{"id":7535,"date":"2018-08-28T15:14:18","date_gmt":"2018-08-28T15:14:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.therialto.co.uk\/pages\/?p=7535"},"modified":"2023-03-21T16:33:47","modified_gmt":"2023-03-21T16:33:47","slug":"a-two-poem-blog","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.therialto.co.uk\/pages\/2018\/08\/28\/a-two-poem-blog\/","title":{"rendered":"A two poem blog"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here is one of my favourite poems from the current issue (No. 90), of the magazine<\/a>.<\/p>\n

CATFORD CYCLING CLUB RACE THROUGH ASHDOWN FOREST<\/strong><\/p>\n

The normal fawn-coloured morning
\nis scored through\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 with a fast-moving<\/p>\n

artery of red
\nthe jerseys of young<\/p>\n

bearded men on a mission \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 to sinew
\na hipster oil-slick\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 of black lycra\u2019d thighs<\/p>\n

flick-flacking
\nthrough the Sussex countryside<\/p>\n

free-wheeling down
\nJib Jacks Hill to Duddleswell
\nswarming wide\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 then thin\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 from six-abreast \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 to one<\/p>\n

backs rounded \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 numbered bingo balls
\nchests bright as a worm of robins<\/p>\n

arses as black
\nas the black-faced Forest sheep.<\/p>\n

Jill Munro<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Ann and I were on holiday in France at the end of July, staying down near Bordeaux, and there happened to be a television on which I could watch the day\u2019s highlights of the Tour de France (quietly sophisticated broadcasting by ITV). A very complicated spectacle, involving large numbers of cars and motorcycles surrounding and chasing along with the cyclists pedalling up and down hills at great speed, competing for positional advantages measured in seconds. Anyway it reminded of this delicious poem by Jill Munro.<\/p>\n

Some readers find this open style of poetry disconcerting, and it was overused in the 1960s by poets stridently claiming to be breaking with the past. But handled well, as here, it works. In cycle racing there is the constant movement forward of the peloton and the constant movement within the peloton, cyclists moving through the peloton or falling back, shielding one another or breaking free at the front. Formally the poem mimics this, with words bunching together and then stretching apart. Line 11 in particular illustrates this, with its ending, \u2018to one\u2019 so far from the beginning of the line as to be almost lost to sight (something I noticed happening as I watched the televised race). \u00a0 The poem is also full of words evoking motion, \u2018swarming\u2019, \u2018free-wheeling\u2019, \u2018flick-flacking\u2019, \u2018fast-moving\u2019, \u2018scored through\u2019.<\/p>\n

This poem does a number of the things that I like to see in poetry. As well as finding a form that fits the content it has great concision; the title, for example, tells us exactly who the poem is about (it\u2019s the Catford club – and by the way look how those five \u2018Cs\u2019 resemble the hooped backs of cyclists) and that they are racing, and they are in Ashdown Forest (precisely located, a large area of heathland and trees in Sussex, within cycling distance of the south London suburb of Catford) (famous as the location of A.A. Milne\u2019s histories of a toy bear). Some of the trees are pines, which seems to me to add clarity to line 7\u2019s \u2018flick-flacking\u2019. There are many roads in the Norfolk Brecks lined with Scots pine and if you stand to one side and watch traffic moving \u2018flick-flacking\u2019 is exactly what you see. Brilliant word choice, evoking both the zoetrope and those slightly grubby flick books we all had or craved after in the 1950s.<\/p>\n

The sense of a precise place is also present in line 10, \u2018Jib Jacks Hill to Duddeswell\u2019. And here I want note another thing in the list of things I like to see in poetry, surprise. Unless you are a resident of either place I imagine the names are, as they are to me, a surprise. The poet is writing from a connected place, knowing the landscape. The reader is drawn in by the oddity of the names (as well as by the alliteration of the \u2018Js\u2019 and the repeated double \u2018l\u2019). English place names can be very expressive \u2013 remember Adlestrop.<\/p>\n

