Vernal Epiphany: Guest Poet John Babel

Vernal Epiphany

Its alchemical prestige

Still staggers almost –

Drawing drought’s dried dregs –

It’s detritus and dross,

And by the grey grace of rain

Grasps all the grand and the gross,

And death’s dumb dirge defeated

Made verge vibrant, verbose.

 

River bottom’s ablaze! All butter

And sun,

The hills are a maze of gingham

Waves run

Round pools of coral and bays of

Cerulean

And islands of blush seashell

Swollen and stung.

 

Hidden among the spumes

Of ice mist

Bundles of cattle

Newborn take their rest –

The scissortail sails singing

Over the frost clover crest

And ministering bees

Bless and are blessed.

 

Its alchemical prestige

Works covert, complete:

Draws drained spirit

From death and defeat –

And with poetic precision

Reveals reality raw and replete

With rebirth and renewal –

Crystal, 

Concrete.

 

- John Babel, 4/17/15

What did I tell you? Singing birds. Best poet since Gerard Manley Hopkins, in my opinion. I might be partial. A bit of spring hope in winter.

Guest Poet: Izzy Babel

Me muscles are singing with cider

Me leg bones with whisky are bowed

A drink is far better and colder and wetter

When drunk in a man’s own abode

 

Me chest is all laden with laughter

Me eyes are a’sparkling with tears

The company’s far kinder and cruelty is blinder

When some of your loved ones are near

 

Me tongue is all heavy with good meat

Me stomach is sloshing like stew

A meal is more filling when slowly you’re grilling

That meal for four more men than you

 

Me head is a’wreathed by me pillow

Me body by blankets are bound

A dream is far sweeter and longer and neater

When you’re snuggled up with a hound

 

Me hands are all warm with me mother’s

Me shoulder is held by me da

Though distant and missed, there’s me brother

Who has all me heart, that’s me Ja

- Izzy Babel

The Babel family is just a nest of singing birds. I am happy and proud to be able to publish my nibling Izzy's poem, which I am simply titling "Izzy's Winter Song." The 'Ja' referenced in the last line is Elijah, Kenny and Kaye's oldest. There is no more Babellian line than "Me stomach is sloshing like stew."

To Autumn, by John Keats

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,

   Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;

Conspiring with him how to load and bless

   With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;

To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,

   And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;

      To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells

   With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,

And still more, later flowers for the bees,

Until they think warm days will never cease,

      For summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells.

 

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?

   Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find

Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,

   Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;

Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,

   Drows'd with the fume of poppies, while thy hook

      Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:

And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep

   Steady thy laden head across a brook;

   Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,

      Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.

 

Where are the songs of spring? Ay, Where are they?

   Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—

While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,

   And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;

Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn

   Among the river sallows, borne aloft

      Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;

And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;

   Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft

   The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;

      And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

Italics mine.

Twice Times

Twice Times

There were Two Little Bears who lived in a Wood,
And one of them was Bad and the other was Good.
Good Bear learnt his Twice Times One -
But Bad Bear left all his buttons undone.

They lived in a Tree when the weather was hot,
And one of them was Good, and the other was Not.
Good Bear learnt his Twice Times Two -
But Bad Bear's thingummies were worn right through.

They lived in a Cave when the weather was cold,
And they Did, and they Didn't Do, what they were told.
Good Bear learnt his Twice Times Three -
But Bad Bear never had his hand-ker-chee.

They lived in the Wood with a Kind Old Aunt,
And one said "Yes'm," and the other said "Shan't!"
Good Bear learnt his Twice Times Four -
But Bad Bear's knicketies were terrible tore.

And then quite suddenly (just like Us)
One got Better and the other got Wuss.
Good Bear muddled his Twice Times Three -
But Bad Bear coughed in his hand-ker-chee!

Good Bear muddled his Twice Times Two -
But Bad Bear's thingummies looked like new.
Good Bear muddled his Twice Times One -
But Bad Bear never left his buttons undone.

There may be a Moral, though some say not;
I think there's a moral, though I don't know what.
But if one gets better, as the other gets wuss,
These Two Little Bears are just like Us.
For Christopher remembers up to Twice Times Ten ...
But I keep forgetting where I put my pen.* 

* So I have had to write this one in pencil.

By A. A. Milne

 

Sailing to Byzantium, by William Butler Yeats

Sailing to Byzantium

That is no country for old men. The young
In one another’s arms, birds in the trees
– Those dying generations – at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.

An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.

O sages standing in God’s holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.

Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.

-William Butler Yeats, 1865 - 1939

A Vagabond Song

A Vagabond Song

By Bliss William Carman

There is something in the autumn that is native to my blood—
Touch of manner, hint of mood;
And my heart is like a rhyme,
With the yellow and the purple and the crimson keeping time.

