The first winter was a long dark winter
After my first wife died: so
I wrote poems. I’ve lived it
Every word of what I tell.
A walk through the cornfield
Lose myself on a lovely day
The corn sways every way.
There’s not many remember a skylark song
I do and women cry for it.
Poetry is written in all ways
I’m a simple country bloke, I spell
The heart.
On a hail-y night in a winter farm
Shut my eyes and I’m there in the storm.
Shut my eyes and see
Taurus the Bull: how his horns shine bright
How The Plough stands out with great form
Shivering and quivering with great delight
How the moon shines on the hunter’s gun
And when we run
You’re beside me on the river in the summer sun.
Neil
Phil writes:
We are entwined with memory. The memory of our parents, school days, a dreaded teacher, a first kiss, a marriage, a child, a death. How we carry those experiences and use them to understand the world — well, let’s just say that’s a life’s work.
The poem above came out of a conversation about this balancing act. When is memory too much of a burden? When is forgetting too much of a loss? During the phone calls that have sparked the start of many of the Necklace of Stars poems, I keep a writing pad by my side. In this particular case I jotted down the conversation and read it back to the speaker. We talked about it and he thought it needed a bit of “twitching” and some polishing too. He suggested some rhymes, hooting with laughter at my Southern accent as I read the lines back to him to check them. Here it is now, twitched and polished. It’s not completely his poem and not mine, it’s somewhere somewhere between the two.
A Necklace of Stars has led us into the night time, the time of dreams, illuminated with stars. It’s easy to get lost in the night, but for all of us, the stars help us to find our way. If you look for them, they’re here in this poem, shivering and quivering with great delight.
Today’s blog was written by Philip Davenport, arthur+martha.
A Necklace of Stars, is supported by Arts Council England, Arts Derbyshire, DCC Public Health and Derbyshire County Council Home Library Service.
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