Jill is good at surprise. There\u2019s the first line with its \u2018normal fawn coloured morning\u2019. I don\u2019t recall ever seeing a morning so described, but we have that neat juxtaposition with \u2018normal\u2019. Clever. And then there\u2019s the description of the cyclists. They\u2019re not just any group, they are a particularly cool lot, \u2018young\/bearded men on a mission \u00a0 \u00a0 to sinew\/ a hipster oil-slick\u00a0 \u00a0 of black lycra\u2019d thighs.\u2019 (I met a colleague the other day who told me he\u2019d joined a cycling club \u2018for the exercise\u2019 and because he liked wearing lycra: cyclists are Beau Brummell\u2019s heirs). Coleridge said something about poetry being \u2018the best words\u2019: \u2018hipster oil-slick\u2019 fits that category for me \u2013 I don\u2019t quite know what it means and at the same time I know exactly what it means. But the best surprise is line 11, \u2018chests bright as a worm of robins\u2019: its a line crying out to be stolen, I\u2019d hug myself for delighted days if I\u2019d written it. Not only do robins like to eat worms there\u2019s the sinuous linkedupness of worms, segments moving together, there\u2019s the famous cheerfulness of robins, there\u2019s \u2018chests\u2019 not \u2018breasts\u2019 (\u2018robin redchest\u2019, imagine!) and there\u2019s the word \u2018worm,\u2019 which also signifies \u2018dragon\u2019. (Yet another suspension in the writing of this as I search youtube for Owen Branigan singing \u2018The Lampton Worm\u2019 sometime in the 60s). This is such emotionally and intellectually intelligent poetry.<\/p>\n

My delight in this poem extends to the last lines \u2018arses as black\/ as the black faced forest sheep\u2019. Poetry colleagues will know that I can be quite fierce about assonance and alliteration, conceitedly confident as I am that use of them doesn’t necessarily constitute poetry. But these lines work, possibly because the Emperor\u2019s New Clothes child voice in me has always wanted to say something about the proximity in the peloton of faces to buttocks, definitely because the \u2018ars\u2019 \u2018as\u2019 \u2018as\u2019 and the \u2018ack’ \u2018ack’ \u2018ace\u2019 sounds work together. (The ack rhyme occurs five times in the fifteen lines). Also sheep-watchers will know that these animals, when they decide to go somewhere in a hurry, move very like the cyclists\u2019 peloton. Also there\u2019s \u2018fawn\u2019 in the first line and \u2018sheep\u2019 in the last line. And so on.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

The second poem I want to write about is the first one in Matt Howard\u2019s collection Gall<\/em><\/a> (The Rialto, 2018, page 9).<\/p>\n

A JAR OF MOLES<\/strong><\/p>\n

I have trawled the whole city for your gift,
\ntrusted the knowledge of black cabs to bring you this \u2013
\nit is quite full, so be careful of its weight.<\/p>\n

The man couldn\u2019t say how many it contains,
\nsimply that it\u2019s full because it has to be,
\njust as a true heart only ever brims with love.<\/em><\/p>\n

Each side is crammed with quiet wild faces,
\npink snouts clear from their maze of dark chambers;
\nsee, this one here still bares its teeth.<\/p>\n

The labouring velvet behind blown glass through decades
\nand where one man made that emptiness
\nanother has worked hard to fill it.<\/p>\n

So take these moles darling, with my love,
\nhold them safe, and away from the sun,
\ncherish each heavy earth-swimming hand.<\/p>\n

Matt Howard<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I first came cross this poem at the Aldeburgh Poetry Festival. Matt was one of the poets chosen to take part in the Sunday morning poetry Masterclass, an event that The Rialto gladly sponsored on and off for many years (latterly I suggested they change the name of the event but no one came up with a politic improvement). The audience were handed printed sheets with the poems to be read and worked on. This poem struck me with astonishment, and it still does, a definite WTF moment. An extraordinary title and my heart was in my mouth for the poet as I thought that here might be a poem about to go horribly wrong. But it doesn\u2019t: what we have is a sure footed and accomplished love poem, a Gothic romance maybe but a brilliantly worked thing.<\/p>\n

The title<\/em><\/p>\n

Of all the unlikely things to find in a jar it\u2019s hard to think of anything odder. But then you have to remember that \u2018jar\u2019 has other meanings. Google comes up with<\/p>\n

