A blog about Poetry

The cat long since departed from my feet and, my god daughter not yet awake in the house next door, silence fills my home – disturbed only by the tapping of my fingers on the keys of a laptop balanced precariously on the dictionary I keep beside the bed (how else to quiet the lexical koans that intrude at 3 in the morning?). Beside me, from an assortment of books, poems stare lifelessly up at the ceiling or, if the spine not yet broken by impatient hand, gasp for breath, face down into the bedclothes. Words start their unsteady journey from my tangled thoughts across the screen that replaces “Dickensian” candle and quill.

I pause and, turning note scribbled pages (“merde”!) of Keats, dip once more into a poem of my youth:

“And Madeline asleep in lap of legends old.”

It is of course impossible for a girl to sleep in the lap of a legend ... or so we like to think! But there she lies and has always lain, a pre-Raphaelite, gorgeous goddess, adored for ever in alexandrine order.

Order? But surely has not poetry always been the means of escaping the “order” of the disordered world into which I have found myself? Order requires rules, regulations, religion, templates and obedience. Order requires clothes, buildings, streets, employment. Order requires, seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, and years - a lifetime of routine. And yet I seek a place into which I can flee and indulge in the loveliness, weep in awe of the depth of peace and spirituality, or silently cry at the high emotion or gut wrenching ghastliness of this – yes, ordered too, world.

Poetry also requires order and in it is to be found the ordered (metrical) art of all seasons, the ordered (rhythmic) craft of all races, people of all shapes, sexualities, colours, sizes and in its ordered substance, Poetry fashions and tempers through an often eloquent rhyme, a sword of thought, of spirit and truth with which to, at times and with mathematical precision, cut down the disorder of our minds and the world around us.

“Freedom, Freedom, Prison of the free!” – wails Lawrence Durrell. He could have been describing Poetry.

Blank or free verse mostly holds little for me: in its particular disorder are to be often found the un-fettered and, un-resolved, doodling of an undisciplined artist. The voice is noise rather than music and the thoughts as a consequence little more than the tenuously connected words often seen in a power-point Mind Map.

In the brevity and complexity of a haiku, the ordered repetition of a villanelle, or the questionable humour of a clerihew, rules and order dictate the form through which the poet skilfully crafts thoughts, observations, feelings and stories from words.

Ah, there’s the rub of it: words!

What would poetry be without words? Words, language, communication. The screen scribbles a green line underneath that last sentence. Intrigued, I press the computer’s Help key and the anonymous sage within Microsoft advises me: “Fragment. If the marked words are an incomplete thought, consider developing this thought into a complete sentence by adding a subject or verb or combining this text with another sentence.” He (the author has to be male, surely?) then provides the following examples: “Instead of ‘Meteors the entire night’ consider ‘We watched meteors the entire night’."

Indeed! In that fragment on meteors are the music, evocation and poetry of the universe; in that sentence, a rather dull evening spent in the company of a group of cardigans watching planets.

And so, having offended my (genuinely) very dearest friends through whose binoculars and telescopes I have gratefully watched, in absolute awe, the differently configured constellations of the Aborigines in the Australian Outback, and those of the ancient Greeks in clear skies over Palm Springs, my fingers return to the keyboard as this blog seeks conclusion. “Madeline” next door wails the new day to life, the cat returns from his dawn patrol, stares critically at the books strewn where he had lain earlier and with a deep sigh, curls up and closes his eyes. The day has begun . . .

The Icelandic Volcanic Fall-out

The Press is of course having a field day: "they took our cash and repaid us with ash," etc etc. The story's origins? The eruption of a volcano that has put paid to all air travel for the passed few days, and which looks likely to continue well into next week.

Inconvenienced, we've all forgotten the impending election, the outrage caused by the British Airways's cabin crew strikes and over-looked the appalling loss of life last week caused by an earthquake in a remote corner of China.

My partner sits in Vienna, colleagues are stranded in Portugal with their families and, in Poland, the funeral of a President has to proceed without most of the world's heads of state as none can fly to Warsaw.

In short: we are all very focussed on how we are being inconvienced by this natural event.

There is though a far greater inconvenience just waiting around the corner to blow our complacency to the four winds: man-made, man-denied, climate change.

Like the denial of the horrific events of the holocaust by people living almost on top of its ovens, we in the West are today blind to the catastrophy we are overseeing with our politics, our consumerism, our fossil carbon burning and excessive consumption. It's somebody else's fault - if it is indeed happening. We are just by-standers. What can we do? we aren't in government. Oh the list goes on.

