poor Richard III no longer rests in peace, but I don't suppose Leicester City council feels any guilt, or anyone else for that matter.


These words are on Shakespeare's gravestone:


"Good frend for Jesus sake forbeare,
To digg the dust encloased heare
Blese be the man that spares thes stones,
And curst be he that moves my bones."






Very best wishes, Patricia



Sunday 6 September 2015

Love Unlocked


Dear Reader,

I started writing this blog ten weeks ago on the advice of one of my granddaughters, Emma, who thought people reading it might enjoy the poems.   As I said in my introduction to this blog I  do know that lots of people would rather scrub the dishes than read a poem, but there are a few out there who do enjoy the odd one.  So I have tried to interest those few people who have looked and enjoyed them.  BUT and this is a big BUT I have had no comments from anyone about the work. Either good or bad or even indifferent. And this makes a difference as to whether I continue.  Writing a comment is NOT difficult.  Press on "comment", tick "anonymous", write your thoughts and press publish.  That's it.  Please do this as it is very important to me and I would be most grateful if you did.

There isn't much story to write about the short poem I wrote on the subject of love.  Goodness me
enough has been written on this subject by Shakespeare, to The Beatles, and thousands more.  So to think of something original was not going to happen, but I did my best and here it is.

Love Unlocked

What can I say about love
that has not been said?

I have little to add except
my sweetheart proffered
a unique key
to the door of possibilities,
through loving me.

             *

A musing this week,

There has been so much sorrow, suffering and grief to engulf us this week that  I thought I would share with you Francis Kilvert's diary entry for September 6th, 1875, to try to make us feel happier for a minute or two.

'The morning suddenly became glorious and we saw what had happened in the night.  All night long millions of gossamer spiders had been spinning and the whole country was covered.....The gossamer webs gleamed and twinkled into crimson and gold and green like the most exquisite shot-silk dress in the finest texture of gauzy silver wire.  I never saw anything like it or anything so exquisite.........'

Very best wishes, Patricia

Sunday 30 August 2015

Not One of Us

Dear Reader,

I went to several boarding schools from the age of eight and never felt happy in any of them although I think some people really enjoyed their boarding schools.  The type of person who was confident and good at sport, came from a secure home and loving parents did seem to settle well and liked being there.
I was not one such person.  Hopeless at sport and rather shy, bespectacled and plump I found each term terrifying and simply to be endured.  One of these schools I was sent to was a convent in Paris which made Dothboys Hall seem quite civilized, french only spoken and I didn't speak french.  And nuns are not quite what they seem.

Not One of Us

Asmall figure at school in
a hot, strange land.  The
children left her alone,
she didn't speak their language
or know their games or rules.
She was not one of them.

Winter now and an English
boarding school, where the rules
were known, but not to her.
She was clumsy, wore spectacles,
couldn't tie her tie, dropped the netball.
couldn't master dance steps gracefully
to the music of "Greensleeves",
was not an asset, wouldn't do.
She was not one of them.

She simply asked,
why do the safely-grounded
hear the beat of a terrified heart
and seek to silence it? Is the beat
too loud, something not understood,
something to frighten?
Are things better when the group
destroys the alien in its midst?

She never knew,
she was not one of them.

            *
A short musing this week...

I had my grand daughter to stay this week.  She is fifteen years old.  A very pretty and sophisticated young girl and strangely wise and completely delightful.  So I was thinking, whilst washing up the dishes last night, how very very different girls are today from sixty years ago when I was fifteen.. In those days I devoured books of a romantic nature and really believed and dreamed that one day a prince, such as Cinderella found, would whisk me away to love and marriage and happiness ever after.   That was my age of innocence but when does the age of innocence leave us today?  Rather, I think, sooner than it used to.

Best wishes, Patricia

Sunday 23 August 2015

Miracle


Dear Reader,

I remember being astonished when I heard of the amazing journey the swallow took when it left us in September, to literally fly round the world and home again.  This small bird is only the size of your hand but, enormously bravely, I think, sets off to fly thousands of miles around the Cape of Africa, over the Pyrenees and the Sahara Desert and returns here to England, and its original nest, in the spring.

Miracle

Rich in England's spring,
cowparsley entrancing
in dog-rosed hedge,
the fecund earth lush green,
a baby swallow
hatches in a Suffolk barn,
to the cries of gulls
flying over mudflats,
over sea-lavender.