\u2018to have a harsh or unpleasant effect on someone or something: to hit or shake (something) forcefully: to make (someone) feel uneasy\u2019. (Merriam- Webster)<\/p>\n

I\u2019d suggest this is very relevant to the poem. Also, literally, a jar is a container, and this too is very relevant \u2013 a poem is a structure to contain. My memory digs up from the 60s Cleanth Brooks and The Well Wrought Urn.<\/em><\/p>\n

First stanza<\/em><\/p>\n

The previous poem has fifteen lines openly organised to convey movement: this poem\u2019s fifteen lines are closely organised in tercets, a form which gives a number of options, one of which, as here, is a self contained beginning, middle and end. (Another option would be a couplet which uses the third line as a link to the next tercet, etc.).<\/p>\n

One (of the many) things I like about this poem is its breath (I was going to say breadth), the pace of it. Listen to the wide vowels of the first line \u2018have\u2019, \u2018trawled\u2019, \u2018whole\u2019, \u2018your\u2019. They slow your eye\/voice down. Particularly with the \u2018w\u2019s and \u2018l\u2019s of \u2018trawled\u2019 and \u2018whole\u2019 which link to the same consonants in \u2018knowledge\u2019 in the next line.<\/p>\n

So, \u2018trawled\u2019 is an interesting choice. It not only sets the pace of the poem, it has implications of content and procedure. I know that with modern methods the fishing industry has a good idea of what the content of the trawl will be, but the word has not lost its older sense of surprise, of never knowing what will be in the net when you haul it up \u2013 an Orford Merman? a bottle with a message? a coelacanth? Clearly the narrator didn\u2019t set out to find a jar of moles. Or did he? \u2018trusting the knowledge\u2019. You can\u2019t, by the way, become an official London black cab driver until you have demonstrated that you have \u2018the knowledge\u2019, an interior map of everywhere in the city and how to arrive there.<\/p>\n

A complete poem<\/em><\/p>\n

Another of the things I like about this poem is the skill with which it\u2019s been tied together: \u2018trawled\u2019 is the third word in the poem, the penultimate word is \u2018swimming\u2019, in the second line there\u2019s \u2018black cabs\u2019 and in line eight \u2018dark chambers\u2019, in line three there\u2019s \u2018full\u2019 which is repeated in line five and reinforced in line 12 with \u2018fill\u2019. And there are other words that express fullness, \u2018brims\u2019 and \u2018crammed\u2019. And \u2018careful\u2019 in line three ties to \u2018safe\u2019 in the penultimate line. And \u2018with love\u2019 in line three ties with \u2018with my love\u2019 in line 13.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no difficulty involved in reading the poem; it is syntactically orthodox, the word choices are apt and admirably clear – you don\u2019t need to resort to Google (or your dictionary) for definitions. There are genius phrases, \u2018quiet wild faces\u2019, \u2018maze of dark chambers\u2019, \u2018heavy earth-swimming hand\u2019. (By the way if you suspect \u2018hand\u2019 as anthropomorphic, go look at a mole). But the more I read it, the more sure I am of its complexity.<\/p>\n

The key (or a key) to the poem has to be these two lines in the second stanza (poet\u2019s italics)<\/p>\n

simply that it\u2019s full because it has to be,
\njust as a true heart only ever brims with love.<\/em><\/p>\n

Two assertions, the first is very matter of fact, the second takes wing and becomes, in the context of a poem ostensibly about a jar of dead creatures, astonishing. Poetry does this, I think it\u2019s part of \u2018poetic licence\u2019: it trundles along and then makes seemingly incontrovertible assertions (\u2018My true love hath my heart and I have his\u2019)(\u2018Beauty is truth, truth beauty\u2019) the logic of which we take as truth as we read them. \u2018A true heart only ever brims with love\u2019, must surely be so, though I didn\u2019t know it, had never thought it before \u2013 personally being more drawn to the notion of love flowing and overflowing. But yes, \u2018brims\u2019 has a modest stoicism to it, a status of readiness and fullness that is immensely likeable \u2013 lovable in fact.<\/p>\n