When I was doing my apprenticeship in horticulture we didn't use peat or peat-based soil mixes; we used John Innes 1, 2 or 3 mixes that we made ourselves by hand. The compost element (aka humus and soil conditioners) were of properly made and screened compost from our own heaps of green waste. Today we have DEFRA and other government departments ringing their hands at the their failure to cut the use by the horticultural trades and public. Ban it! Ban the extraction, the sale and the importation of it and any product tainted by it (Russia is a popular alternative source it seems). Force the industry and gardeners to behave responsibly. Use the current "fad" for Grow Your Own to instill a real awareness of the value of knowing where your food comes from,  how much better it tastes if not produced in a factory, and how important it is to do things properly for the sake of our children's and our neighbour's world ...if not our own.

It won't just be a lonely Polar bear being photographed in future: it'll also be the last Inuit Indian and close behind them will be the Western photographer who set out to warn us - but was ignored.

I'm loving the plane-free skies over London: the quiet gives me a chance to hear some of the sirens so easily drowned out by our growing carbon footprint. 

A day in the life of my job

My day started with the composition of a fairly lengthy response to a petition about dangerous dogs in parks.

That done, it was a quick drive out into the parks in the north of the borough. There I encountered a number of elderly folk walking their dogs and enjoying the milder weather. London is water-logged at present and there's more rain yet to come. The parks are flooded in places.

As with dogs in parks, I'm responsible for the excessive rain water in the roads and gardens surrounding the parks and yesterday afternoon was spent carefully rebutting allegations on that front too!

   Little Wormwood Scrubs 25th February 2010 

Following the tour of some of my own parks, I travelled by bus into Westminster to look at Green Park and then Hyde Park. Both are Royal Parks Agency sites, and are faring no better than ourselves at present from what I could see.

I find the dull, weather and damp at this time of year extremely depressing ... yet bumped into a colleague standing in the light rain this afternoon - absolutely delighted and literally soaking it up. How sad he must be in a hot, dry summer!

Shadows

I am currently reading "Out of Shadows" by Jason Wallace.

We went to the same school, but he was there some years after I had finished. His book, in part in the mould of "Stalky and Co" by Rudyard Kilping, is a brave attempt at portaying a fictious series of events involving public school boys in Zimbabwe. The vast majority of his readers will not, I fear, have the slightest knowledge of his subject matter and consequently be baffled by it all.

I must confess to feeling let down by the book. In part I suspect because of the constantly injected tension between characters that just reads false, and political views that were the very antithesis of the school and the parents who chose to send their children there. There was never an admiration for Ian Smith and there always were considerably more black and brown faces amongst the pupils than is suggested by the book! The other irritation is one of style: the dramatic suspense added to the closing sentences of chapters referring to unfortunate incidents to unfold later ... after the third or fourth I started skipping over them!

However those faults aside, I have enjoyed indulging myself in the mix of Shona and Afrikaans words that I recognise from my boyhood vocabulary, the descriptions of the bush and mention of places such as Monkey Hill, where the school flag was flown. I'd forgotten about the Matebele ants and devil thorns - goodness they hurt if you trod on them!

On the bullying of "squacks" by House Prefects and others, I also have a problem: have I, in adulthood, excised painful memories? Were we bullied? I don't think so! Yes, there was the odd scrap and some boys were indeed taunted and made to feel pretty rotten at times, but generally those incidents were isolated; furthermore, if anyone in authority became aware of them, all hell let loose! This story, though suggests an endemic culture of violence which is unfortunate.

The main protagonist yearns to be in England: surely then he would have been aware of the strong links between Peterhouse's house system as well as studies (Toyes rooms) and Winchester?

Missing from the story too, are Tri-colour and Bi-colour - the unique Peterhouse (Haven School in the book) - punishment meted out for minor misdemeanors. It involved writing out a text in very faint pencil and then going over it neatly in ink using a different colour ink for each letter. It took hours!

However, besides all of that: I have started more books than I care to speak of and consequently on a purely technical level am impressed by Jason's completion and ability to have this difficult story published. For me the strength of his writing is not so much in the story but his ability to evoke very strong memories of political and social events that we both lived through.

If you know this period of history in Zimbabwe, or grew up there: you may enjoy reading this book. However, if you didn't - expect to be very confused.