This small bird grows
embracing our summer warmth,
swooping on insects caught
above rolling grasslands.
It dips and tumbles gracefully,
trouble-free.

But what instinct tells of winter's cold?
This bird, hand sized, will
fly over icy Pyrenees,
thirst through the parched Sahara,
soar and glide on trade winds,
south to The Cape of Africa
drawn, inexplicably, to the heat
of the southern sun.

In early spring does
this swallow's courageous heart
grow restless, homesick for
a Suffolk barn?
Is it a miracle that some force
of nature returns this minute bird
to its birth-nest by the English sea?
Who knows, but it seems so to me.

                      *

Musing for this week.....

This week there is another story of a bird, although why I keep paying attention to stories about birds is a bit of a mystery to me.  So this bird is called Chris and he is a cuckoo.  He was tagged and tracked so that the British Trust for Ornithology could see where he went on his 10,000 mile journey, before he returned here in the summer.  But he has gone missing, has disappeard altogether.  No one has seen him since August 8th, and everyone is very concerned.  For myself I expect he was fed up with being tagged, got loose and flew away to freedom.

 Best wishes, Patricia




Sunday 16 August 2015

Silent, Their Men Stand By


Dear Reader,




My husband, Geoffrey, and I were staying in Marrakech, Morocco, on holiday a few summers ago.  We had a bedroom and bathroom in a small house in the hotel grounds which was cleaned by two women from the district.  They spoke absolutely no english and I speak absolutely no moroccan
but we made ourselves understood with laughter and signs and, as we left, a hug or two.  On return to England I wrote the following poem.




Silent, Their Men Stand By

as universal woman talks
with women
who are not friends,
or neighbours,
or women they know or love,
just women.

Their bonding thread
is laughter, touch, glance, cry,
instant understanding.

While silent, mystified, their men stand by.

                         *

A musing this week.

I really do not like August weather,  this last week has been terrible.  Either I am fetching another cardigan because it has become so cold, or I am taking off the said cardigan and feeling much too hot, and it is all the fault, I think, of the humidity.  Jane Austen said whilst staying in Kent in 1796 : "What dreadful hot weather we have! - It keeps one in a continual state of inelegance".  So I have been in a "state of inelegance" all this last week, don't like it, and much look forward to September.

Best wishes, Patricia

Sunday 9 August 2015

Presents


Dear Reader,

I have always found receiving presents or indeed anything to do with presents very difficult emotionally.  The few presents my parents gave me were material things I did not want, but longed for, instead, less tangible  objects.  You know the sort of thing I mean, dear reader:  love, affection,
attention, laughter, and "approbation" as Jane Austen might say.


Presents

I don't want presents
tied and ribboned.
Encouragement doesn't wrap
well in green tissue,
praise in paisley boxes
or love in thick gold paper.
I don't want guilt
compressed into an envelope
with cheque.

A parcel of thoughtfulness,
a parcel of interest,
a parcel of embracing,
a parcel of safety, were
the presents I hoped for
under the festive tree.
The presents I hoped for
which were not to be.

             *           

Musing this week.....

I heard of a village in southern Italy where none of the people who  lived there had ever been to the sea.  They had decided that before they died they really wanted to see it and would, somehow find the money. It was the women who made this decision, the pensioners, and it was only them, the women who were to go.  A grandson told them to go on line where, it seems, for a good cause, people all over the world will donate money for whatever is wanted.  And they got the money. But the interesting thing about this tale for me was that quite one or two of the ladies, who had never in all their lives, been out of the village didn't want to go.  One of them said she thought the world a dangerous place and she would rather stay put.  This reminded me of Mr. Wodehouse in Jane Austen's "Emma" who, in his turn, liked to stay within a mile or so of his house on account of the dangers abroad.   I  must say I feel much the same as the Italian lady and Mr. Wodehouse.

Best wishes, Patricia

Sunday 2 August 2015

England Dear to Me


Dear Reader,

This poem "England Dear to Me" is very self explanatory.  I think everyone has a favourite place in England that conjures up memories of houses, or holidays, somewhere in the hills perhaps or on a special beach picniking.  For many years I spent holidays in North Norfolk, often in the pouring rain and frequently with rather tired and cross children.   But looking back I think with enormous affection of those long walks to the sandy, empty beaches, carrying umbrellas, baskets and all the necessary equipment for a day's stay at the seaside. I wrote this poem trying to  and think of all the things english that made my spirits rise, and made me  feel proud of my beautiful country.