The scarlet of the maples can shake me like a cry
Of bugles going by.
And my lonely spirit thrills
To see the frosty asters like a smoke upon the hills.

There is something in October sets the gypsy blood astir;
We must rise and follow her,
When from every hill of flame
She calls and calls each vagabond by name.

William Bliss Carman, Canadian poet and Alan Rickman look-alike.

John Mouldy by Walter de la Mare

John Mouldy

By Walter de la Mare

I spied John Mouldy in his cellar,
Deep down twenty steps of stone;
In the dusk he sat a-smiling
Smiling there all alone.

He read no book, he snuffed no candle;
The rats ran in, the rats ran out,
And far and near, the drip of water
Went whisp'ring about.

The dusk was still, with dew a-falling,
I saw the Dog-star bleak and grim,
I saw a slim brown rat of Norway
Creep over him.

I spied John Mouldy in his cellar,
Deep down twenty steps of stone;
In the dusk he sat a-smiling
Smiling there all alone.

'The Horns of Elfland'

BLOW, BUGLE, BLOW

by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

 

The splendour falls on castle walls

And snowy summits old in story:

The long light shakes across the lakes,

And the wild cataract leaps in glory.

Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,

Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

 

O hark, O hear, how thin and clear,

And thinner, clearer, farther going!

O sweet and far from cliff and scar

The horns of Elfland faintly blowing!

Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying:

Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

 

O love, they die in yon rich sky,

They faint on field or hill or river:

Our echoes roll from soul to soul,

And grow for ever and for ever.

Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,

Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

The Way Through the Woods

 

The Way Through The Woods

They shut the road through the woods
Seventy years ago.
Weather and rain have undone it again,
And now you would never know
There was once a road through the woods
Before they planted the trees.
It is underneath the coppice and heath,
And the thin anemones.
Only the keeper sees
That, where the ring-dove broods,
And the badgers roll at ease,
There was once a road through the woods.

Yet, if you enter the woods
Of a summer evening late,
When the night-air cools on the trout-ringed pools
Where the otter whistles his mate
(They fear not men in the woods
Because they see so few),
You will hear the beat of a horses feet
And the swish of a skirt in the dew,
Steadily cantering through
The misty solitudes,
As though they perfectly knew
The old lost road through the woods...
But there is no road through the woods!

--Rudyard Kipling, from Rewards and Fairies.

Some One

Some One

by Walter de la Mare

Some one came knocking
At my wee, small door;
Someone came knocking;
I'm sure-sure-sure;
I listened, I opened,
I looked to left and right,
But nought there was a stirring
In the still dark night;
Only the busy beetle
Tap-tapping in the wall,
Only from the forest
The screech-owl's call,
Only the cricket whistling
While the dewdrops fall,
So I know not who came knocking,
At all, at all, at all.

The Fool's Prayer By Edward Rowland Sill

The Fool's Prayer By Edward Rowland Sill

The royal feast was done; the King
Sought some new sport to banish care,
And to his jester cried: "Sir Fool,
Kneel now, and make for us a prayer!"

The jester doffed his cap and bells,
And stood the mocking court before;
They could not see the bitter smile
Behind the painted grin he wore.

He bowed his head, and bent his knee
Upon the monarch's silken stool;
His pleading voice arose: "O Lord,
Be merciful to me, a fool!

"No pity, Lord, could change the heart
From red with wrong to white as wool;
The rod must heal the sin; but Lord,
Be merciful to me, a fool!

" 'Tis not by guilt the onward sweep
Of truth and right, O Lord, we stay;
'Tis by our follies that so long
We hold the earth from heaven away.

"These clumsy feet, still in the mire,
Go crushing blossoms without end;
These hard, well-meaning hands we thrust
Among the heart-strings of a friend.

"The ill-timed truth we might have kept-
Who knows how sharp it pierced and stung?
The word we had not sense to say-
Who knows how grandly it had rung?

"Our faults no tenderness should ask,
The chastening stripes must cleanse them all;
But for our blunders-oh, in shame
Before the eyes of heaven we fall.

"Earth bears no balsam for mistakes;
Men crown the knave, and scourge the tool
That did his will; but Thou, O Lord,
Be merciful to me, a fool!"

The room was hushed; in silence rose
The King, and sought his gardens cool,
And walked apart, and murmured low,
"Be merciful to me, a fool!"

WHAT TOMAS AN BUILE SAID IN A PUB, by JAMES STEPHENS

WHAT TOMAS AN BUILE SAID IN A PUB, by JAMES STEPHENS  

I saw God. Do you doubt it?
Do you dare to doubt it?
I saw the Almighty Man. His hand
Was resting on a mountain, and
He looked upon the World and all about it:
I saw him plainer than you see me now,
You mustn't doubt it.

