National Poetry Day in the UK

It was National Poetry Day today in the UK and I've waited until - almost - the midnight hour to post my contribution to this nationwide celebration. Regular readers of this blog know that I don't need any excuse to upload poems. Poetry in my view is the subversion of prose and therefore the overthrow of what could otherwise be a lineal narrative. And the three works I present to you tonight bear witnesses to that statement.

Sujata Bhatt was born in India in 1956. Her first three books of poems were published to wide acclaim by Carcanet between 1988 and 1995. The text below was taken from 'Augatora', a Poetry Book Society Recommendation, that frst saw the light in 2000. Sujata's poems have the capacity to take the reader to both real and imagined landscapes and it was this peculiar trait that made me choose this poem as one of my presents to you tonight.

The Woman They call Abuela

Eighty-six-years-old or maybe
eighty-nine - She doesn't know herself
and couldn't care less.

She still works in her field
beside the beach -
Where the sand ends
her field begins -

The Atlantic Ocean rushing through her mind -
She plants potatoes - keeps a duck
to eat the snails.

Thirty-seven years a widow -
Dressed in black, of course -
long socks, black and heavy
even in the heat.

The other day she lifted her skirt
to marvel at her thighs
her young girl's skin white and firm
and untouched by the sun -

She laughed.

The woman they call abuela -
her voice threaded
sharp with the Andalusian wind -
all these years the noise of the ocean
crashing within her ears - white roses
cover the trellis in her garden.

Thirty-seven years a widow -
She watched Franco's men ride by:
Moroccan mercenaries took over
the bunker in front of her house -

And she watched Rafael Alberti
back from exile
walking by her door -

All these years the noise
of the ocean now breaking
now lulling within her ears -

One of the wonders of the blogosphere is the amount of talent one comes across. I sometimes resemble a lonely rambler roaming from blog to blog, soaking up either their take on a classic piece of art or their own personal contribution to the world of muses and fauns. And Dave from Pics and Poems is no exception. I make sure to pay him a visit at least twice a week, if not more, because he always has interesting subjects on which to debate. Dave is also a marvellous poet, one of those wordsmiths who makes one wonder whether there's a limit to the use of language by humans. Fortunately, there isn't, and when you read the poem below you will understand why. To me it is a very honest and sincere ode to nature and how patient it has been with our excesses, but also in this gem of a poem there lies a cautionary message: mess up with Mama Natura at your own peril. Many thanks, Dave, for allowing me to reproduce your work.

On Turning Over a New Leaf

When the apple tree turned over a new leaf
it began producing plums.

When the pear turned over a new leaf
it brought forth grapes instead.

When the cherry turned over a new leaf
it found acorns on its branches.

When The Book of Life turned over a new leaf
a skeleton crawled out.

When the woods turned over their new leaves
a million tiny creatures saw the sun.

When these turned over the dead leaves
the dust and ash beneath began to smoke.

When humankind turned over its new leaves
it took leave of its senses

and not until it turned again the old leaves
did the trees bring forth their true and ample fruit.

My last offering tonight comes from a poet derided by the Tory press in his time as part of the Cockney School of Poetry. John Keats' sensual imagery, more specifically in his odes, put him on a par with both Shelley and Byron, two other exponents of the renowned Romantic movement.

To Autumn.

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.

Next Post: 'Sunday Morning: Coffee, Reflections and Music' to be published on Sunday 11th October at 10:00am (GMT)