England Dear to Me

It is the robins, blackbirds, blue tits,
hopping and grubbing in the garden
that lurch my heart
make England dear to me.
It is the velvet of green moss,
oak trees, old with history,
the first cowslips,
hedgerows filled with dog rose, foxgloves
and shy sweetpeas in china bowls.
It is finding tea rooms in small market towns,
enticing with homemade scones and strawberry jam,
or suddenly glimpsing church spires
inching their way to heaven.
It is finding a Norman church,
full with a thousand years of prayer,
and a quiet churchyard mothering its dead.
It is small country lanes, high hedged,
views of mauve hills stretching skywards,
sheep and lambs dotting the green,
and bleached Norfolk beaches,
silence only broken wit a seagull's cry.
It is the people,
their sense of humour,
their way of saying "sorry" when you bump into them,
their fairness, and once or twice a year
their "letting go",
singing "Jerusalem" with tears and passion.

It is these things
that lurch my heart
make England dear to me.


                *

A musing this week,

Lat week I was speculating on the aggression of seagulls; this week I saw a story about a peacock called Percy.   Percy apparently has caused thousands of pounds worth of damage to cars by attacking its own reflection, mistaking it for a rival. So what has happened to our feathered friends, I wonder?
Has the global anger that seems to pervade everything we do, and say, wafted out to the  woods,  tree tops, mountains, lakes, and rivers - and have the birds caught it on the wing and decided to copy us human beings?  Aggressive people, aggressive birds?

Best wishes,
Patricia

Sunday 26 July 2015

Agnes Ellen Turner



Dear Reader,

I thought this week I would present you with a poem about my nanny.  My parents were of the generation and class that thought it was quite normal not to look after their children during childhood, and sometimes beyond, but to hire someone else to do it, namely a nanny.  My father, an actor was often away and my mother was busy with her social life, so nanny was, in effect, my mother and I thought of her as such, and still do.  Nanny lived in a two up and two down in the backstreets of the city of Canterbury until she started work at the age of fourteen as a nursery maid in an aristocratic family.  She never married since all single young men she knew were killed  in the First World
War. Harry, the young man she was engaged to, was certainly one of them.

Agnes Ellen Turner

who wore her hair
in a long silver plait
wound round her head

who always had a brooch
on her sensible floral dress
worn with shiny black lace-up shoes

who as a child slept
five in a bed with
her brothers and sisters
head to toe

who had a fiance, Henry
who waved her goodbye
but didn't come home

who wore white face powder
with no other adornments
and smelt of lavender water

who wrote to me at boarding school
sent me Georgetter Heyer novels
wrapped in brown paper

who watched "Songs of Praise"
and listened to Dick Barton
a bottle of Guiness at her side

who three weeks before my wedding
knitted a woolly hat to wear
but she didn't make it
her breath ran out

nanny, who loved me
            *
           
A musing for today.

A lesson I have learnt this week is not, at any cost, to eat a sandwich sitting in a deck chair on the beach when I go on holiday to Sidmouth next month.  If I do an aggressive seagull may swoop on the sandwich or perhaps peck at my head leaving blood running down my cheeks, or worse.  I did see too that a seagull had killed a small dog and attacked a tortoise and, if I was running the world, I would find some way to cull these dangerous birds.  There are many poems and books depicting seagulls as romantic figures but obviously this is not, in truth, the case.

Best wishes, Patricia

Sunday 19 July 2015

A Variation on the Tortoise and the Hare


Dear Reader,

I am going to tell you today about the following poem and why I wrote it.  I went to a rather boring poetry workshop  for a three day course and met there other poets.  Not that they weren't very nice but they were all very intense and there weren't many jokes to be had.  On the last day we were asked to write a poem with the idea of a myth or a fable as its subject.  I don't know any myths so I had to rely on my rather vague memories of fables read to me as a child.  We had only an hour to produce something and racing against time I produced the following poem and hope you enjoy it.

A Variation on the Tortoise and the Hare

The tortoise, shell-encased,
shy and timid,
was fond of quiet places.
He ate lettuce sandwiches,
drank bottled water
and did deep breathing exercises.
He was slow alright,
but kept on "keeping on", getting there,
although a little fearful
of what life can bring.

Then, he discovered anxiety pills
and grew bolder,
he opinionated more,
rejected lettuce,
ate avocado and prawn cocktails,
drank vodka,
and tried his hand at salsa dancing.
Confidence changed him.
He became the hare.

