Misconception

                                                                                   Common Pheasant

 

Dear Reader,

Each year 40 million pheasants are released into the countryside only to be shot.  That is what they are bred for.  The first pheasants were introduced nearly a thousand years ago from the mountains of Georgia, but the most common varieties now come from western China.

Pheasants are large, long tailed game birds.  The males have rich a dark green head, with chestnut, golden brown and black markings on their bodies and tails.  Pheasants can be found on woodland, farmland, scrub and wetlands.  But in its natural habitat the common pheasant lives in grasslands near water with small copses of trees.  

Pheasants are gregarious birds and outside the breeding season form loose flocks.  Whenever they are hunted they are always timid.  Once they associate humans with danger and will quickly retreat for safety after hearing the arrival of hunting parties.

                                                                   

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From Gerald Manley Hopkins, 1873, October 29th, in Surrey

'Wonderful downpour of leaf: when the morning sun began to melt the frost they fell at one touch and in a few minutes  a whole tree was flung of them; they lay masking and papering the ground at the foot.   Then the tree seems to be looking down on its cast self as blue sky on snow after a long fall, its losing, its doing.'

From Dorothy Wordsworth, 1800, October 31st, in Windermere

'A very fine moonlight night - the moon shone like herrings in the water.'

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Misconception

The woman thought when she left
the office building would explode,
blood from her willing heart
would drip from the ceiling,
pieces of her goodwill,
her ready smile,
possibly her arms and legs,
would drop into waste bins,
flow out of filing cabinets,
strew the carpet with bits of herself.
The atmosphere would be dank
with the tears for the loss of her.
She knew her worth.

In the spring, Sandra met her.
Karen, from Accounts,
now has her job, she said.
She is brilliant, everyone loves her.

The woman walked away,
mantled in her goodness,
surprised at what poor judgements
people make.

                                                                                     *

With best wishes, Patricia

Havana Cigars

                                                                                              Havana

 Dear Reader,

In the 1950s when I was a debutante I went to lots of dinner parties where, after dinner, the men smoked cigars. It is such a particular smell, never to be forgotten, and when I some times smell it in the street, it takes me straight back to those days. Francis and I have been watching Downton Abbey again, and it all so reminds me of my youthful days.  When we (I was married then and lived in the New Forest in a manor house) gave dinner parties, after the desert  the women rose to their feet and traipsed out of the dining room and went upstairs to "powder our noses". The men then smoked cigars and talked about money or told dirty stories until they got drunk on brandy, or some liqueur, then they drove home in that condition.  On several occasions guests would end up in ditches, and had, sometimes, bad accidents. And the smell of cigar smoke stayed in the dining room for days.  I can smell it now, writing this. 

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From Dorothy Wordsworth, October 30th, 1802, in Westmorland

'It is a breathless, grey day, that leaves the golden woods of autumn quiet in their own tranquility, stately and beautiful in their decaying:the lake is a perfect mirror'.

From S.T. Coleridge, October 31st, 1803 in Cumberland

The full moon glided on behind a black cloud. And what then? And who cared?

                                                                                         *

Havana Cigars

A man walked past me
smoking a cigar,
puffing out smoke
with its unique aroma
of luxury and opulence.

What memories it brings.

Candlelit dinners eaten,
Cuban cigars passed round
in silver boxes
nestling in sandalwood.
Talk was of politics, shooting, fishing,
and dubious stories
generating laughter amongst the men.

Cigars at race course,
smoke and racehorse sweat mingling.
Cigars after lunch and coffee
the erotic smell of tobacco leaves
awakening desires.

Cigars enjoyed by old men
remembering younger days,
cigars in large country houses
with sunlit gardens embracing
the scent of gardenias and roses.
Evening dancing with
partners smelling of claret
and Havana cigars.

A time of grandeur
of abundance,

another time.

                                                                                   *

With best wishes, Patricia

 

 

Blue Gingham Dress

                                                                                              Elvis and I

 

 

 

 

                                                                                                  Elvis
 

 

Dear Reader,

Francis gave me a surprise last week.  He made an Elvis lookalike and brought him into the sitting room after supper. He knows that I love Elvis dearly, and always have, and I was wondering why he is, and always has been, so very popular with the public.  I read that somewhere a woman has a record of Elvis that she plays every day and has done so for over forty years.  

Neil McCormick in the Daily Telegraph writing about Adele's latest single says that 'the song and singer deliver a deeply emotional truth from the heart'. And, he argues, isn't that the very essence of what music is, and why it means so much to us?  So why do some voices touch us, our hearts and souls, that no other singer does?  It is certainly a mystery but I am sure it is a gift of some sort from God, or who ever your idea of a Higher Being is. Songs need a voice that can carry emotion and demand attention.  This Elvis did in spades for me and probably for you too.