He was not satisfied;
His look was all dissatisfied.
His beard swung on a wind far out of sight
Behind the world's curve, and there was light
Most fearful from His forehead, and He sighed,
"That star went always wrong, and from the start
I was dissatisfied."

He lifted up His hand --
I say He heaved a dreadful hand
Over the spinning Earth. Then I said, "Stay,
You must not strike it, God; I'm in the way;
And I will never move from where I stand."
He said, "Dear child, I feared that you were dead,"
And stayed His hand.

 

It's Not Turkey Day

 

I don’t know why I seem to be so obsessed with Thanksgiving this year, or to be more precise, with Thanksgiving memories and an aspect of the holiday that is fading away, a process I’ve watched for decades, eclipsed by football, gluttony, and Black Friday as the historical framework became more and more problematic and the faith facet of gratitude just shriveled away. I’ve never been a huge Thanksgiving guy (I think I’ve written the word ‘Thanksgiving’ more in these posts than I have in the last 30 years) but I’ve felt the need to scratch together all my old cultural memories (once more attached to things rather than actual experiences) into one tidy little bundle. To that end, here are three poems connected with the holiday that I’ve known since I was small. “Over the River” started life as a Christmas song and is here slightly abridged. “We Gather Together” was originally written in Dutch and had nothing but gratitude to God, literally giving thanks, in common with our American holiday. I think this will be the last post on the subject for a while. (See how cleverly I avoided writing out ‘Thanksgiving’ again … oh, dash it all!)

Over the River and Through the Woods

By Lydia Maria Child (1884)

 

Over the river and through the woods

To grandmother’s house we go.

The horse knows the way to carry the sleigh
Through the white and drifting snow.

Over the river and through the woods,
Oh how the wind does blow.
It stings the toes and bites the nose,
As over the ground we go.

Over the river and through the woods

and straight through the barnyard gate
We seem to go extremely slow
It is ever so hard to wait.

Over the river and through the woods,
Now grandmother's cap I spy,
Hurrah for the fun, the pudding is done,
Hurrah for pumpkin pie!

Over the river and through the woods,
To grandmother’s house we go!

A Turkey Sat on the Backyard Fence

(Unknown Composer & Date)

 A Turkey sat on the backyard fence
and he sang a sad, sad tune.
 
Thanksgiving Day is coming 
Gobble, gobble, gobble, gobble
and I know I'll be eaten soo-oo-oon,
 
Gobble, Gobble, Gobble, Gobble, Gobble, Gobble, Gobble
I don't like Thanksgiving Day-ay-ay.
 
Gobble, Gobble, Gobble, Gobble, Gobble, Gobble, Gobble
I think I'll run away-ay-ay.

We Gather Together to Ask the Lord’s Blessing

(Adrianus Valerius, 1597; tr. by Theodore Baker, 1894)

 We gather together to ask the Lord's blessing;
He chastens and hastens His will to make known;
the wicked oppressing now cease from distressing.
Sing praises to His name, He forgets not His own.

 Beside us to guide us, our God with us joining,
ordaining, maintaining His kingdom divine;
so from the beginning the fight we were winning:
the Lord was at our side- the glory be Thine!

 We all do extol Thee, Thou leader triumphant,
and pray that Thou still our defender wilt be.
Let Thy congregation escape tribulation;
Thy name be ever praised! O Lord, make us free!

The Ghost Kings

                           

 The Ghost Kings by Robert E. Howard

 

The ghost kings are marching; the midnight knows their tread,
From the distant, stealthy planets of the dim, unstable dead;
There are whisperings on the night-winds and the shuddering stars have fled.

A ghostly trumpet echoes from a barren mountain head;
Through the fen the wandering witch-lights gleam like phantom arrows sped;
There is silence in the valleys and the moon is rising red.

The ghost kings are marching down the ages’ dusty maze;
The unseen feet are tramping through the moonlight’s pallid haze,
Down the hollow clanging stairways of a million yesterdays.

The ghost kings are marching, where the vague moon-vapor creeps,
While the night-wind, to their coming, like a thund’rous herald sweeps;
They are clad in ancient grandeur, but the world, unheeding, sleeps.

I first read these verses in an issue of The Savage Sword of Conan when I was in high school. While I never thought it was great poetry (it lacks a satisfying ending, for one thing) I always felt there was something there, if only an evocation of a mood. Howard was reaching, perhaps for some parity or just a comparison with other weird poets like Clark Ashton Smith. There are some days in fall (and the end of this day is one of them) when The Ghost Kings come treading through my mind, and I think he just maybe achieves good poetry when the mood is right.