Poetry Blog No 167 Two Birthday Sonnets

                                 
           

TWO BIRTHDAY SONNETS

All poetic forms can be considered, in some respects, constrictions. That is, they require the following of a certain set pattern. However, paradoxically these very restrictions can lead to further creativity. The English or Shakespearean sonnet form illustrates this. It is composed of three quatrains (Rhyming scheme abab, cdcd, efef) and a finishing couplet (g,g). All lines are iambic pentameter (unstressed, stressed syllables five times). Because of this form you are challenged, as it were, to express the thoughts or theme of the poem in a more elegant and imaginative way. The first section (abab) tends to be given to the first statement of the theme, the second a further development and the third a penultimate conclusion or an antithesis (opposing the trend of the first two) and the couplet sums up the conclusion (it too can be an antithesis). All this leads to an imaginative elaboration of the theme that can add unexpected depths of meaning and feeling. 

 

A BIRTHDAY SONNET, LATE-SENT

Late thought's a shame-faced messenger, distracted

By idle pastimes from his path, though sent

Before the vital drama was enacted,

Arriving useless after real event.

It is a tardy, last, fast-fading flower,

That winter prophecy of dawn's first frost

Cold-withers, robbing radiance and power-

The blossom of it purposed beauty lost.

Yet willing message sent, however slow,

Was once intended good, before time's doom;

And even fated, final flower may show

Some moment's shining splendour in its bloom.

     Likewise, well-wishes, out of time, may be

     Still meant from heart, in late sincerity.

 

 

SONNET -Time and the Lion Sun

(for a Leo)

Now out upon the boundless heights of sky,

As winter warms to southern spring, once more

Great golden lion looks with solar eye

To tell time's way flows from all-being's core.

For that deep song, far being's melody,

Is endless in the endless yearly rounds,

Evolving ever, life's forever tree,

Whose leaves are singing of these secret sounds.

And if our song seems but a bounded rhyme,

We think on you, oh, royal lion-sun,

On how your time is still the human time,

For time and timelessness at heart are one.

      Our phoenix time is one with this- deep sound

      Of your eternity's great singing round.

 

Poetry Blog No 166 Rowing on a Lake

ROWING ON A LAKE

Most of the verses here have four feet per line and each stanza follows the form idea of the "Chinese Sonnet- "The usual Chinese poem is four lines. The first line contains the initial phrase; the second line, the continuation of that phrase; the third line turns from this subject and begins a new one; and the fourth line brings the first three lines together. Quote from http://deoxy.org/koan/88

Though there are no rhymes there are sound patterns of assonance and alliteration in the lines. For example- Chill breezes ruffle restful waters (alliteration the r sound is also in breezes) or the assonance of "eye" vowel sounds in Brave white high-riding over grey.

The lake in question was Narrabeen Lake in Sydney many years ago.

ROWING ON A LAKE 

Chill breezes ruffle restful waters;

Thick clouds dissemble a dome above.

As we leave shore a lone gull cries,

Brave white high-riding over grey. 

Green ripples push against the prow.

Seen-thin in sinuous, far prayer for fish,

A cormorant gives grace unto

The comic bobbing of a buoy. 

With sudden multitudes of drops

Rain-mist greys distances and patters

Wide patternings of growing rings

Upon the surface of the lake. 

We row toward land and sheltering trees

And beach on dark-grained sand and trudge

Into the centre of the centre island

And gaze upon the black shape of a dredge. 

So seeing the heart of the lake invaded,

We shrug and turn back to return

And row across rain-bubbled waters

Back to the streets from which we came; 

Back to the buildings and the buses,

Back to the shops and highway noise.

Away, away, we leave but carry

In image living nature-

Sand, earth and water;

Lake and sky. 

Fossicking Poetry Blog No 165

FOSSICKING

calcite rose

This poem is a small celebration of the wonders of stones and minerals. It refers to some pottering around in a basalt quarry- rocks that are remains of the erosion of a large volcanic area or caldera in the Northern Rivers region of NSW. When the volcano finished it's eruptions about 20 million years ago, it had risen to a height of over 2 kilometres, and layers of lava and ash had been deposited over its outward slopes, to a diameter of about 100 kilometres. http://www.bigvolcano.com.au/natural/wollum.htm

chalcedony

A couple of terms that may be unfamiliar to some-

FOSSICKING- Australia and NZ - searching for gold

or precious stones in abandoned workings, rivers, etc.

To rummage or search for (something)

POTHOLE A hole or pit, especially one in a road surface. 

red jasper

volcanic glass (obsidian)

FOSSICKING

Here's a hole in green hill's flow:

Bare, official gulf in grass,

Where they've blown up earth and dug;

Crushing rocks to heaps of rubble,

Dusty piles of small, grey stones-

Spread as gravel to resurface

Long and pot-holed, country roads.

Here's a patch for plundering,

Searching Vulcan's ancient store,

Fossicking for fragments forged

In the far past fires of the earth,

In his long-since vanished furnace.

Just for pleasure in the seeking,

Peering all around the place,

We go searching for earth beauty,

Buried far from sight and light.

Just for seeking as a pleasure,

We go smashing bits from boulders

In the massive mounds of tumbled rocks,

Finding what deposited and formed

In the fissures of the basalt.

And hidden, they are here:

Bright tiny treasurings-

A calcite rose: a fadeless flower

With centuries in petals; a great

Smooth egg of dark volcanic glass,

So hard and sheer, so sharp if shattered.

