Dear Dad, There’s just so much I have to tell you, Just so much that I have seen… …Dear Sis, I hope you’re keeping well, I’m keeping fit and fed and clean… …My darling Anne, Oh how I miss you still, I hope your married life is good… …My best mate Dan, And all the lads a’t’mill, Is there someone else where I once stood ?… …Dear Mum… …Mijn lieve Klara… …Bonne-maman… ….A Seán, a chara… …Take these words, they’re all we’ve got, They’ll cross the sea as we cannot… …Cari saluti… …Bester grus… …Todo mi amor… …Mit einem Kuss…
The sea is wide, my son, so wide, And the wind is free, so free – The sea is long to the other side, And the currents strong on the Westward tide. Don’t tarry here because I cried – Your boat is at the quay.
The land is big, I hear, so big, The boat is small, is she – But you must leave aboard this brig, To seek out better roots to dig. I know you won’t return, my sprig – You won’t return to me.
Tomorrow is this daily poetry adventure’s second anniversary, and have I got a treat for you !
Several years ago, a friend of mine was devising a piece of amateur theatre which I stage-managed, based around the laying of the first ocean-spanning telegraph cable in 1858. His work was pretty experimental, but he had wanted it to be a musical of sorts and there were a couple of songs in it. All of which got me thinking about writing a sequence of lyrics around the topic, a sort of soundtrack album to a film that never got made.
I should mention that that first cable failed after only three weeks and had to be replaced in 1866, but don’t look to these poems for too much historical detail. There’s some, but it’s not a documentary. And anyway, it’s dramatically more satisfying to imagine it as a single event with a false dawn and speedy follow-up.
So, starting tomorrow and continuing over the subsequent twelve days I present to you the The Transatlantic Cable !
The game goes on, despite the news, Despite the empty stands – No pre-match build up now, of course, No captains shaking hands. With silence as the coin is tossed, But not born of suspense – Then the ref’s whistle deafens But you couldn’t call it tense. The sound of boot-on-ball And teammate calls are very clear Even from the back row, Has the action felt so near ? Except, from our separate sofas On this long, long afternoon, They might as well be playing On the far side of the Moon. The empty seating does not care What happens down the wing And though the cameras catch it all, Their ops don’t want to sing. Like a stand-up cracking belters in rehearsal To an empty hall, The elephant in the stadium’s Not trumpeting at all. A goal is barely celebrated, No-one’s bellicose – Their tackles are half-hearted, They’re unsure of getting close. A pigeon pecks the touchline And the players work their shift – As if the world has changed the channel, Cutting them adrift. It all feels rather academic, Pondering the score – For does a lonely goal still count If no-one’s there to roar ?
New to the village then, hey ? Ah, the cottage of old man Beck. All that garden in the way ! Well, good luck keeping that in check…
Tell you what, let’s take a gander, Milk and two spoons, lovely, cheers. Of course, it used to be much grander – But gone to seed for donkey’s years.
These flowers like potatoes… Nightshade ? No, it’s bittersweet. Oh, don’t look so relieved mate – Those are just as deadly if you eat.
What’s that, you hope to keep some bees ? I really wouldn’t, were I you – Cos when they pollinate all these, It turns their honey deadly too !
Now here’s a fine old holly tree, Though he could do with quite a trim. Yes, he’s a he – a male, you see, You’ll get no berries out of him !
Your buddleia is running free, In crumbled mortar, rotten sills, And, yes, between your slates, I see. Pretty flowers, massive bills !
And stonecrop on your gable-end – Hanging mid-air, what a champ ! But best to hoick it out, my friend, For room for roots is room for damp.
I see you’ve last year’s veg galore, All overgrown and moulted. Too late to shut the greenhouse door, Your cabbages have bolted.
Your bindweed bullies ev’rywhere, Insinuating strangling strands While its triumphal trumpets blare – A cheeky chap with wand’ring hands.
A shame about the knotweed, though, And ragwort too ! And bracken fronds, And ivy, nettles, thorny sloe, And duckweed choking off the ponds.
This hemlock – best not touch it, natch – All snowy-flowered, poison-flecked. Much like your giant hogweed patch With last year’s corpses still erect.
Your wild tobacco’s quite a hit, And morphine poppies look a treat – Oh don’t sweat guv, they’re quite legit – Though weed-out all your weed, toot-sweet !
And are those shrooms I see in spawn Between the death caps ’neath the trees ? And fairy rings across your lawn, And stinkhorns flavouring the breeze.
But say, your dandelions roar ! A joy, a golden-yellow sea, And ev’ry year, there’s more and more – Old Beck would brew the leaves for tea…
Speaking of which, is there more in the pot ? Well, can’t stand jawing round here all day. I’d say you’ve got one hell of a plot, To keep you busy for many a May.
detail from The Veth Sisters by Jan Veth, remastered with FaceApp
Heavy Canvas
The modern portrait comes in many gazes – Some are staring at us, While others ponder into space – And profiles never even know we’re there. But the thing that most amazes Is the thing we barely suss, Until the aggregate of faces Steals upon us what it is they share:
It is their air of serious concern – The weight upon their brows, Their watchful eyes, Their level lips. These sitters sit unblinking, deep and stern, In ranks of frowns and scowls, And endless masks of empty guise Through which their boredom slips.
They’re pictured well, each grave expression, Well enough to find them in a crowd – And yes, they entertain us for a time, For all their dour style. So portraiture’s a serious profession, Justly resolute and proud – And yet…can it be such a crime To sometimes paint one with a smile ?
On the Inability of many Victorians to adequately append to their Dissertations such short and succinct titular Benamings as would better serve their weighty Publications without exposure to crucial Details of sundry Devices and Plots thus delineated by which the presumed Reader is disprivileged and their subsequent Enpleasurement undersated.
To comment that Nature is always in balance Is viewing it just in the shortest of terms – Infact, as the countless extinctions all show How the strong will go on, and the weak will just go. For Nature exploits with its various talents, From predator apex to parasite worms, With no thought for planning or smoothing-out quirks – And the law of the jungle is ‘whatever works’.
Like the tusks of a babirusa Or a peacock’s sexy tail, Nature will often fail through greed – And as for the losers, let them all bleed !
From ancient bacteria breathing out oxygen, Right upto elephants knocking down trees, They do it regardless, they live for today – And the balance keep shifting, and life finds a way. So don’t think of Nature as perfection’s proxy When plague-rats are swarming with some new disease – For humans could not be more nat’ral, in truth, When Nature is selfish and red in the tooth.
Like the cheetah and gazelle, It’s an arms race to the bottom The tree of life is rotten through With its endless fascination for the new.
But warnings are warnings – why must we resist them ? We still haven’t learned not to piss in the wadis – We poison ourselves when we poison our neighbours – The stables need cleaning, but nobody labours. And sure, we are smart, but we’re part of the system – For just as our thoughts are a part of our bodies, So bodies are Nature, and Nature is us – As perfectly nat’ral as cancer and pus.
Like the lemmings booming and busting, There’s too many of us, however clever But Nature’s balance is never still – And if we can’t fix it, other life will.
A survey sought to sample us Down to a thousand souls – I was never questioned though, So others filled my roles. But who were these individuals Standing in for me ? I always hoped to be unique, Not cloned so easily ! Am I nothing more than maths, A mindless analogue ? Am I so predictable, A predetermined cog ? Probably. With seven bill’yon-odd, The odds are high, All thinking they’re alone, like me – Statistically shy.
Rhyming Couplets 