When people have something special to say… I mean something special, important, something that requires that extra dimension, whatever that may be, they sit down, try to concentrate, and write a piece of what they call poetry.
Poetry isn’t like prose. Prose can be like poetry, but poetry cant, indeed mustn’t, be like prose, otherwise where would that special importance come from?
The average person trying to produce that desperately important poetry has a problem. Chatting over a cup of tea is normal, swapping silly stories over a pint of bitter, or a port-and-lemon down the pub is easy enough, but writing a letter to aunty to thank her for something you didn’t want in the first place is not so easy. And when it comes to writing something special, what can you do? You dont want ordinary words. You need something that stands out. You need something that says something over and above what the words appear to say. How can you make those words say what you want them to say? How can you make them imply all sorts of special little things that you want them to imply? You want those words to convey something important. You want the words to disclose more than they are usually able to convey.
How do you do it?
You cant. You have never thought of words, and how they get their meanings, and how secret meanings can be prised out of those words. You’re stuck. You need help.
Let me quote you something I wrote many years ago which maybe explains what I am trying to convey.
For the first time in my life I need to say something
but cannot speak
all words fade without meaning
they line up ready to speak
but not a single word has anything to say.
I was facing a coffin which contained the deserted body of my wife.
A couple of weeks earlier my daughter was going to visit Annabel in hospital. We knew she was near the end. I desperately wanted to say something to her and knew this would be the last thing I ever said to her. I struggled desperately to put the whole of me, the universe, and everything into those final words.
I ended up writing three apparently pointless lines. I am told that Annabel read them and smiled. Those three lines worked. She smiled a reply. There’s something special in that.
That’s poetry.
Most of what is presented as poetry these days is merely poorly written prose. Most of what is presented as poetry these days gets poetry a bad, indeed a very bad, name. It’s a turn-off to say you write poetry. It’s a turn-off to advertise a poetry reading. Who goes to poetry readings except die-hard optimists?
It doesn’t have to be like that. I may not be able to teach you how to write real poetry, to uncover secret meanings in collections of words, meanings that touch the soul, but I can try.
I mentioned above not being able to find words that would say the things I wanted them to say. I even wanted to find words for things I didn’t know I wanted to say, because so far I hadn’t come across such words. Eventually I wanted to say something, even if it wasn’t something Annabel would be able to hear.
This is the result. It’s some sort of composite. Part story, part description, part apology, part hunting for something.
She Falls Asleep
There is an audio version of this poem on my Youtube channel. Here is the link:
I'm sitting on a bed
puzzled
thirty years ago I pushed away a pile of records
on the floor by the dansette
old records of
old music
the symphonies of Beethoven, Mendelsohnn and Brahms
dismissed with a wave of the hand
old hat
“Dont you have something better?
dont you have music by someone who's alive?"
I lean back against the bed
watching the girl with the long fair hair
as she shuffles records
and plays The Rolling Stones
The house is old
the floor is wooden
floorboards slightly twisted
black with knots
she leans back against me
I put my arms around her
squeeze her breasts
as we listen to the songs
so long ago
Now I’m sitting on a bed
puzzled
There are half a dozen records
old records of
old music
the symphonies of Beethoven, Mendelsohnn and Brahms
For over thirty years she's lugged these silly records from room to room
worn smooth
or did she never play them?
There is no record deck.
Did they carry some secret?
Was there some tiny speck of Annabel embedded in these things?
I turn them over.
Thirty years and here they are in an almost empty bedroom.
I look round the room.
There is the bed,
the cupboard,
the wardrobe,
a carpet on the floor,
and a low window looking out to the street beyond the tree.
This is where she stayed for years
locked in some struggle with another woman
grimly unhappy
dying in jerky stages.
Why do the records puzzle me so much?
I put them down.
Maybe they were the first things she really made her own.
Here in my hands are Annabel's first real choices as a growing girl,
and last week she had them still
on her dressing table
in a room without a player.
Three years ago she stood in my bedroom
touched the bed and smiled
giggled at my pictures
remembering when she painted them.
I put my arm around her enormous waist
and squeezed a little
trying to imagine who she was.
Was there somewhere inside this mass
the little girl I used to play with?
Her hair feels full of sand.
It's re-grown so many times.
Her bottom's vast
I could write a book of poems on its acreage,
yet the voice is Annabel's.
I close my eyes.
There is a slender girl
in a field on a summer day
she bends to watch a butterfly
long white tights
into a tiny patch of black lace
and a bright red miniskirt;
she skips over the grass towards the hedge.
Is there somewhere inside this massive carcass of disease
that little girl?
She comes again to see me
and sits in the garden.
Is she dreaming?
Is she in there still?
I dont know what to say.
I find her body so repulsive.
Inside the disease is multiplying,
always pushing outwards
and yet so many years ago we two
grew up together
fast and violent
happy and sad
confused and determined
and wrote ourselves across each other's bodies
Now we have nothing to say
But Annabel is saying things inside herself
as she sits in my garden
staring dreamily at the lake.
She has a camera, and
with slight smile
she focuses
and paints a picture in trees and water
which she hangs upon some inner wall.
For days she comes
dreaming back across so many paintings.
She sitting in my garden
me working in my study.
And then she leaves a sheaf of poems.
"You'll know when to read them."
The next time I see her she is coughing in the church.
I make a rude remark
no quarter given
we grew up together
we will always be together
I am talking to you
loud across the crowd
I know you hear me
for really
no-one else is here.
She cannot walk
what can I do?
I wish…
I wish so very much I could take her with me
to sit beneath an orange tree in the sun,
to sit under a thin curved moon
so much like the curve of hair across her face
where the mountains are dark
and curve against the midnight blue
and the dogs bark on the dark terraces
and the scent of orange blossom drifts on the cool night air
and the bright yellow light streams from the cottage window
and somewhere in the east
the small sea breathes
as a wave suddenly turns over against the sand
while above
so many stars have come to tell your fortune
If only I could take you to sit in your painting
where once we slept all night
and woke
with orange blossom in our hair.
I reached to pick a golden apple
placed it between your breasts
and back in your studio
you painted our wonky little house
with the light shining out thru the grove of oranges
to prove to all the world that things are made of magic.
But she is frightened
and doesn't want to see me
This time she knows she cannot fight.
For the first time in my life I need to say something
but cannot speak
all words fade without meaning
they line up ready to speak
but not a single word has anything to say.
I pace about
frantically searching for some meaning that will be a bridge to join us
but every word I use
crumbles at the sight of death
I will send her an empty sheet of paper.
No words on it,
but it came from me.
I screw it up and throw it on the lawn.
I carefully craft a silly song,
three lines long
It is the last thing I shall ever say to you.
It is utterly meaningless
but you will understand.
and my daughter said you smiled.
Is that really you Annabel
in a narrow box on wheels?
I look about the room
but cant feel you anywhere.
I read your tiny poems to the congregation
and wonder who the girl is,
then turn,
stare at the box
"safe journey Annabel"
and wonder if you're going anywhere.
The box disappears behind a curtain
taking your half of me.
I walk about my rooms.
I dont miss you because you'd left so many years ago
it's just that so many pieces of me now
no longer work
and I cannot help but talk to you.
I draw the curtains,
turn and mutter about going to bed.
I think i heard you say you wanted to finish your painting.
You are kneeling on the floor, a brush teasing some paint.
I bend down, look over your shoulder
draw two fingers thru your hair like a paint-brush
pushing the paint about
then go to bed
and fall asleep.
You will always be here while I am here
the part you left behind
and I must take good care of you
because it's me.
And one day
when I am dead
you too will fall asleep.