Stanza three<\/em><\/p>\n

Returns ostensibly to the accurate description of the jar and contents, but look at the line endings, \u2018wild faces\u2019, \u2018dark chambers\u2019, \u2018its teeth\u2019, and put them into relationship with the italicised previous line. Containment yes, possibly only just though.<\/p>\n

Fourth stanza<\/em><\/p>\n

Again in the first line of the stanza Matt uses open vowels to slow the poem\u2019s pace \u2013 \u2018labouring\u2019, \u2018blown\u2019. \u2018Velvet\u2019 reminds me of the ancient Jacobite toast, \u2018To the velvet gentleman\u2019, the mole who dug the hole that tripped the horse that threw king William III and caused his death. Possibly irrelevant to a reading of the poem. What is relevant to Matt is the attention in this stanza to work. Matt values physical labour; there\u2019s a vital section in Gall called \u2018Blackwater Carr\u2019 where he describes working to clear a piece of\u00a0 neglected land. I commend it to you. One of the poems in the section, \u2018Crome\u2019, has been chosen by Mark Cocker as a preface to his new, important, book, Our Place. Anyway, this stanza balances the preceding one, we have the moles and then we have the what and how of what the humans have done with them. I think the stanza is also a comment on relationship and on the process of writing a poem.
\nFinal\u00a0 stanza<\/p>\n

The last three lines return us to the start of the poem and to the presentation of the \u2018gift\u2019. And, by the by, the initial throwaway \u2018So\u2019 is cheeky, implying that the intervening lines have explained everything, whereas they\u2019ve raised more questions than answers. But the three lines do tie the poem up, the gift is given, with further instructions for its care. The moles, in death, need to be kept out of the sun, much as they stayed in the dark when they lived. (And maybe much as we are in the dark about the characters of the narrator and the beloved?) We are also reminded that the giver is expressing \u2018love\u2019. The word \u2018heavy\u2019 in the final line ties in with \u2018weight\u2019 in the third line of the first tercet. The physicality of the moles is again emphasised with the brilliant image of their being equipped to swim through the earth.<\/p>\n

Conclusion<\/em><\/p>\n

I found this a very satisfying poem to read; it\u2019s skilfully written, it weaves together clarities and obscurities, and it gives me a new way of thinking about love. I also found, writing about both poems, that I\u2019d mislaid something of my love of poetry, the jump for joy of it, in the process of triage that has to take over when I\u2019m reading for the magazine. Looking at these two poems has provided very salutary pleasure.<\/p>\n

As I was ruminating on Matt\u2019s poem the phrase \u2018a box of sweets\u2019 drifted into my mind, as somehow a parallel to this jar of moles. The internet helped me correct myself (\u2018of\u2019 is of course \u2018where\u2019) and to remind me that the context is these four lines by George Herbert.<\/p>\n

Sweet spring, full of sweet days and roses,
\nA box where sweets compacted lie;
\nMy music shows ye have your closes,
\nAnd all must die.<\/p>\n

The seventeenth century Metaphysical poets, who were considered weird and dark, until the twentieth century discovered they are marvellous, had two main themes \u2018Momento Mori\u2019 (be aware of your death) and \u2018Carpe Diem\u2019 (live all you can). Jill Munro\u2019s cyclists are definitely joyfully seizing the day. Matt Howard combines both themes.<\/p>\n

Michael Mackmin<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here is one of my favourite poems from the current issue (No. 90), of the magazine. CATFORD CYCLING CLUB RACE THROUGH ASHDOWN FOREST The normal fawn-coloured morning is scored through\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 with a fast-moving artery of red the jerseys of young bearded men on a mission \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 to sinew a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":7361,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[204],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7535","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.therialto.co.uk\/pages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7535","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.therialto.co.uk\/pages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.therialto.co.uk\/pages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therialto.co.uk\/pages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therialto.co.uk\/pages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7535"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.therialto.co.uk\/pages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7535\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7539,"href":"https:\/\/www.therialto.co.uk\/pages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7535\/revisions\/7539"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therialto.co.uk\/pages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7361"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.therialto.co.uk\/pages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7535"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therialto.co.uk\/pages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7535"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therialto.co.uk\/pages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7535"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}