And scattered here and there, there lie

Red shards of tough, sleek jasper;

Or shimmering, light fragments

Of bubbled, waxy-white chalcedony;

Or best, a hollow of clear calcite crystal,

Once buried far from light, in stony starkness,

Now finding day to glitter with its shining peaks-

As if some distant star-gleam leaked

The forms of pure light into the solid darkness.

calcite crystals

Poetry Blog No 164 By the Highway

BY THE HIGHWAY

From time to time in life we experience heightened moments that are yet moments of peace where our inner vision of life seems to connect with the more archetypal and universal feelings and truths. One use of poetry I believe is to try to evoke something of such experiences when "the better self awakes in us" (Goethe). The following poem is about the feeling and sense of such a moment while taking a break from driving on the NSW tablelands. The lines are in iambics of varying length, mostly with rhymes.

BY THE HIGHWAY

While of a time long-travelling

the way through higher lands

I stop by gravel highway side

to stand on legs, relax my hands.

Above me now I'm noticing

how cloud wisps drift on, white and wide,

in thin and winter wind on high.

Dark trees on slight hills cluster on

the cold, blue edges of the sky,

remote from browning paddocks where

sparse grass is leaving patches bare.

Yet all the air

is cool and clean.

I'm taking in

clear distances of world

across the stillness of the scene

and for a moment know

a peace with where I am,

a peace with where I've been,

a peace with where I go.

The following version of the poem in German has been created by Franz Tieber of Vienna who has kindly given permission for it to be pasted on this blog. This is the first time I have ever had a poem translated and re-imagined in another language.

An der Landstraße

Auf Hochland während langer Fahrt
auf einem Kiesbankett -
auf Beinen stehn, und lockern noch
die Hände, macht Ermüdung wett.

Und Wolkensträhnen über mir,
die weit als weiße Fracht so ziehn
dem dünnen Winterwind voran.

An zarten Hügeln zeigt das Glüh´n
des Firmaments die Bäume dumpf,
fernab von kargen Matten leert
der Schwund den letzten Gräserherd.

Die Luft so kühl,
so gänzlich rein.
Ich grenze ein
mein Selbst nunmehr zur Welt,

da über dieser stillen Flur

ich augenblicklich seh,

was Frieden ist im Hier,
ein Frieden für das „War“
und einer für mein Ziel.

Poetry Blog No 163 Orpheus

 

"Orpheus Leading Eurydice from the Underworld" by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

ORPHEUS

 Orpheus surrounded by animals. Ancient Roman floor mosaic, from Palermo

The legend of Orpheus is particularly attractive to those in the arts as all would wish their art had the sort of magical power attributed to his music.

Orpheus was a legendary musician, poet, and prophet in ancient Greek religion and myth. The major stories about him are centred on his ability to charm all living things and even stones with his music, his attempt to retrieve his wife, Eurydice, from the underworld, and his death at the hands of those who could not hear his divine music. As an archetype of the inspired singer, Orpheus is one of the most significant figures in the reception of classical mythology in Western culture, portrayed or alluded to in countless forms of art and popular culture including poetry, film, opera, music, and painting. From Wikipedia

The mysticism attributed to Orpheus was also a powerful influence on Greek life and through that ultimately on European culture.

The Orphics were an ascetic sect; wine, to them, was only a symbol, as, later, in the Christian sacrament. The intoxication that they sought was that of "enthusiasm," of union with the god. They believed themselves, in this way, to acquire mystic knowledge not obtainable by ordinary means. This mystical element entered into Greek philosophy with Pythagoras, who was a reformer of Orphism as Orpheus was a reformer of the religion of Dionysus. From Pythagoras Orphic elements entered into the philosophy of Plato, and from Plato into most later philosophy that was in any degree religious. Bertrand Russell 

 

Orpheus (left, with lyre) among the Thracians, from an Attic red-figure bell-krater

ORPHEUS

There was a singer once they say;

None ever sung as he could sing,

And none could ever, ever play

As he upon each singing string.

The world would hush when hearing him,

All listen in their stillness, even

The winged inhabitants of heaven

Would follow him; wild beasts of prey

Would lie before his feet in peace.

Great, leaf-proud trees would gently sway;

And all would wish him not to cease.

His lyre had but seven strings,

Like seven planets wandering

The deep and starry-sounding sky.

And it was said of him as well

Even the three-faced hound of hell

Was lulled by his soft lullaby.

And in the song that he would sing

Lived deeper truth of everything,

As he would sing of deeper showing

From life to life to grow to light...

And all that's seen by sightless sight,

And all that's heard in silent knowing.

And he would play and he would roam,

And when he sang soft winds would moan,

And all things dreamt of their lost home.

Will ever any sing such song?

For he has gone now- he has gone. 

Orpheus with the lyre and surrounded by beasts (Byzantine & Christian Museum, Athens)

 Orpheus with the lyre and surrounded by beasts (Byzantine & Christian Museum, Athens)

Poetry Blog No 162 Apollo

Apollo

Myth and mythical figures are, I believe, more than stories. They can give us imaginative and living experiences of truths. We can imagine ourselves, for example, as a "being" of light- shining the spirit light of our awareness on all around. This piece tries to embody this in simple and direct verse.

APOLLO

Apollo, with his shining sight

And his gold-bright bow,

Rode upon the sun's broad glow

And shot the dragon of dark night

With his dawning shafts of light.

So may that power be in our sight,

So may that power be in our souls-

The power of spirit light.

So may clear seeing

Glow from our being-

As a sun

Into the dark,

Like a sun

Within each heart.