The Robinsons

I give notice that I am aware that a woman whose vicious out-pourings on gay people etc is in the gutter (undergoing psychiatric help) and that her husband has been forced, temporarily at least, out of office on account of his failure to declare what he knew of her financial dealings with her (former) nineteen year old, lover. Needless to say, both are politicians. She has said she will step down within days (after negotiating her golden hand-shake and pension?) and he has taken six weeks' leave of absence.

My desire to be more compassionate in my dealings towards others prevents me venting what I really feel at present about the demise of the Robinson duo ....  I am hopeful that now that they are really down, they start to appreciate the meaning of the word.

Away from Northern Ireland and Westminster they may indeed find time enough to reflect on what led to their unplanned early departure and why so many are content to see them suffer.

Is Compassion A Good Thing? revisited

In August 2009 I wrote a short blog on my response to the Scottish Government's handling of the Libyan convicted of the Lockerbie bombing.

Today I transcribe in full the Charter for Compassion that I have copied from the TED site:

"The principle of compassion lies at the heart of all religious, ethical and spiritual traditions, calling us always to treat all others as we wish to be treated ourselves. Compassion impels us to work tirelessly to alleviate the suffering of our fellow creatures, to dethrone ourselves from the centre of our world and put another there, and to honour the inviolable sanctity of every single human being, treating everybody, without exception, with absolute justice, equity and respect.
It is also necessary in both public and private life to refrain consistently and empathically from inflicting pain. To act or speak violently out of spite, chauvinism, or self-interest, to impoverish, exploit or deny basic rights to anybody, and to incite hatred by denigrating others—even our enemies—is a denial of our common humanity. We acknowledge that we have failed to live compassionately and that some have even increased the sum of human misery in the name of religion.

We therefore call upon all men and women ~ to restore compassion to the centre of morality and religion ~ to return to the ancient principle that any interpretation of scripture that breeds violence, hatred or disdain is illegitimate ~ to ensure that youth are given accurate and respectful information about other traditions, religions and cultures ~ to encourage a positive appreciation of cultural and religious diversity ~ to cultivate an informed empathy with the suffering of all human beings—even those regarded as enemies.

We urgently need to make compassion a clear, luminous and dynamic force in our polarized world. Rooted in a principled determination to transcend selfishness, compassion can break down political, dogmatic, ideological and religious boundaries. Born of our deep interdependence, compassion is essential to human relationships and to a fulfilled humanity. It is the path to enlightenment, and indispensible to the creation of a just economy and a peaceful global community."

Wow - such a simple, unifying idea whose time must surely have come!

Communicating in 2010

A recent exchange of emails with my brother in Cairns, Australia, has brought into fairly sharp relief how communications have changed in my limited life time.

As a child on a farm in Karoi, Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), I can remember the huge excitement that followed a telephone call from the local telephone exchange advising my mother to be ready, sitting beside the telephone on a particular date and at a specific time, in order to "take the call" booked in Edinburgh by her brother. The phone would ring and then, before the two could chat to each other, there would be literally minutes of different exchange operators talking to one another to set up the link: Hello Salisbury this is Karoi - I have Karoi 44126 on the line.... Hello Pretoria, this is Salisbury - I have Karoi 44126 on the line.... Hello Cape Town ... and so on."

The farm's telephone was on a party line which meant not only that we could hear every telephone being rung (each had a unique ring) but neighbours could, and sometimes did, pick up their handsets and listen in to other people's conversations. How that irritated my parents!

When I first came to the United Kingdom the first port of call was always a Post Office in order to send a telegram: arrived safely ... and then after that all communication was by letter. There's a stranger!

When I was doing my national service in the Rhodesian army as a signaller I loved to tune in late at night and listen to radio hams chatting to each other around the world: how I envied their distant, exotic sounding locations and ability to chat to each other!

Now I keep in touch by email - from a laptop using wifi, or a BlackBerry. Or even by SMS on my mobile telephone (my sister's favourite method of keeping in touch).

And it's all so incredibly fast, effectively free and not reliant upon anyone with a face - just a piece of equipment and network that is maintained probably by an army of de-humanised IT experts who have replaced the ladies in the telephone exchange (or the neighbours listening in). Progress - huh!

And then there are my Blog and Twitter sites (if you really want to know what I'm up to, you'll find me there )...

A very selective Christmas message?