 

                                                              *

From Gilbert White, October 25th, 1784 in Wiltshire

'Hard Frost, thick ice.  In my way to Newton I was covered with snow! Snow covers the ground, and trees!!'

From Francis Kilvert, October 25th, 1874 in Wiltshire

'A damp warm morning steaming with heat, the outer air like a hothouse, the inner air colder, and in consequence the old thick panelled walls of the front rooms streaming with warm air condensed on the cold walls....The afternoon was so gloomy that I was obliged for the first time to have lights in the pulpit.'

                                                                *

Blue Gingham Dress

She was wearing
a blue gingham dress
long-sleeved, with lace collar
one summer evening in July.

A sweet smell from lilies
lavender bushes
roses and orange blossom
drifted on the air,

the sea sapphire
played its own repetitive tune
soft and enticing
and a southerly wind blew.

Suddenly he took her hand
drew her near
kissed her gently
then came a call,

they separated
ran back to the house
her heart racing
knees weak, on fire.

The gingham dress
worn and faded now,
hangs at the back of the cupboard,
but the kiss is still as fresh
as it was on that one
summer evening in July.

With best wishes, Patricia

Camel

                                                                                          Petra Rose
 

 

Dear Reader,

The poem today was written after I had visited a wild life park near where I live. Of course it is lovely to go and spend the day looking at the animals especially if you have small children with you, but I do wonder about the rights of these animals.  Do lions and tigers, pandas, merekats, camels, and so on really enjoy being caged up all day with no wild places to hunt or go?  I suspect not and, if offered the choice, would love to be back in their natural habitats.  As circuses are now closing, especially if they had performing animals, perhaps in a few years time these wild life parks will be no more.  I would be glad if this were the case.

                                                                                       *

From Dorothy Wordsworth, October 12th, 1800 in Westmorland

'We pulled apples after dinner, a large basket full. We walked before tea by Bainriggs to observe the many-coloured foliage.  The oaks dark green with some yellow leaves, the birches generally still green, some near the water yellowish, the sycamore crimson-tufted, the mountain ash a deep orange, the common ash lemon colour, but many ashes still fresh in their summer green.'

From Gilbert White, October 13th, 1787 in Hampshire

'We saw several redwings among the bushes on the north side of the common. There were swallows about the village at the same time: so that summer and winter birds of  passage were seen on the same day.'

                                                                                        *

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 come 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 haunches
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.

With best wishes, Patricia

Sideburns 2014

                                                                                  Thomas Hardy

                                                                            Thomas Hardy's cottage
 

Will you, dear reader, please excuse a bit of a rant this week.  I bought a book to read called 'Beautiful World, Where are you' by an Irish writer called Sally Rooney.  She seems to be the top author of the times, and this book was well reviewed by almost everyone.  But I found it so completely disappointing.  I have always thought that a novel needs to have a good story, one that you can't wait to get back to whilst washing the dishes. But this book didn't seem to have a good story, in fact almost no story at all.  Just four odd people meandering through the pages talking about themselves and their rather boring lives. But if graphic sex is your thing, then this would be the book for you.  Give me some of Thomas Hardy's work, his clever novels with such interesting characters and wonderful plots, and I won't bother with modern works in future. I know this makes me sound old and boring, not up with the times, but so be it.....

                                                                                        *

From Dorothy Wordsworth, 1800, October 2nd in Westmorland

A very rainy morning.   We walked after dinner to observe the torrents....the lichens are now coming out afresh, I carried home a collection in the afternoon.   We had a pleasant conservation about the manners of the rich - avarice, inordinate desires, and effeminacy, unnaturalness, and the unworthy objects of education ... a showery evening.  The moon light lay upon the hills like snow.

                                                                                          *

Sideburns

Astonished, I see the sideburns
the slicked up hair,
the ill-fitting suit,
large red hands
jolting it back on the shoulders
with awkward gesture
at a young man's funeral
in the village church.
White lilies fill the air
with their sweet scent
while soft music plays.
I see tears on every cheek,
sad young women, and men too -
there to seek some comfort
from the vicar's words.

I blink and thought
I saw Thomas Hardy standing
in a nearby pew,
back in time from his day.
The ancient poet seemed to be
embodied in the blood and lives
of this congregation
among whom nothing has change over the
years,
not the people, nor the service,
and death is still great sorrow.

But there is tea and beer
at the Bull Inn,
gossip and laughter
tears and memories, as
life's cycle keeps turning,
our beginnings and our endings
the only certainties.

                                                                                      *

With best wishes, Patricia