Ah ha the hare.

This hare spoke his mind.
He jumped and danced
texted and mobiled friends,
arranged outings,
and had a ball.
But the Gods were watching him,
they sent a "don't forget card"
to remind him of his tortoise life,
his quiet life,
the life that was right and good
for a tortoise.

He threw the anxiety pills away
and slowly his shell grew back,
he started reading again,
he talked less,
thought more,
enjoyed lettuce sandwiches
and drank bottled water.
He became the tortoise
that he was meant to be.

Musing this week:

Am I the only person to not appreciate the Pluto landing which seems to have caused so much excitement.  It is a very long way to go and, I think, took thirteen years to achieve. When you finally arrive it all looks grey,  grim looking, and empty.  No nice spots for a picnic or a  pretty country walk, no birds, no flowers,  in fact nothing, I would say, to recommend it.

Best wishes, Patricia

Sunday 12 July 2015

Camel


Dear Reader,

Since last week when I wrote my first blog I have been thinking about the best way to do it, and have decided to write it on Sundays.  This is the day, after going to church, that, universally I think, needs filling in a bit if you are not in your first youth.  I know people work in their gardens, or play bridge, or do the ironing, but still time seems to have a slower pace on Sundays, so it seems a good day for me to write my blog.

I will write the reason for the poem first, as I told you last week,  and then write the poem out for you to read.  Then the musing.   This could be anything but I will try to think of something that I find amusing or extraordinary, or perhaps, even sad, although there is so much sadness in the world today, perhaps we all need cheering up instead.  But we shall see.

My poem today is called "Camel".  I had been visiting a wildlife park near to where I live with the grand children.  We had looked at everything, enjoyed the monkeys and merecats, the rabbits and the guinea pigs,  then we came upon the field with the camels in it.  And they all looked so miserable that I felt miserable looking at them. This is the poem.

Camel

The woman stares at me
into my rheumy eyes, my sad face
sees a dusty, dirty animal
mud sticking to my coat
my miserable tail hanging loose
my hooves cracked, hump matted.

But I want her to know that this is not me.
I came from a land of warmth
of sun, of sand,
my arab owner loved me
understood me
he stroked my coat.
He rode on my back
Kelim rugs hugging my hanunches
water in large panniers
strung to my side.
We rode to oases, to Petra Rose,
he was my friend.
I weep for the want of him.

The woman walks away
but something glistens on her cheek.


A musing this week.

Thinking of the Greek crisis I remembered a quotation from Dickens.   It was Mr. Micawber from David Copperfield who said:  "Annual income twenty pound, annual expenditure nineteen pounds, nineteen shillings and sixpence, result happiness.  Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds, ought and sixpence, result misery".
Perhaps the Greeks ought to read more Dickens.


Sunday 5 July 2015

Introduction to my blog


Dear Reader,

This is my first attempt at a "blog" so please forgive me if it falls short of your expectations of what a poet thinks and writes.  I know poetry is not very popular, in fact, lots of people hate it, say it is incomprehensible, but I don't think that is the case with mine.  I try to write clearly so what I am trying to say is easy to understand.   My granddaughter thought it would be fun for me to write about my poems, and why I wrote them, so this is what I am going to try to do.  First of all I will tell you why I had the idea for the poem and then I will type it out for you to read and see if you like it.

Then, since I like musing on daily events, I thought I would share with you something I saw or read in the newspapers which you might have missed, and which I thought was amusing.

So I will write today's musing first.

I t appears that Larry, the Downing Street cat, is not performing his mouse duties well enough.  Yesterday, George Osborne, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, saw a mouse running over the sofa whilst in an important meeting in Downing Street.  It seems that a colleague and George raced after it and trapped it in a paper bag before letting it out somewhere more suitable.
Larry was not available for comment.

The poem "Acknowledgement" which you can find on my blog page under "poems" was written when my granddaughter was about five years old.  We were going for a walk together and suddenly she asked me whether I knew her grandfather.  He and I had been married for many years before our
divorce and I found the question really upset me.  Small children don't really understand relationships
and she was puzzled by mine. I wrote this poem when I got home and, when reading it at gatherings people often came up afterwards and told me their own stories, relating to the poem, and say they felt emotional when hearing me read it.

If you have ant ideas for my blog please let me know as I would welcome any advice,
Best wishes,  Patricia