I must confess to be starting to lose track of modern Christianity: on top of the Swiss referendum result to ban more minarets being built (see a minaret and become Muslim? - that doesn't sound too logical ...), the outrage at a lesbian being elected as a Bishop by her diocese and the deafening silence from the Archbishop of Canterbury and Pope on the legislation (and hatred) being written into Ugandan law this week against gay people who will now face the death penalty (as will anyone associated with them).

We are reminded constantly of the declining numbers attending church services, assailed with requests to remind ourselves of the true meaning of Christmas and yet have the collective leadership seemingly silent on the real message of the gospel, namely: "love, forgiveness, conviviality, community, healing and freedom from demonic preoccupation"*(THOMAS MOORE: WRITING IN THE SAND).

You cannot help but wonder what Christ would have thought!

Bring a still, calm voice, to the Garden . . .

“And behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind tore into the mountains and broke the rocks in pieces before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake;

12 and after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice.

13 So it was, when Elijah heard it, that he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood in the entrance of the cave. Suddenly a voice came to him, and said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” 1 Kings 19:11-18 (New King James Version)

Last year we visited Venice. It is a deeply spiritual place – not just because of the intensely atmospheric architecture and juxtaposition of buildings and sky with the lapping waters of the canals and sea, but also the sheer scale and number of churches. In one such church I was deeply moved by the singing of a catholic priest as he started an afternoon service for visitors with a rendition of “All people that on earth do dwell” (the Old One Hundredth in Anglican parlance).

A few weeks ago we had the privilege of observing Buddhist monks leading congregations in prayer in Kyoto, and again, it was the singing from the front – the person leading the service – that captured my spirit and sent me soaring on a spiritual high!

Since then I have been exploring the internet for more evidence of what Thomas Moore has described as “Zen Catholicism” (see Writing in the Sand). There is plenty, and all of a sudden my fascination with the symbolism and purpose of the Zen Gardens of Kyoto, the role that they play and why they are suddenly so attractive to an enquiring western mind such as my own, has come crashing together in a noisy cacophony of thoughts and ideas much as poor old Elijah must have had to deal with in his mountain side cave. (Did Elijah exist? I don’t care – if he did, that’s great; if not, his story is suitably apocryphal to explain to what I am currently experiencing: oh for a still, quiet voice, and calm!)

In my recent, limited, readings on Zen and Christianity, I am starting to recognise a universality in their paths, their messages of love and peace, their explanations on where to find the Kingdom of God and so on. It does not matter one iota whether we are brought up as Buddhists, or Christians, or Muslims or Shintoists! All seek the same relationship with God, all seek to better Mankind and, if Zen is about thinking deeply about religion and the nature of all things (quite apart from just Man), then we can all can learn from it!

In the bustle of everyday life we never seem to find the time, or the place, to sit and be quiet, to listen to the still calm voice from within: and if we do, the noise from our own minds comes crashing in with everyday concerns and worries. Zen Buddhists use devices such as “koans” (answerless questions – “mu” - and intensely deep ideas to ponder) and gardens on which to focus their minds as they practice the emptying of trite and everyday concerns from their minds as they perform “zazen”.

Jesus said, "If your leaders say to you, 'Look, the (Father's) kingdom is in the sky,' then the birds of the sky will precede you. If they say to you, 'It is in the sea,' then the fish will precede you. Rather, the (Father's) kingdom is within you and it is outside you. When you know yourselves, then you will be known, and you will understand that you are children of the living Father. But if you do not know yourselves, then you live in poverty, and you are the poverty." The Gospel of Thomas.

What am I doing here?

How poor, am I!

Kyoto

My first visit to Japan has proven to be an absolute triumph. Not only do I have a massively higher estimation of the Japanese people - all of whom I found extremely polite, helpful, courteous, but also of their culture and outlook on life. It would be impossible to gain anything but a minuscule of knowledge in the week or so that we spent in Japan ... but wow! what people, what a place, what a culture!

The greatest highpoint for a gardener was obviously the temples and gardens of Kyoto.

I found myself every day trying desperately not to say: things have better as the trip unfolded. With the benefit of several hundred photographs (500+) and distance, I can confidently point out "equal bests" from every day, and that has been gratifying. Jeff and I saw so much and yet there remains so much to see. At the end of this blog is a list of the sites dipped into - and I mean dipped as we wanted to see as much as we could in preparation for, yes, a return visit soon.

Whenever I visit a new gallery or museum, I try to glance into every room in order to get the flavour of the place. I then reflect and return to maybe three or four rooms or galleries for a more studious visit. And so it was and will be with Kyoto. So what impressed me:

The cleanliness - My God how clean is the whole of Japan? It's amazing.

The spirituality of the people - particularly in Kyoto. In one of our guide books it made light of the reverence of the Japanese for their Shinto and Buddhist roots and said that these were no longer of importance. Where-ever we went there was clearly a very strong observance of religious ritual and while I accept that these two traditions are inter-observed by most or many Japanese, I can see no wrong in that: they are clearly acknowledging what I believe is a universal fundamental to all religions. Somewhere in the root of all the world's faiths can be found the truth! The smell of incense, the rich tones of the Buddhist monks leading people in prayer through the day; the shrines along the paths and roads or in gardens; the dressed statues of Buddha; the Zen gardens and their abstract spirituality encouraging a moment if not life of contemplation - all these are the heady essence of a living faith.

The gorgeousness of the colour in the autumn sunlight - even the few cherry trees still in leaf brought something to the mix of Acers and Ginkgos, the reds, golds and pale yellow tree leaves against which the moving palate of green mosses and grasses contrasted in sumptuous compliment with each other. To that could be added the blue sky, the unseasonal warmth of the sunlight and the bird song in some of the temple gardens. Magic.

The artifice and art of both the gardens and beautiful Ikebana flower arrangements. The amazing topiary and shrub pruning. The symbolism of every element used in the design - the significance or meaning of of which I could only hazard a guess.

The War Memorials - not just to the Japanese dead and missing from the Burma Campaign in which my father fought but all so to the Unknown Soldier of the World in Worlds War II. We were there when the Allies remember their dead - 11th November - how poignant to reflect upon the sacrifices and bravery of the enemy of my parents' generation. What an opportunity for personally re-appraising the futility and ghastliness of warfare - man upon man.

The amazing food - we didn't see sushi once - but we had some amazing tempura, sashimi, tepenyaki, kaeseki ...

The Bullet Train ride between Tokyo and Kyoto. Looking out of the train window at Mt. Fuji with its snow-dressed cap.

Oh, and did I mention the Americans? When we returned to the Okura Hotel in Tokyo at the weekend, the Obama delegation had taken over a wing of the hotel (the Embassy is located right next door). A little over the top on the number of policemen , secret service agents from both countries and airport style security screening ...

So where did we go?

Nijo Castle and grounds.

Arashiyama: Togetsu-kyo bridge; Tenryu-ji; Bamboo forests; Kameyama Koen; Okochi Sanso Villa (a private garden); Jokakuko-ji; Gio-ji (fantastic moss garden); Adashino-nembutsu-ji; Atago torii (lovely old thatched roofs).

Northern Higashiyama: Tenju-an (Zen garden); Konchi-in (Zen garden); Nanzen-ji; Kotoqu-an; Eian-do; along the philosopher's walk to Honen-in and Ginkaku-ji (Zen garden with the Mt. Fuji structure).

North west Kyoto: Kinkaku-ji (the Golden Temple; Ryoan-ji (possibly the most famous Zen garden, war memorial to Burmese campaign).

Southern Higashiyama: Taini Neguri (where we entered the absolute darkness of the womb of the Bodhisattva); Kiyomiza-dera; Ishibei Koji (spectacular side street); Ryozen Kannon (war memorial to all unknown soldiers killed in WWII); Chion-in (the Vatican of Buddhist complexes in Kyoto); Shoren-in (spectacularly decorated rooms over-looking a lovely garden.

Daitoku-ji: A huge complex of working temples into which we went: Daisen-in (Zen Garden); Ryongen in (a 400 year old Camellia - the oldest in Japan?); and finally Koto-in (a sublime Zen garden amongst others and impressive Ikebana display).

SUMMER, SAISHO-IN

The evening bell, solemn and bronze

in the grandfather temple down the hill,

sounds dimly here.

Slow beat of the mountain's heart, perhaps,

or determined pulse of pine tree (gift of the birds)

growing out of the crotch of the slippery mountain tree.

All one, perhaps - -

bell, mountain, tree . . .

and steady cicada vibratto

and little white dog

and quiet artist-priest, carver of the Noh masks,

fashioning a bamboo crutch, symbol of strength, symbol of concern.

All cool under nodding crowns of the vertical forest,

all seeking this place,

all finding in this place - -

hidden yet open to all - -

the spirit in the cedar's heart.

(Anon)

___ ___ ___

Verse seen at the entrance to Saisho-in: a small, Eighth Century Buddhist temple in a mountain gorge near Kyoto.